Bradley Garrett offers an alternative reading of ‘urban exploration’. He contrasts my “virtual” study with the extended period of participant observation entailed in his three year study of urban exploration, and its “diverse and multifaceted community”. Garrett implies that only such long term immersion can reveal the full colour and polyphony of this community.

Urban exploration certainly does, at times, display a public image of apolitical benignity, aligned with notions of “leaving no trace” that conform with contemporary eco-tourism practices in order to garner public support, but Bennett never attempts to unravel that smoke screen to see what lies behind it.