Walking unplugged?

My friend Neil told me that the music on his iPod helped enormously as he cycled his way from Land's End to John O'Groats last year. I'd been wondering what music I should take for my journey and months later it's not something that I'm close to answering yet.

Everywhere people are travelling with the accompianment of music. The once ubiquitous earphones seem now be almost obligatory for anyone on the move. I hear from regular commuters (like Neil) that listening to favourite music changes a routine journey into something more pleasurable. It can be uplifting, encouraging and totally involving. I really understand that but I'm wondering if favourite music might bring the wrong kind of distraction, turning my exploration of the unfamiliar into something more routine, dulling my senses and inclining my attention to the elsewhere.

The radios in my house alternate from Radio Four to Five Live when I'm around. I'm a complete news addict, so early morning and late night listening is always to speech radio. I mostly work in complete silence and prefer it that way but each time I'm in the kitchen to make a cup of coffee or in the car I'm listening to one of these two channels. On a day off or if I'm doing something less demanding I might use Spotify or Last.FM to listen to music but on the whole my study is library-quiet, a sanctuary of silence. I like it that way.

A sabbatical should be a time to explore new things, of course, to forego instinctive habits in order to play with new things. So should I take the radio, which will add 0.25 kg to my pack weight, and should I stock up my phone with MP3 tracks? My instincts tell me to do both, that 50 days away will include plenty of boring hours which could be really pleasantly relieved by entertainment and music. And what happens if a major news story breaks while I'm away? Could I survive without following every unfolding detail, hour by hour?

Walking with earphones definitely removes me from the environment. And there's the problem. If I abstract myself from every boring path or dismal landscape, what will I miss? I fear that the experience of each place and moment will be less authentic if it's accompanied by a stirring soundtrack or reassuring melody.

So at the moment, my inclination is to leave the radio behind, to put only unfamiliar music on my MP3 player and to use it sparingly. We'll see.