The creeks, coves and hidden beaches of the Dorset coastline
make up England’s most unlikely natural larder. No, really, we’re
serious. Paddle your way into the hard-to-reach chalk clefts, rock
stacks and sandy corners of the beautiful Studland Bay area and you
can find enough pre-seasoned fresh produce to plate up a small
seafood platter. Just ask the adventurous duo behind Fore
Adventure – or join them on a coastal jolly by kayak. You’ll be
fishing for mackerel and jumping ashore in untouched bays to scour
below Dorset’s dramatic cliff lines and shingle beaches for sea
purslane, sea aster and rock samphire. After catching crabs and
digging out cockles, it’s back to camp for a cook-up over flames,
using all the produce you’ve harvested to whip up a veritable
banquet of a beach feast.

What it costs: From £140pp

Ditch the crowded campsites and jammed-up beach roads of the
south coast and head north-east instead. Rugged Northumberland,
with its windswept sandy shores, craggy headlands and rambunctious
wilderness, is a prime location for pitching up in your campervan
and kicking back. Hire a sleek set of wheels from Northumberland250 (the tent is up top), then plot your
course along the county’s dramatic coastal curves. Wild With
Consent pairs seclusion-seeking campers with off-grid
locations, allowing you to legally park up and bed down in some of
the region’s wildest corners. They promise you’ll be the only
campers in sight, meaning you’ll have the county’s ancient forests
and rugged hilltops all to yourself.

What it costs: A three-day rental of a Land
Rover Defender costs from £499. Wild With Consent pitch sites start
at £25 a night.

Set sail across the glossy waters of Holkham Bay under the red
sail of a traditional Norfolk lugger for a day-long Swallows and
Amazons-style adventure on England’s eastern reaches. There’s no
need to concern yourself with mainsheets and mast rigging – helming
help from rugged sea captains is all part and parcel of the
experience provided by Coastal
Expeditions, ensuring you keep your port and starboard the
right way round. Harness the county’s blustery winds to explore
Scolt Head, a sand dune-fringed slice of land overlooking the
Norfolk coastline. You can expect stops for wild swimming and a
chance to forage for tasty additions to your picnic hamper of
Norfolk produce. After that, it’s time to indulge in a beach lunch
of sourdough sandwiches, local cheese and homemade pies. Make a
weekend of it by warming up post-sail at The Brisley
Bell, a cosy, six-key pub with rooms located a 30-minute drive
from the coast.

What it costs: From £125pp, including breakfast
and lunch

The humble act of pilgrimage has been enjoying something of a
renaissance in the last few years – and devotion to a deity is no
longer a prerequisite for tracing the ancient pathways that
criss-cross the UK. Lace up your hiking boots to get started on a
scenic trail through the “Garden of England” on the North Downs
Pilgrims’ Way. The 246km journey has taken ecclesiastial
enthusiasts from Winchester to Canterbury since time immemorial,
but we don’t think the powers that be will mind if you cut down on
the distances and start your travels from Chilham, instead.
Following the Great Stour River, you’ll pass through the
butterfly-filled Church Woods in Blean and the county’s winelands,
en route to Canterbury Cathedral. There are sharp-suited stays
aplenty dotted along the route (our pick is The Duke
William in Ickham), plus enough pubs to turn this into an act
of worship in the name of the county’s hop harvest.

What it costs: Nothing. Simply pick your route
using britishpilgrimage.org and set off…

Treehouses are havens of nostalgia; a canopy-top escape to our
childhoods. So what better way to spend our bank holiday break than
clambering up a ladder into an arboreal abode beneath hazy summer skies? Shrouded by
the pale branches and verdant leaves of birches in a 36-hectare
former Second World War airfield-turned-nature reserve in
Northamptonshire, Two Pines is our preferred option for a treetop
stay. Turn your phone to airplane mode (this is an airfield, after
all) and settle into your leafy surroundings. Merging
sympathetically into the woodland around it, this sleekly designed,
metal-clad cabin pairs cool countryside interiors with easy outdoor
living: think distressed wood furnishings, a copper bathtub on the
terrace, a wood-fired pizza oven for al fresco dining and a
forest’s-worth of adventure on offer beneath the wooden staircase.
Immerse yourself in the natural world with a guided ecology walk
around the site, then curl up beside the wood-burning stove, ears
pricked for owl hoots.

What it costs: From £195 a night

Adventure doesn’t have to be uncomfortable (or that’s what we’re
telling ourselves). Just a 5km drive from the northern end of the
Jubilee tube line is the pastoral paradise of Hertfordshire’s
Home
Farm – a working agricultural idyll plucked straight from the
bucolic backdrop of a children’s book. On arrival at this
60-hectare utopia in Elstree, you’ll be led to your weekend stay,
trundling through the sea of lazily waving grassland that conceals
the farm’s cluster of sweetly furnished yurts and bell tents. Home
Farm had been in the ownership of the Gibbs family for over 400
years when Jess Allen-Back returned home and opened up the arable
lands to visitors. Now it’s a grown-up rendition of a summer camp,
with woodlands to explore, croquet to play, art workshops to
attend, morning yoga classes under canvas to take part in and a
wellness retreat ready to whisk you to paradise via a range of
pampering packages. Make use of the tent barbecues to rustle up an
al fresco dinner (there are communal fridges to hand), then snuggle
down by your personal fire pit for sundowners and marshmallow
toasting under celestial skies.

What it costs: From £125 a night in a bell
tent

Bored of panic peddling at spin class to close your rings? Us,
too, which is why we’ve been raving about outdoor bouldering since day dot. Forget
chalky fingers and long queues at your local wall: we’re packing
our climbing shoes and heading out to Stone Farm Rocks in West
Sussex to scale the sandstone crags just south of East Grinstead.
Under the care of the British Mountaineering Council, these tumbling
geological formations – of up to 8m in height – provide assorted
easy-climbing routes for a weekend workout. It’s just a 40-minute
drive from Brighton, too, so, post-boulder, you can bed down in a
room above buzzy The Ginger Pig pub. Come morning, treat tired triceps
with a cool dip in the sea – all 11 rooms at the Hove hotel provide
guests with beach bags filled with towels and mats.

What it costs: Petrol prices, and nothing
else