<![CDATA[Richard Matthews

<![CDATA[Richard Matthews - Thoughts]]>Tue, 23 Dec 2025 02:32:29 +0000Weebly<![CDATA[The Return of the Micra]]>Sun, 09 Jun 2024 04:57:14 GMThttps://www.richard-matthews.co.uk/thoughts/the-return-of-the-micraMany of you reading this will have found the site because of the Global Convoy Navigation, a challenge I ran some 7 years ago now. So much has changed since then! To be fair, I would argue that everything has changed since then, including the Micra that went on that trip.
It’s been hiding away for almost 3 years now, and before that it was held up on the side of the road. Now, after lots of hard work and grafting learning new things (including how to weld, although somewhat terribly and very slowly!) the Micra is now legal and back on the road. Well…sort of back on the road.

Yes, despite changing so many things including new brakes, suspension, lines, hoses, the steering rack, exhaust, bearings…(and that is not an exhaustive list!) it’s still refusing to play ball. There was a strange noise coming from the front left of the car which I initially thought was a rock stuck between the pad and disk. The noise got worse and worse before changing so I got underneath and discovered a very dodgy sounding differential and driveshaft. Due to the car being higher, it’s not out of place for the diff to go. So ‘new gearbox it is’ I thought – this all happened right before its first big show, The Bushcraft Show, not the best timing! I stayed up until 3am changing the box but guess what? It wasn’t the box. Stupid thing! Very tired and feeling rather defeated, I headed home and went to sleep.

t was back to the diagnosis process. The noise comes with rotation so it can only be the driveshaft, brakes, or bearing. The bearing is brand new, and the noise stops when turning right so that rules that one out. So, using the process of elimination it was on to service the brakes and make sure they weren’t binding. When I stripped them down there was a bit of binding but nothing too bad. I tested it and still the same, so new shafts it is, which is where I am now waiting for the shafts to arrive to fit them. The finally, I’ll be able to get out on some adventures. Oh, and I still need to fix both the vans but that’s a whole other task…

The question is, why did I even bother to try and bring the micra back from the wreckage that it was? Although it has seen many parts of the world, it needs to see more! As such I’m organizing an Adventure Rally across Europe this summer, before it’s not possible to drive it anywhere. After that, I’ve got Africa and Scandinavia on the bucket list of places the Micra needs to visit. But until then, if you’re interested in joining our adventure this year, please get involved here.

]]><![CDATA[Covid-19 and the Outdoor Industry]]>Sat, 23 Jan 2021 13:37:03 GMThttps://www.richard-matthews.co.uk/thoughts/covid-19-and-the-outdoor-industryWritten June/July 2020

2020 has been one of the most difficult times for many of us in living memory, with it being mandatory to stay at home, social distance, losing jobs or being placed on furlough. With different governments tackling the global Covid-19 Pandemic with different approaches, all with different outcomes.

So where does that leave the adventure and travel industries?

The answer - in tatters.

Travel, whilst in some areas of the world are starting to open up, who knows what could happen, borders could close at any given moment. As demonstrated recently in Spain, leaving people stranded and/or with compulsory quarantine on return, travel companies are already on their knees unable to pay out, for yet another run of refunds.

Back in March, (which, seems like years ago now and in a different time period) all the outdoor activity providers, climbing centres, school expeditions and everything else in between were either cancelled or closed. Outdoor professionals, many of whom are freelancers, had no guarantee of being paid, as it happens, many of whom weren’t and of course many other industries were affected similarly, but let’s focus on the outdoor industry.

