Stopping the clock

Time loses you in the wilderness. Time as we know it, at least. The time that fragments your day into a series of frantic tasks – children, employment, housework, admin, technology, set your alarm and do it again tomorrow.

But not in the wild. Out here, you swap your watch for nature’s timeless timepiece, no batteries or software updates required.

For the angler, time has meaning again.

Dawn and dusk, when the fish are most accommodating. Midday, when the sun is high and the fish are deep, or hiding in the shadows of the banks, demanding impossible casts.

And through it all, the river flows slow and steady, happy to reach its destination on its own time. Never pressured to meet a deadline, unanswerable to head office.

The pace of your life slows, distractions melt away, you hear and see what you usually miss, and for a few days at least, you breathe again.