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For me, it started as a child with one of those little wooden jigsaw maps of the U.S., where's there's crocodiles on Florida and apples on Washington state. That was my very first map.

I've been working with the land for most of my life; walking it and photographing it. And I love it to bits.

I had a place in England and was commuting from England to Australia, which is pretty stupid, but after two years I sort of knew what I wanted to do, more or less.

I went through a lot of occupations. I was questioning my contribution to the world.

I have come from a background where I haven't had lots of money to put me on the map. I've had to work very hard for what I've got.

You know, we travelled a lot when I was a kid because my father was wherever the work was.

My father worked in agriculture, and I got to travel round remote rural areas with him and see a bit of the landscape and people.

I've worked behind counters serving food, and I've lived on the circus train, and I've led bicycle tours in Eastern Europe and the Balkans and Russia. I've been a key liner for a newspaper, I've done typesetting. Oh, all sorts of things.

I grew up under the spell of London. Illustrator Kerry Lee's evocative 1950 wall map of the city hung above our breakfast table at home in Canada. Over my corn flakes, I traced the capital's high roads and medieval alleys.