Just joined today.
I grew up in deepest, darkest Yorkshire 40-odd years ago, so my friends and I spent our school holidays exploring for miles around, getting dive-bombed by swifts in barley fields, unsuccessfully trying to trap rabbits, similarly trying to make bows and arrows (they always broke), making Tarzans over disused millponds, baking spuds on fires and generally doing things parents today would be utterly horrified by. We loved it. Not an adult in sight.
Now I live in Birmingham and have an 8 yo daughter that seems to have inherited my childhood love of nature and bush craft. She's already made a lean-too shelter, fire from a ferro stick and steel and nettle tea. She's caught carp (but put them back), mackerel (which we barbecued and ate) and crabs (too small to eat), She's even tried tracking wild ponies from their poo and prints in Sutton Park.
Now, she's desperate to try wild camping, which I haven't done since I was 14, though I still have my 1940's canvas ex-army 2 man tent (and I still swear it's better than anything made of nylon, even with the beetles that creep in).
A couple of years ago I bought a caravan to ease her into camping and she loves it but it's quite a jump for an 8 yo to go from a shower, loo, cooker, fridge and heating to a holiday in a canvas tent in the woods. So I have a plan...
Use the caravan as a base camp, find a land-owner with a bit of forest and a stream, get permission to camp and see how she gets on in a tent in the woods for a day or two. Any problems, we break camp and head back to the caravan and maybe head off to a lakeside or seaside caravan park for a less wild break.
Now, all I have to do is find a suitable small, quiet forest and an understanding farmer not a million miles from Brum.
I'm happy to do a lot of legwork in preparation but if anyone has any suggestions of locations or contacts, I'd be very happy to hear them. South Wales, Derbyshire or anywhere within 100 miles would be good but I'm not going to drive to Scotland to do it.
So, that's us and what we're hoping to do this year
In the meantime I'm going to have a good look round the forum to see what I can find!
I grew up in deepest, darkest Yorkshire 40-odd years ago, so my friends and I spent our school holidays exploring for miles around, getting dive-bombed by swifts in barley fields, unsuccessfully trying to trap rabbits, similarly trying to make bows and arrows (they always broke), making Tarzans over disused millponds, baking spuds on fires and generally doing things parents today would be utterly horrified by. We loved it. Not an adult in sight.
Now I live in Birmingham and have an 8 yo daughter that seems to have inherited my childhood love of nature and bush craft. She's already made a lean-too shelter, fire from a ferro stick and steel and nettle tea. She's caught carp (but put them back), mackerel (which we barbecued and ate) and crabs (too small to eat), She's even tried tracking wild ponies from their poo and prints in Sutton Park.
Now, she's desperate to try wild camping, which I haven't done since I was 14, though I still have my 1940's canvas ex-army 2 man tent (and I still swear it's better than anything made of nylon, even with the beetles that creep in).
A couple of years ago I bought a caravan to ease her into camping and she loves it but it's quite a jump for an 8 yo to go from a shower, loo, cooker, fridge and heating to a holiday in a canvas tent in the woods. So I have a plan...
Use the caravan as a base camp, find a land-owner with a bit of forest and a stream, get permission to camp and see how she gets on in a tent in the woods for a day or two. Any problems, we break camp and head back to the caravan and maybe head off to a lakeside or seaside caravan park for a less wild break.
Now, all I have to do is find a suitable small, quiet forest and an understanding farmer not a million miles from Brum.
I'm happy to do a lot of legwork in preparation but if anyone has any suggestions of locations or contacts, I'd be very happy to hear them. South Wales, Derbyshire or anywhere within 100 miles would be good but I'm not going to drive to Scotland to do it.
So, that's us and what we're hoping to do this year
In the meantime I'm going to have a good look round the forum to see what I can find!
