For an island, Britain packs a huge variety of landscapes and wild places into its 80,000 square miles. If you wanted, you could see craggy mountains, windswept coastal plains, bleak moorland and lush valleys, cascading waterfalls and meandering rivers, wide open spaces and tiny urban green gems, all in the space of one day. Although you would spend most of it in the car, to explore it properly takes more time.

A two week holiday makes just a small impact on the list of places I would love to visit,  so this year I am taking a three month sabbatical break from work, to see all those places. Travelling the length and bredth of Britain in a campervan, I will find out more about meres and mosses, limestone pavements, honeycomb reefs, and the Machair.

Released from my desk into the wild, I hope to see more of the biodiversity we are working so hard to look after. It is also a chance to find out more about other Wildlife Trusts, their reserves and projects. So for the next three months, this blog will feature a series of Wildlife Trust reserves from around Britain and the people that look after them.

Friday was my last day at the Trust for the summer. In a fabricated meeting about rubber ducks (don’t ask, I may post an explanatory picture next week), the Conservation Team presented me with a sabbatical survival kit. As well as providing camping rations, midge protection and emergency wine, they have set me the challenge of filling in a hand crafted I-spy book of things I should be looking out for on my travels.