For myself, this included two international expeditions, several talks and freelance work with a variety of different centres up to the end of September 2020, all being cancelled. It also delayed the launching of, 'RM Adventures', the courses and adventures that we had been planning.
I’ve been incredibly lucky and at a huge advantage, almost privileged, to have found other work. Throughout the majority of lockdown and coming out of lockdown, I’ve been working as a delivery driver. Of course, many people have been incredibly unlucky losing their jobs, entire companies shutting down to never open their doors again. We all know of a business or several that have fallen this way. Everyone has been affected in some way and much of it negative.
To add to this outdoor instructors, generally speaking, are not good at being stuck inside, I think it comes with the nature of the job. While yes, getting out for a local walk, cycle and run was great it’s not the same as climbing a summit on a remote mountain top, overlanding overseas or ' insert any extreme sport' here. The general conclusion has been to keep safe, it was necessary and still will be with the coming of winter.

Where does this leave us with lockdown restrictions being lifted here in England?

More people than ever seem to be heading to hills, last weekend I headed out with Lisa to wild camp in the Okement Valley, on the North Moor of Dartmoor, our first outing. We counted 11 groups wild camping across the entire valley. I’ve never seen this many people out wild camping, even in Ten Tors season, while yes, the groups would be much bigger, there would only be maybe 2 or 3 groups in the valley at the same time.

The following morning, there was a different behaviour in the animals. As we were packing down and gearing up for a small walk, a herd of cows approached us, coming up to our tent. They all then gathered around the tent 'sticking to strict social distance guidelines of 2 metres', for a while, before gaining confidence - coming closer to around a metre away. Now cows are curious creatures, but it took a lot of effort to get them to move on, something that I’ve never encountered before. Usually a walk towards them and they move off, not this time 10 minutes of arm waving and shouting before they ran, luckily for us in the opposite direction. (The weekend before, a lady had been trampled and ended up in Plymouth hospital, many others have reported similar encounters). My theory;- due to a lack of interaction with humans, cows and other animals have become less accustom to seeing people and now have a sense of being encroached on again. That’s just my theory and I am by no means and animal behaviourist.

What do you think and have you experienced this?

For some small outdoor companies, sole traders and freelancers they have been able to use this time, to upgrade websites, update content and come up with new ideas for course and how they can engage their clients. Many have used the lockdown to become creative using online courses.

Over the last few years there has been more research about the benefits of being outdoors, for our mental and physical health. We’ve all just experienced what it’s like to not have access to outdoors spaces, has this given us a mind check of sorts, on how we appreciate the outdoors and have taken it for granted? This is where geography comes in to play, where we live in the UK matters. If you are out in the countryside miles away from anyone then it makes sense that you would naturally be outside quite a bit more, than say someone else living in inner city London were it's more difficult to get to natural green space.

How we strive to be in nature?

This is a thought, I’ve seen a huge change in my myself. Having not suffered with hay fever for 15 years. I suddenly started having signs of it again some days quite severally.
With all this there are some other side effects, increased footfall on the mountains like we’ve seen in Snowdonia. The environmental impact of this could be severe and similar increase in footfall across all the national parks, along with more people driving long distances to reach these and other beauty spots. With this, however, more people seem to not be aware of 'Leave no Trace' ethics, leading to an increase amount of rubbish across all area. It is simply, if you take food/drink with you, take the rubbish home. but this message is something that is uncommon to many people. Especially if you've lived in a city your whole life and never really ventured outside of the urban area this concept might be unknown. Not to say that it's just people who live cities that are causing this increase in rubbish. There could a general lack of understanding and education of it's impact across the board that we are as outdoor professionals are completely unaware.

My final thoughts

I personally think that the outdoor industry is going to be in difficult and turbulent waters for the immediate future. Personally, I am looking to the season of 2021 and beyond, where I am positive we shall see a resurgence of the outdoor industry. A safe vaccine will certainly help with this improvement and without one or herd immunity, if it’s effective, this will stifle a huge resurgence with a constant risk over all our heads. But and this is a big but. I also believe with a change of mindset, increased awareness of how the outdoors impact on our lives, the outdoor industry is going increase massively.

This is only my thoughts, hence the name, on how the situation might pan out. I don’t have any of the answers, this is what, I’ve observed over the pandemic, as someone who was about to enter the outdoor industry as a full time freelancer.

How do you think it will pan out? I am interested to hear your opinions on this, leave your comments below.

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