Why I bought a wood

In Britain, it's not usual for private individuals to own woodland. Most woodland is either part of huge country estates, or owned by state agencies like the Forestry Commission.

In the south-east of England, family-sized plots of woodland are expensive. In the London area, where I live, they're ruinously expensive. The situation gets worse and worse every year, as more and more of the countryside gets flattened for housing and roads. I can only afford my own wood because I first bought one decades ago, when a modest plot could be had for about the same price as a car.

I bought my first wood on a whim.

I'd organized a camping trip with my wife and our kids, to a commercial campsite in a large forest about two hours' drive from the family home. The kids were between five and ten years old at the time: the same age I was, when I developed an interest in the outdoor life. My parents never took me camping, though -- that would have to wait until I was able to go with friends. I was hoping that, on our family holiday, we would have the same kind of experiences I longed for in my childhood, and had in my youth.

Well, the bad things were certainly the same as I remembered. The forest was dark and gloomy, and somewhat disconcerting at night. The hygiene facilities were inadequate. We were crammed into a small field with about fifty other families, tents cheek-by-jowl. Other people's crappy music kept us awake. And so on.

None of these things had bothered me as a youth, because they were completely outweighed by the good things.

Back in those days, we could have a huge fire, and cook odd things on it. We'd push sausages onto sticks and cook them inadequately -- with the result that we'd wish the hygiene facilities were less inadequate the next day. We could get steaming drunk on cheap lager, and sing, and other people would either throw things at us, or join in. Those who were of a mind to could smoke recreational herbal products, far from the eyes of anybody who might disapprove (not that I ever did, of course).

If I got up early, and was quiet, I would see deer or badgers nosing around between the tents. It was all jolly splendid.

Oh, my -- how things had changed over the last thirty years.

Most obviously, we weren't allowed to build a camp fire in the campsite. Apparently, it was a fire risk. Overt consumption of alcohol wasn't allowed. Nobody was supposed to make even a whisper after 10pm. And as for wildlife -- not a chance: the campsite was surrounded by metal fences.

It wasn't just this one campsite, we later found out. Public campsites in Britain had become rule-bound, cheerless places. They provided us with all the bad things about woodland camping, and none of the good.

Then one day, we were driving -- I don't remember where -- and my wife spotted a "for sale" sign next to a wood. Until that point, it hadn't really occurred to me that a wood was something you could go out and buy. When I looked into it later, I discovered there were specialist agents who bought and sold woodland, in plots manageable by a single family.

And so, to cut a long story short, I bought one. It wasn't an easy purchase, even then, and I had to borrow money. A while later, I sold it, and used the proceeds to buy a nicer one, in a better location.

Our current wood is close enough to our home for me to treat it as a large backyard, but sufficiently isolated that the nearest house is a mile away. We can make as much noise as we like, have a fire the size of a barn, drink or smoke whatever takes our fancy, and annoy nobody except the foxes and squirrels.

More responsibly, we're preserving one small corner of the south-east from being turned into a shopping mall or a car park.

Managing the wood -- which can be back-breaking -- provides me with exercise and fresh air. There are no utilities, of course, which gives me an opportunity to experiment with solar power and rainwater collection. The wood provides an endless source of firewood, which we use to heat our house. In fact, I'm writing this sitting next to a roaring fire, powered by wood that I grew, harvested, cut, chopped, and stacked with my own hands.

The wood was an absolute life-saver during the Covid lock-downs. At a time when all entertainment venues, sports facilities, and public amenities were closed, I could still get exercise, and practice shooting and archery. In fact, the lock-downs hardly changed my life at all, except that the drive to the wood was even quicker, as there was almost no traffic. Near the wood, deer were grazing on the central reservation between the two lanes of the highway -- it was almost a post-apocalyptic experience.

Also worth mentioning at my advanced age: woodland isn't subject to inheritance tax. These days, it's about the only property that isn't.

There will come a day -- probably not that far away -- when I'll be too old to wield a chainsaw. Perhaps too old even to get into the wood, and sit watching the ducks on the pond. That will be a terrible day, because I've been a "gentleman forester" for so long that it's part of my identity. I can't imagine being anything else. I never forget, not for a day, how fortunate I am to have had such an opportunity.

Published 2026-03-07, updated 2026-03-07

Why I bought a wood

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