My Venn Diagram

If my dream lifestyle were a venn diagram this is what it would look like. I was thinking about current trends and desires and this is what I reduced it down to, it's a kind of thick stock, a gravy of my woodland dreams....




.....Ok I'll shut up now as I'm turning into captain random. I'm off to bed to dream about tree houses, open fires, guitars and owls...zzzzzzzzzz.

I'm in love (again)..

Spring is finally in the air and after an inspiring chat with a lovely friend who shares my love of all things caravan and outdoors, I had to share this beauty with you, click on the pic to see the whole flickr stream...

All we need now is the smell of matches and camping gas, bring on summer!

Proper camping

We abandoned the festival we were meant to go to, for all it's noise, people and sensory overload (get enough of that with my busy life) and instead found a farm in the peaks to pitch up.

Our only neighbours were sheep (and a lot of sheep poo!). The facilities included a tap and a porta loo. The views were just stunning and I had a proper feel of nature and being at one with the land. I saw herons, swallows, rabbits and voles.

I also got a bit Ray Mears and went Ferral. I think I missed my vocation and should have been in the SAS. I come from generations of forces families and I only realised this weekend that it must be in my blood!

Top 5 Proper Camping activities:

Fire building
Setting up camp
Cloud spotting
Drinking round the campfire with good friends
Wittling sticks with your knife - pointless but fun.

I have an ambition to try Hardcore Camping where you build your own shelter in a wood and live off the land. One day.

One thing it did make me is a green warrior - you realise how much crap you create as a human. I made a vow to cut down on plastic, packaging, chemicals and unneccessary 'stuff'. When you live that basically you realise what you actually need and it really isn't that much. I'm also going to use biodegradable cello wrappers and vegetable inks for my cards in future.

In the meantime here's the view I woke up to every morning.