Description: …or so Alfred Wainwright said. This is something I wrote a while ago for a friend who was visiting the UK and wanted to do some hiking. It&# …
…or so Alfred Wainwright said. This is something I wrote a while ago for a friend who was visiting the UK and wanted to do some hiking. It’s extremely subjective but outlines some great places to visit.
While there are many wonderful places outdoors on Great Britain, the easiest way to get a sampling of the history, ranging from the prehistoric to the industrial, is to visit the National Parks or the “ Areas of Outstanding Natural Beauty ” (AONB). Scotland has its own way of doing things. The mountains may be small, but they have character and certainly enough character to provide an epic for the unprepared!
While National Parks and AONB’s are scattered around the country, I prefer the north. The south, and particularly the Cornwall Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty will have better weather, the north provides a rawness and seemingly a closer connection to its history than other parts of the country. That said, in the south the places I recommend are the South Downs [ info | map ], Dartmoor [ info | map ] Exmoor [ info | map ] and the New Forest .