To be philosophical or not to be philosophical

I've finally started working on the manuscript for the book of the great travelogue tour. So far I've got 39 documents of rough notes that need a lot of editing. The plan is to put another layer of thoughts over the top using ideas that developed later thus filling in the boring bits where not much happened. So far I've reviewed the first ten days and I don't seem to have had any days where not much happened. I'm wondering if I'll either have to cut stuff out or not add the extra material as I'd hoped.

As I travelled around the country I'd found myself mulling over some ideas that I'd had for some time regarding the perception of irrational ideas in the modern world and how much of the satisfaction of life comes from a contact with the irrational. These ideas include art, humour, moments of sudden self actualisation (described by Maslow as peak experiences), love, spirituality (whatever that is), etc. After stopping half way around the country and discussing the project with some pagan friends in Derbyshire I came to the conclusion that I should include these ideas in the story of the journey. Over a few days I came up with the idea of using these ideas to fill in the boring days and, perhaps, draw some parallels with things that happened on the way.

I estimated that I was writing about 1000 words a day in note form, which would give me about 40,000 words once it was tidied up. If I added another 30-40,000 words it would make a book of about the right length. Now I'm expecting I'll have about 50-60,000 words before I add the philosophical stuff. It's either going to be longer than I'd thought or I'm going to have to leave the philosophical stuff out.

A journey through the 39 historic counties of England

Starting on May 1st 2013 I embarked on a travelogue tour of the 39 historic counties of England. The plan was (and still is) to write a book about the journey. The list below is an index of the journey and the date for each county. These are short blog posts giving an idea of what I got up. At the time of creating this post I'm still editing the full manuscript. Keep coming back for news of the trip in detail and the development of the book.

May 1st Oxfordshire 43 miles
May 2nd Buckinghamshire 73 miles
May 3rd Bedfordshire 119 miles
May 4th Huntingdonshire 161 miles
May 5th Cambridgeshire 216 miles
May 6th Suffolk 235 miles
May 7th Norfolk 298 miles
May 8th Rutland 513 miles
May 9th Lincolnshire 629 miles
May 10th Yorkshire 742 miles
May 11th County Durham 811 miles
May 12th Northumberland 953 miles
May 13th Cumberland 1113 miles
May 14th Westmorland 1174 miles
May 15th Lancashire 1238 miles
May 16th Cheshire 1315 miles
May 17th Staffordshire 1350 miles
May 18th Derbyshire 1384 miles
May 19th Nottinghamshire 1442 miles
May 20th Leicestershire 1534 miles
May 21st Northamptonshire 1580 miles
May 22nd Warwickshire 1648 miles
May 23rd Worcestershire 1699 miles
May 24th Shropshire 1776 miles
May 25th Herefordshire 1841 miles
May 26th Gloucestershire 1889 miles
May 27th Somerset 1988 miles
May 28th Devon 2090 miles
May 29th Cornwall 2248 miles
May 30th Dorset 2441 miles
May 31st Wiltshire 2553 miles
June 1st Berkshire 2629 miles
June 2nd Hampshire 2711 miles
June 3rd Sussex 2763 miles
June 4th Kent 2852 miles
June 5th Surrey 2956 miles
June 6th Middlesex 3015 miles
June 7th Essex 3083 miles
June 8th Hertfordshire 3128 miles

Here are the photos on Instagram