Walk, Don't Walk...

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Evening walk along the coastal path the other night - to the right of this fence/gate is the path - to the right of that, the bit of coast that is slowly eroding/falling away to the beach below and thence to the sea: like so much of our coastline, some of it is a natural and inevitable process, and some of it is as a result of human activity, such as creating focussed national footpaths like this one.

An interesting conundrum: the freedom to roam versus environmental impact. As a keen walker of such clearly marked and well-maintained byways, I sometimes wonder if we've done the right thing in making the countryside so easy to traverse: removing topographical challenge and necessary route-finding skills has encouraged more and more people onto these paths, very often those who would have hitherto not bothered to do. As I say: a conundrum...

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