The Guardian, By: Helen Pidd, 12/26/2013
As the wind felled trees, flooded homes and cancelled ferries this week, much of the nation needed little excuse to stay indoors. But for a group of hardy anti-fracking protesters camped by the M62 on Barton Moss in Salford, near Manchester, going inside was not an option, explained Joe Boyd, a 40-year-old builder from Liverpool who was on not just his first demo but also his first real camping trip.
Before the storms hit the north, Boyd was already wrapped up warm: a coat, a fleece, two woolly jumpers, a lumberjack shirt and a turtleneck base layer, two pairs of socks, pyjama bottoms and waterproof trousers. His tent had a fluffy rug over the ground sheet, he had insulated his lilo and worked out the optimum number of sleeping bags and quilts to sleep under without either roasting or freezing to death. But he refused to moan. The way he sees it, a little bit of discomfort is worth it to avert an "environmental disaster".
