Wild at heart

Good evening.
Moments in true wildness can feel rare on these built-up isles. There are the Highlands of Scotland, where the population density is around eight people per square kilometre. There are the north Pennines, described as England’s last wilderness. Then there’s Dartmoor, a place “when, in an instant, soft southern England summons its dark side”.
This “instant” is what writer James Gingell describes as “a Dartmoor moment”. That realisation when “you’ve walked away from fires and towels and teacups”, when “you’re far from the chocolate-box villages on the moor’s edge”, and you suddenly feel you’re in harsh country. It can daunt the unwary, he says, but come with the right kit and grit, and that moment can be a thrill. It’s also the only place in England where you are allowed to wild camp - for now.
Elsewhere in Europe, wildness is more easily attainable. Rhiannon Batten and her family tap into traditional shepherds’ culture in the southern French Alps by following old transhumance routes up into the mountains and staying in remote refuges. On their trip, they discover the sole permanently inhabited village within a French national park. “Up, up, up we go until, finally, we cross a little footbridge over a ravine and arrive in a meadow laced with buttercups, apple trees and scented paperwhites. Goldfinches are calling and smoke curls from the chimneys of Dormillouse’s larch-roofed cottages.”
Meanwhile, the Wild Atlantic Way is a very clever piece of marketing dreamt up 10 years ago to lure people over to the west coast of Ireland after the financial crisis of 2008. It is a 1,600-mile route running from County Cork in the south-west to County Donegal in the north-west, weaving through nine counties and taking in some of Europe’s most spectacular scenery. But it’s easy to go off-road to experience some truly wild west coast landscapes, as Jane Dunford writes: “In Connemara national park, we follow one of the trails across grassland, boulders and bog, with a backdrop of the Twelve Bens mountain range and far-reaching views across the ocean”.
Wildness is all around us, it’s just a matter of “walking away from fires, towels and teacups.”