Looking down to Buttermere and Crummock Water on a hazy summer's day
“The tendency nowadays to wander in wilderness is delightful to
see. Thousands of tired, nerve-shaken,
over-civilised people are beginning to findout that going to the mountains is
going home; that wilderness is a necessity; that mountain parks and reservations
are useful not only as fountains of timber and irrigating rivers, but as
fountains of life. Awakening from the
stupefying effects of the vice of over-industry and the deadly apathy of luxury,
they are trying as best they can to mix and enrich their own little ongoings
with those of Nature, and to get rid of rust and disease. Briskly venturing and roaming, some are
washing off sins and cobweb cares of the devil’s spinning in all-day storms on
mountains; sauntering in rosiny pinewoods or in gentian meadows, brushing
through chaparral, bending down and parting sweet, flowery sprays; tracing
rivers to their sources, getting in touch with the nerves of Mother Earth; jumping from rock to rock,
feeling the life of them, learning the songs of them, panting in whole-souled
exercise, and rejoicing in deep, long-drawn breaths of pure wildness…Wander
here a whole summer, if you can.
Thousands of God’s wild blessings will search you and soak you like a
sponge and the big days will go by uncounted.”
(John Muir)
River Esk flowing from its source among the Scafells
