Hi buddy,
Glad you had a great time on SM and I hope you have many more. However, I do have a bone to pick i.e. your use of live wood for both your spit and fuel. Yes, live birch will eventually burn but there is plenty of windfall and deadwood around if only you are prepared to look for it (recently, a lot of trees have been cleared by the landowner and are left to the side of some paths, easy pickings). Many of our favourite spots on SM have lost all seclusion and privacy due to people cutting down the nearest tree they find because they can't be arsed to get out there and look.
With regards to going up for the Solstice celebrations; we have been harassed on numerous occasions by both the police and Adrian Thornhill in person (usually at Summer Solstice) who's main complaints are noise, rubbish, burning of live wood, fire pits directly onto the ground and of course, trespass. As a consequence, we now hide ourselves away from prying eyes as much as we can. We always have a stone base to our fire pit (that is our fire pit in your picture that we built years ago and move regularly), we very rarely cut live wood, keep our site tidy and try to blend in. I'm sure you will agree, as will most others here, that these should be the basic tenets of any wild camp - especially when you are on Private Property.
Please do not take offense at my post, I do not mean to preach, scold or lay claim to anything. As fellow trespassers, we just ask that you treat the local flora and fauna, the whole moor in general, and others that use it after you with the respect that any "bush-crafter/wild camper" should.
