Country diary: Searching for sanctuary, we find something else entirely | Eben Muse

Drakes Broughton, Worcestershire: The scourge of rural litter is enough to bring anyone together, even a farmer and us, trying to camp for the night in his fieldIn deepest rural Worcestershire - unfamiliar country for a mountaineer and a Welshman - we need a place to sleep. Our hedged lane skirts a little copse, and tired eyes pick out a gap; a couple of big steps over the brambles and we're in. We haul the bike trailer (heavy with cans and bottles, picked up over some 300 miles on England's dirty roads) into the woods. Damien Gabet, with whom I'm here to wild camp, is on a 1,000-mile journey in the shape of a Lucozade bottle as part of an anti-litter campaign, all the while removing as many plastic bottles as he can fit in his small orange trailer.Beyond the wood is a field where the corn has been cut: a perfect spot, hidden from view, disturbing no one. Stars start to blink awake as we make our home for the night. Suddenly, the rumble of an engine - a silver Range Rover turns the corner. A familiar weariness grip me: I'm already resigned to being moved on, to take some stick for our trespass. Continue reading...