#pennine-way

#pennine-way

Peat bogs provide huge value to humans and the environment. When healthy, they store twice as much carbon as all the world's forests, reducing global emissions.

"For the first time, we can truly see how popular and meaningful the Appalachian Trail and its landscape are to millions of people," says Cinda Waldbuesser, president and CEO of the Appalachian Trail Conservancy, in an official March 2026 statement.

The early morning sun is bursting around the dark corners of High Dodd and Sleet Fell, sending a flush of light across the golden bracken and on to the hammered silver of the lake.

The Lake District was the inspiration for William Wordsworth, John Ruskin and Beatrix Potter, but its big skies, gentle waters, lofty fells and landscapes were surely designed to seduce modern-day, digitally ambushed families. In fact, escaping to the countryside and one of the best family-friendly hotels in the Lake District might just feel as other worldly as diving into a classic novel.

Jornet's well-publicized States of Elevation project in 2025 was a feat in human endurance, mountain running, and planning. Starting on September 3, he linked 72 of the 14ers in the contiguous U.S in a human-powered fashion - on foot and bike - with a support crew following him and helping with logistics. He started with the 14,259-foot Longs Peak in Colorado, then went on to California and north to Washington, finishing on the 14,410-foot Mount Rainier.

While the data shows 80% of people live within walking distance of green or blue spaces such as a river, park or woodland, it also reveals a disparity between rural and poorer urban areas. In some areas of local authorities, fewer than 20% of residents live close to these spaces, according to data released by the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs on Wednesday.

I've never seen so many people talk about Emily Brontë and Wuthering Heights. It's been quite mind-blowing - really, very surreal. We talk about the Brontës every day and everyone else is kind of joining in on this conversation, and it is everywhere. So many people are picking up the book for the first time and discovering the Brontës for the first time.

Brontë portrayed these landscapes as being bleak, unforgiving, and tempestuous—and at many times of year they are, but they are also staggeringly beautiful and have given birth to some of the United Kingdom's greatest 20th-century artists and sculptors.

Although these attractions are beautiful, the crowds they drew during my trip put a damper on the experience. I preferred sights like the Lagazuoi Tunnels, Monte Civetta, and Cinque Torri, all of which were less touristy but still had equally showstopping views and hikes.

"On that bleak hill-top the earth was hard with a black frost, and the air made me shiver through every limb," so wrote Emily Brontë. In a story studded with untameable lust, unbreakable love, fierce tempers and shocking acts of revenge, perhaps the most faithful aspect of Emerald Fennell's latest film, "Wuthering Heights", to its 1847 novel is the tempestuous depiction of the remote English countryside. The Yorkshire moors, to be exact.

Garrington Property Finders' annual ranking is described as an impartial, objective ranking based on publicly available data across 18 categories, including proximity to open space, National Parks and Areas of Outstanding Natural Beauty, the number of listed and period homes, air quality, and crime figures. A wide range of data sources is used, including those provided by the Office for National Statistics, the Department for Levelling Up, and Natural England.

The body is a shifting landscape transformed by surfaces and sensations. Each look captures a different tactile world: the heat of blood, the cool weight of metal, the yielding drift of water. The result is a sculptural study of how the elements carve, shield, and release the self. The materials we embody become the emotions we carry, and the body becomes a materialised exhibition of our emotions, from the pulse of Blood to the discipline of Metal to the surrender of Water.

From reproductive rights to climate change to Big Tech, The Independent is on the ground when the story is developing. Whether it's investigating the financials of Elon Musk's pro-Trump PAC or producing our latest documentary, 'The A Word', which shines a light on the American women fighting for reproductive rights, we know how important it is to parse out the facts from the messaging.

Like half-remembered dreams, her curious pastoral visions displace familiarity in search of wilder fantasies, where humans are nowhere to be found. Against Nature, the London-based artist's second solo show at Pilar Corrias, establishes Wilson at the helm of a flourishing artistic engagement with the para-pastoral in contemporary painting. Hers is an altogether strange, uncanny variant of the British countryside that resists the canonical entrapments of a bucolic idyll.

In the UK, there is a proud tradition of naming long-distance walking paths after talented reprobates. I mean the various opium fiends, international terrorists and child murderers who make up our colourful national tapestry (see the Coleridge Way, Drake's Trail and the Richard III Trail). So perhaps a 30-mile weekend walk dedicated to the Mortimers, and their most notorious scion, Sir Roger, is an appropriate addition to the weave.

From reproductive rights to climate change to Big Tech, The Independent is on the ground when the story is developing. Whether it's investigating the financials of Elon Musk's pro-Trump PAC or producing our latest documentary, 'The A Word', which shines a light on the American women fighting for reproductive rights, we know how important it is to parse out the facts from the messaging. At such a critical moment in US history, we need reporters on the ground. Your donation allows us to keep sending journalists to speak to both sides of the story. The Independent is trusted by Americans across the entire political spectrum. And unlike many other quality news outlets, we choose not to lock Americans out of our reporting and analysis with paywalls. We believe quality journalism should be available to everyone, paid for by those who can afford it.

A massive landslip has dramatically reshaped a section of the Jurassic Coast, weeks after a significant 300ft crack emerged in the cliff face. Thousands of tonnes of rock and mud have collapsed onto Charmouth beach in Dorset, obliterating a chunk of the popular South West Coastal Path England's most-visited National Trail. A 30ft wide section of the 450ft tall cliff has detached from the mainland, now resting approximately 20ft lower than its original position.

I'm learning to go slowly, not too fast too soon. It's probably the reason I got the fracture in the first place.

Many of them were built for purposes that no longer exist - cattle drives, mining prospecting, early U.S. Forest Service fire patrols - while others were packed by the footprints of the Chumash people well before the colonization of North America. Sections of trail cling to steep slopes that seem to barely resist gravity, shedding soil and stone with each winter storm.

AllTrails, a hiking app with trail maps and reviews, dug into insights from their 90 million-plus members and team of trail experts to spotlight lesser-known places where the trail alone is worth planning a trip around. Their guide, Travel-Worthy Trails for 2026, spotlights eight unexpected destinations around the world where the trail is the destination.

I trekked it in December 2023 with plans and a permit to camp at Bright Angel Campground, a scenic cottonwood-shaded hideaway just near the famed Phantom Ranch (the only lodging on the world wonder's floor). Then, two days before my trip, a miracle happened: One last-minute reservation became available for Phantom Ranch. The ranch digs typically book out over a year in advance, but if you're lucky, you can either get in via the lottery or a last-minute opening. This made the grueling but gorgeous hike down and up the steep South Kaibab Trail even more memorable.