Re: Best bit of TMA writing ever | Forum

Howburn Digger Jan 6, 2011 20:47:20

Replying to postman

postman wrote:

They've packed us in so tightly that sometimes it just can't be helped,
(trespassing that is) For me ownership of land is mostly bunkum, climb every fence, cross every field, do it sensatively and i'm sure all will go well.

I am a bit intrigued about the harsh, regressive, restrictive regime in the South where freedoms like the abilty to walk over hills and fields, wherever one might wish, apparently just dont exist. I still find this difficult to believe and so I had to check on your English Rambler's Association pages to see if the limitations on personal freedoms (like walking in your countryside) were actually true (or just made up). The Rambling Ass. people of England and Wales actually tell me that in England
"In general, there is no freedom to roam and in most areas of open country, you are a trespasser."
I mean it's the 21st Century. Cant you cats down in Engerland and Wales just get with it? How can you bear to live like that?
We'd have no truck with such nonsense up here. Sort it out! Normally the only time I set foot in England is at Shap services on my way to Wales (or Charnock Richards for emergency fuel) but I was seriously considering visiting some sites in Cumbria this year. This kind of trespass law silliness just puts me off.

StoneGloves Jan 7, 2011 08:20:14

Replying to Howburn Digger

Well, there is Right To Roam in Cumbria and Northumberland but it is subject to conditions. If you plan to walk over moors that are keepered for grouse then you will be trailed, overtly and covertly, by a phone tree of concerned individuals, mainly gamekeepers. In some places you'll be told 'you can't come up here'. Even though you can. So it's not all plain sailing.

Megalithics Jan 7, 2011 21:06:19

Replying to Howburn Digger

Howburn Digger wrote:

Yes, it gets our goats too (both of them). Some English landowners are wonderful, putting up stiles and fenced walkways to monuments on private land, others not so, unfortunately. Sometimes a public right of way passes within a hundred metres or so of a monument in the same field, you might think that because of this you'd be OK, not so, as we've been lectured to a few times in the past.

Unless it's blindingly obvious that the landowner is OK with visiting (eg a large sign with "Stone Circle this way, all welcome") we always ask permission now. Even this is not easy, you have to find the right place to ask (not always obvious!), and even if you do, farms are frequently deserted in the daytime.

Yes, the path of the English Megalithomancer can indeed be a difficult one.