'It’s worth remembering that our closest surroundings often hold multitudes of their own'

Not all meaningful journeys cover great distances.

An easy misconception around travel is that the magic of an experience somehow correlates to the miles covered and money spent in making it happen. It is the rationale by which the Seychelles automatically outweigh Suffolk, Dubai trumps Devon and Phuket knocks the Peak District into a cocked hat. Only, that’s not always the case.

Trips that broaden the mind or swell the soul don’t have to involve baggage carousels or beach cocktails. Sometimes, they can involve simply stepping out of the house for a few hours. This is no swipe at the travel industry. It would be disingenuous to downplay the thrill of the far-flung — little compares directly to the heart-thumping drama of the African savannah at dawn, say, or the incense-laden otherness of a Himalayan temple — but there is always potential for fresh wonder in the places we call home. A learning or discovery made 20 minutes away from your front door is no less valid than one made on another continent.

‘A man travels the world over in search of what he needs,’ runs a telling quote attributed to Irish writer George Augustus Moore, ‘and returns home to find it.’ We may feel, without stopping to give it much thought, that we already know everything there is to know about our locality — every historical quirk, every creative outlet, every fold and rill in the landscape — but the regions we’re most acquainted with can often hold more substance than we credit them with.

Exploring the details of a long-familiar place with the eyes of a curious visitor, in fact, is a sure way of expanding and unravelling its appeal. Those prehistoric ruins on the local OS map? That unfamiliar birdsong in the conifer-darkened copse? The country house you’ve put off visiting for the past decade? The art class on the noticeboard? The tucked-away pub? The footpath you’ve never considered taking the dog down? The canopy of stars that unfurls overhead when you’re inside watching BBC News at Ten? To add to this, our home patch, wherever that may be, has a set of qualities that nowhere else on the planet is able to replicate. Its nearness to us gives us layers to unpeel at length; its past provides us with stories to understand over time; its gradual changes throw up undreamt-of possibilities and new characters.

At Country Life, we welcome in the exotic, the distant and the luxurious, from the island tropics of Madagascar to the polished splendour of La Dolce Vita Orient Express. The tales they tell are inspiring, but when we take a step back from the world of passport stamps and far-off horizons, it’s worth remembering that our closest surroundings often hold multitudes of their own