Enjoying my little corner of paradise

Read Martin’s column every week in the Western Morning News

- Martin Hesp

TWO hikers marched through the forest opposite our cottage just now, passing me and Finn on our daily dog walk - and the woman in front barked: "You're the first human we've seen in hours!

She smiled as she passed and muttered: "Beautiful! Just beautiful!"

She certainly wasn’t talking about either me or Finn. Indeed, her male companion looked slightly alarmed by the fact that they were encountering such an unkempt and scruffy pair in the middle of a remote woodland. Maybe he'd seen the movie Deliverance and perhaps we came across as a brace of tobacco-chewing, banjo-playing hillbillies. Finn does have that look about him, and my beard is getting longer and wilder.

But of course it was the silent, empty, gorgeous, countryside the lady hiker was talking about. Because the area really is silent, empty and gorgeous and, not for the first time, I was reminded how lucky we are to live in such a place.

There can be few people in overcrowded Britain who come across awe-stricken hikers so close to their front door. Awed by the overwhelming sense of peace and tranquillity. Our valley has it in bucketfuls, and I wallow in every silent, spacious, spir-

itually-uplifting second of it like a pig in the proverbial.