Stephen Graham - The Gentle Art of Tramping

My secrets in the wind and open sky,

There is no longer any Time to lose;

The world is young with laughter we can fly

Among the imprisoned hours as we choose!

The rushing minutes pause; an unused Day

Breaks into dawn and cheats the tired sun;

The birds are singing. Hark! Come out and play!

There is no hurry! Life has just begun.

Algernon Blackwood

Contents

I spent over six years abroad on adventures before it ever occurred to me to explore my own country. Like many young people I found the place where I grew up to be stultifying and infuriating. I wanted out. So I did my time, by bike and boot and backpack, exploring the ends of the earth. Along the way I discovered that I loved simplicity, endurance, wilderness, and eccentricity. I travelled myself restless, learning that I would always suffer from wanderlust and struggle with the routines of normal life.

I used to think I was weird. That at regular intervals I needed to turn off my computer and go sleep on a hill for the night, or just run howling into the nearest woodland river. And perhaps that is a little odd, but stumbling upon Stephen Graham back in 2011 assured me that at least I was not alone.

First published in 1926, The Gentle Art of Tramping suffers a little with its title. The modern reader would do well to swap the word Tramping for Hiking, Backpacking, or simply Being Outdoors. It is, essentially, a fabulous how-to guide to all of these things, combined with wry humour, philosophical musings on living a full life, and enjoyably dated advice on gear:

A collar and tie may be secreted in a pocket of the knapsack to be unwillingly put on when it is necessary to visit a post-office or a bank, a priest, or the police. But otherwise we go forth with free necks and throats, top button of shirt preferably undone.

The modern-day adventurer all shiny Gore-Tex and smartphones will find little useful equipment advice, but will enjoy Grahams recommendations from almost a century ago. I get exasperated with how often people ask me about equipment needs for going on adventures, as if it is only possible to leave the office in gear more fitting to the Himalayas. Grahams advice here is pertinent: The less you carry the more you will see, the less you spend the more you will experience.

The true pleasure from The Gentle Art of Tramping is how much of the lifestyle Graham espouses is still relevant today, perhaps even more so in this crazy era of constantly being busy. He urges us to escape (if only for a weekend) the constraints of careers we hate, to cease to be identified by ones salary or by ones golf handicap. It is a simple thing, though many of us build it up to seem prohibitively complex, to get out of the city into an air that is refreshing and free. You liberate yourself from the tacit assumption of your everyday life. I have, since 2011, derived so much calmness and enjoyment from small, simple acts, such as spending a night in the open air, following my nose cross-country for a day or a week, and perhaps most of all from seeking out refreshing swims wherever I go. Graham too was a convert, recognising that The morning swim is such an embellishment of the open-air life that many are tempted to plan their whole expedition with that in view. I couldnt agree more.

Graham doesnt only write about bucolic, comfortable days out in the sunshine. He is a fan, as I am, of longer tramps of a hearty dose of masochism and misery. You learn a great deal about yourself on long, difficult journeys. You also discover the true character of any companion you choose to tackle a challenging tramp with. Graham is full of wisdom on this subject, noting that There is perhaps no greater test of friendship than going on a long tramp and that You cannot tell till youve spent a night in the rain, or lost the way in the mountains, and eaten all the food, whether you have both stout hearts and a readiness for every fate.

From my own experiences, I have learned to travel slowly Measure a tramp by the time taken rather than by the miles. A couple of summers ago I spent a month walking through northern Spain. It was a journey that felt like the perfect accumulation of all that I had learned from The Gentle Art of Tramping . I lived like a vagrant, sleeping under the stars, on a frugal budget of less than a handful of Euros a day. In the whole month I walked a mere 500 miles, a distance I could have covered in a day by bus. It was a magnificent experience, though difficult, but time is always kind to the memory of hungry, uncomfortable nights sleeping on hilltops: Nothing in the present ever seems so good as what is past.

And the modern adventurer would do well also to remember Grahams cautioning against boasting, or travelling merely to tell the tale, to show off on social media. Beware of going to Jerusalem, he warns, in order that you may come back and tell the world you have been. It spoils all you found on the way.

I am thrilled that The Gentle Art of Tramping is being shared to a new audience once again. It will provide entertainment, advice, and food for thought for all of us who love getting away from the world out into the peaceful wild places.

This book reminds us all that In tramping you are not earning a living, but earning a happiness.

Alastair Humphreys, 2018

Author of Microadventures: Local Discoveries For Great Escapes

It is a gentle art; know how to tramp and you know how to live. Manners makyth man, and tramping makyth manners. Know how to meet your fellow wanderer, how to be passive to the beauty of Nature and how to be active to its wildness and its rigour. Tramping brings one to reality.

If you would have a portrait of Man you must not depict him in high hat and carrying in one hand a small shiny bag, nor would one draw him in gnarled corduroys and with red handkerchief about his neck, nor with lined brow on a high bench watching a hand that is pushing a pen, nor with pick and shovel on the road. You cannot show him carrying a rifle, you dare not put him in priests garb with conventional cross on breast. You will not point to King or Bishop with crown or mitre. But most fittingly you will show a man with staff in hand and burden on his shoulders, striving onward from darkness to light upon an upward road, shading his eyes with his hand as he seeks his way. You will show a figure something like that posthumous picture of Tolstoy, called Tolstoy pilgrimaging toward eternity.

So when you put on your old clothes and take to the road, you make at least a right gesture. You get into your right place in the world in the right way. Even if your tramping expedition is a mere jest, a jaunt, a spree, you are apt to feel the benefits of getting into a right relation toward God, Nature, and your fellow man. You get into an air that is refreshing and free. You liberate yourself from the tacit assumption of your everyday life.

What a relief to escape from being voter, taxpayer, authority on old brass, brother of man who is an authority on old brass, author of a bestseller, uncle of an author of a bestseller. What a relief to cease being for a while a grade-three clerk, or grade-two clerk who has reached his limit, to cease to be identified by ones salary or by ones golf handicap. It is undoubtedly a delicious moment when Miles the gardener, seeing you coming along in tramping rig, omits to touch his hat as you pass. Of course it is part of the gentle art not to be offended. It is no small part of the gentle art of tramping to learn to accept the simple and humble role and not to crave respect, honour, obeisance. It is a mistake to take to the wilderness clad in new plus-fours, sports jacket, West-End tie, jewelled tie-pin, in gaiters, or carrying a silver-topped cane. One should not carry visiting cards, but try and forget the three-storied house, remembering Diogenes and his tub.