Rivus: a stream, an artificial watercourse; a channel, a conduit, a canal. A small stream of water, a brook. There’s nothing like camping next to a burn, the word missing from this definition. I wonder why I never camped up the Dreel Burn? There must be plenty places in the Nature Reserve and we spent many an evening on the bridge, or under it. That’s where we saw a UFO, though that’s another story. What I’m thinking about today is England.
Not often I can say that but yesterday the courts decided in favour of the Dartmouth landowners and camping has been banned there. Outlawed. Outrageous. The only place in England it was legal to camp wild. To have this taken away does not bode well for outdoor fans or the future of the country. At least in Scotland we are protected in some ways from landowners like that. The camping by-laws in Loch Lomond and the Trossachs remain in place, though still controversial. Maybe they were necessary, I don’t know. How it’s even policed is beyond me when they’ve cut all the rangers jobs in every council I know. Maybe mountain security should be my new job, plenty of work in England unfortunately.