There’s perhaps no reason why I should feel embarrassed about the collective thrill my mate Toby and I felt on charging my mobile phone on solar power gathered during a day of wandering through the undulating hills of Wiltshire.

That and the enjoyment of walking on a footpath slicing across Madonna’s property – a right of way many hundreds of years old that she was attempting to get closed. Nice feeling that – using the oldest source of energy in a state-of-the-art zero emissions endeavour to ensure my girlfriend got the routine late night call from the tent. (The update of our journey westward usually involved reports of inconvenient delays caused by pubs obstructing the path). Between my solar charger and wind-up torch, I found myself in modern camping comfort without the drawbacks of having no in-tent charging point or feeling guilty about my otherwise ceaseless demand for electricity and its impact on the natural world I was enjoying.

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