READING. 1. Read the text (the paragraphs are out of order)

1. Read the text (the paragraphs are out of order). Then do the tasks which follow. Sum up the reasons for travelling that Mark Wallington mentions in his essay.

A

So I turned to its personal significance: was I escaping from something? Was I turning my back on the nine-to-five monotony of the working week? Unlikely, I didn’t have a ________. Was I then perhaps setting out as a protest? Or was I searching for the Man Within, the Real Me, was spiritual development my goal? No, I couldn't convince myself, and in the end the best ________ I could come up with was I thought I might impress this girl I’d met at a party before Christmas.

B

But try telling people that. They’ll say, “Yes, but why are you doing it?" They want a declaration, an objective that gives the trip a plot; something of the "To ________ Vikings could have done it in open boats", kind of thing.

C

Now, as motives go this may sound one of the less impressive, but at this point I think it's worthwhile looking back through ________ at the various voyages of discovery and making note of just how many pioneers set out not to chart the unknown and extend the limits of human endurance but to impress girls they'd met at parties. You'll find none of them did, which I think is a shame. If only one of the great ________ could have stepped off his mountain or boat and instead of delivering some ________ speech concerning Man and Destiny, have announced that he did it to impress Debbie whom he met round at Doug's place a fortnight before, then the world would be a better place – we'd probably still think it was flat, but it would be better.

D

The best journeys have no motives. They are insignificant little affairs, made for no other reason than they exist, for no other goal than ________.

E

I'd thought long and hard to try and give my walk round the Cornish coast some kind of purpose, but had found it difficult. To begin with I'd considered its geographical implication, but as a journey it wasn't original enough. Devon had no lost tribes, Cornwall no rivers with sources ________. I was going to hike round the peninsular coastal path and I was unlikely to prove anything about the earth that couldn't already be looked up in any atlas of the area. I wasn't even going to be the first person to walk the path in its entirety; my test was purely one of physical strength and endurance; if I wanted to get myself in the record books I'd have to walk it ________ or blindfold.

(from 500 Mile Walkies by Mark Wallington)

1. Decide on the correct order of the paragraphs.

2. Decide where the following words should come in the text: adventures, backwards, fun, history, job, meaningless, prove, reason, undiscovered.

3. Make up a title for the text.