Volume 13　アウトドアの楽しみ


Safety or Excitement?

Ann: We used to backpack. We would go backpacking in the Sierras. And you would hike in for miles and miles and miles with everything on your back, and usually without a tent. It would just be carrying your supplies and your sleeping bag, and then we would camp. And I remember tying the food, putting the food into a bag and suspending it from a tree branch, because at night the animals would come, otherwise, and try to get your food, and bother you possibly, which, you don't want bears . . . If you were lucky it would just be a raccoon or something like that, but it could also be a bear. And so we would suspend the food in the tree some distance away from where we were sleeping.

Michael: And you had no tent? You slept in the sleeping bags.

Ann: No, we just slept out under the stars, which was beautiful but, ha-ha.

Michael: Ha-ha, a little bit dangerous.

Ann: Yeah, I mean if there were any bears. But the good thing is the food drew them off from where you were.

Michael: Right, OK. Well, at least in England we don't have any big nasty animals like that.

Ann: True.

Michael: Hiking in the U.K. is nice because we have a lot of public footways and bridleways. A bridleway is a public path for horses. So you can go horse-riding. And these public footpaths they crisscross the country. There's about 225,000 kilometers worth . . .

Ann: Wow.

Michael: . . . of public footpaths in the U.K. These cross over private land, uh, farmland, but public have the right to use them. So you can walk across fields of wheat and go and mix with the cows and the sheep. So, yeah, taking a nice walk in the English countryside is something I do enjoy when I go back.
 Other things, outdoor sports would be, well, cricket on a Sunday afternoon. That was a big thing. If you drive around the U.K. you visit all the villages and the small towns. A lot of them have their own cricket pitch in the center of the village. You'll always see games going on Sundays. Golf of course is, uh, a big game in the U.K. It's cheap to play and there's a lot of public golf courses that you pay maybe £5 just to do a round. Hiking, as I mentioned, horse-riding, mountaineering, up in Scotland where we have, uh, our little mountains. So yes, especially recently, I think, outdoor activities have become more popular.

Ann: Yeah, yeah, and I suppose, you know, the good thing about doing it in England, if we give a recommendation for where to do it, is no bears will get you. 

Michael: That's the big thing. No bears, nothing dangerous. So given a choice between England and . . .

Ann: California.

Michael: Go with England; it's a lot safer.

Ann: But California's more exciting.

Michael: True. Got bigger mountains haven't you?

Ann: That's true, but bears. Ha-ha.

Michael: But bears.

Ann: All right, well on that cheery note, we will look forward to being with you next time. Thank you very much for joining us.

Michael: Thank you indeed.

Ann: Bye.

Michael: Bye-bye.