Local Discoveries for Great Escapes
Alastair Humphreys
Adventure is available on a Tuesday night within five miles of your front door — stop waiting.
Humphreys — who cycled around the world — discovered that the biggest barrier to adventure isn't time or money, it's inertia. Microadventures are small, local, and cheap, and people who do them regularly report dramatically higher satisfaction.
Everything Humphreys wants you to walk away with
Adventure is a state of mind: enthusiasm, ambition, open-mindedness, and curiosity. You don't need to cross deserts or climb mountains. If it stretches you mentally, physically, or culturally, it counts. You just have to seek it out.
Waiting for all your stars to align guarantees the adventure will never happen. Waiting until you simultaneously have loads of money and plenty of time is daft. Something too difficult? Do an easier version. Just make sure you do something.
The adventurous soul with a proper job has to be determined to make the most of weekends rather than spending them at IKEA or watching TV. For every sacrificed hour of sleep, you receive one glorious hour somewhere beautiful. It's a fair swap.
Get the 9 to 5 out of the way and then cram the rest with activity. Sleep on a hilltop with a Scotch egg. You might look crumpled walking into work, but it's a small price to pay. A sleeping bag on a hill is all you need to be happy.
Think big, then think small — what's the first tiny step you need to take? Then start small. Lower the threshold until there is no excuse left not to go. The very best hill is the one close to where you live.
One way to shift your perspective is visiting a familiar place at an unfamiliar time. A night walk through your own neighborhood reveals a different world. Seek out wildness and adventure close to home. The more you look, the more you find.
Humphreys grabbed a sleeping bag, walked into his garden, and counted stars and satellites. He woke as the sun rose feeling more relaxed than any normal morning. Exercise in the park instead of the gym. Have breakfast outdoors. Eat dinner outside on a cold night.
Cycle to the biggest cathedral in your county, or the newest restaurant, or the oldest museum. Ride to a friend's house and arrive unannounced. Visit your parents' birthplaces. The method matters less than the movement.
Humphreys has spent over a thousand nights sleeping outdoors. Maybe ten were in proper campsites. Adventure is all around us, at all times. Getting into the wild is more invigorating and important than ever.
A microadventure is a refresh button for busy lives. The point isn't to prove anything — it's to test whether small doses of wildness, novelty, and presence make your ordinary life feel fuller. For most people, they absolutely do.
These notes are inspired by direct excerpts and woven together into a readable guide you can follow from start to finish.
By Alastair Humphreys
Adventures teach you about the world and about yourself. They bring focus, purpose and perspective — benefits too important not to share with as many people as possible. That impulse led to the concept of the microadventure: an effort to break down the barriers to adventure so that anyone can experience them.
Definition
A microadventure is not a diluted, inferior version of an adventure — it is an adventure. Adventure is a state of mind, a spirit of trying something new and leaving your comfort zone. It is about enthusiasm, ambition, open-mindedness and curiosity. You do not need to fly to the other side of the planet to find wilderness and beauty. A microadventure is an adventure that is close to home: cheap, simple, short, and yet very effective. It captures the essence of big adventures — the challenge, the fun, the escapism, the learning experiences and the excitement — condensed into a weekend away or even a midweek escape.
Adventure is stretching yourself — mentally, physically or culturally — doing something you do not normally do, pushing yourself hard and doing it to the best of your ability. You do not need to be an elite athlete, expertly trained, or rich. Even people living in big cities are not very far from small pockets of wilderness. Adventure is all around you, at all times, even during hard financial times — times when getting out into the wild is more invigorating and important than ever. Think of a microadventure as a refresh button for busy lives, and give yourself permission to regain a childlike enjoyment of wild places.
The excuses vary, but the essence remains: “One day I want adventure in my life, but unfortunately it can’t be right now.” Waiting for all your stars to align is a guaranteed way to ensure the adventure you crave will never happen. Waiting until you somehow, suddenly and simultaneously have both loads of money and plenty of time is daft.
If something suggested here seems too difficult, do an easier version. If something is too easy, make it harder. Mould it and adapt it to your own situation — just make sure you do something. If you travel slowly and with a smile on your face, you will meet different people, have interesting conversations, and learn something new about the world and about yourself. You might cycle to the biggest cathedral or sports stadium in your county, or the newest restaurant, or the oldest museum. Ride to a friend’s house and arrive unannounced.
If you want to start incorporating microadventures into your life, the most important thing to do is change your perspective. Begin seeking out wildness and adventure close to home, in seemingly familiar and humdrum places. The more you look, the more you will find. One way to help this mind shift is by going somewhere you know very well, but at night. Microadventures are about looking at familiar places in fresh ways.
Consider running home from a party or an evening out. Running through city streets after a night out is a way to see your city differently and discover new parts of it. You could also visit your parents’ birthplaces — turn personal history into a reason to travel.
If you add up all your weekends, statutory leave and bank holidays, you have about 130 free days each year. The trouble is the fragmented nature of these days, so you have to be determined to make the most of your weekends rather than frittering them away.
Key Insight
Get up early and you’ll have time to get up high. For every sacrificed hour of sleep you receive, in exchange, one glorious hour somewhere beautiful. It’s a fair swap.
There are many ways to enjoy the countryside by bike — purpose-built trails at a mountain bike trail centre are a good way to test yourself and improve your skills. Coasteering is an exciting, challenging and fun way of exploring rocky coastline. You can also find a taster weekend course in something you’ve never done before: climbing, kayaking, sailing, photography, bird watching or mushroom foraging. Search online for local options.
Sometimes escaping can be as simple as fetching your sleeping bag and a head torch, grabbing a pillow and a book, and walking into your garden to sleep outside. The novelty alone is refreshing. The night is full of distractions — noisier than you might expect, with a gentle breeze rustling the trees. You can count stars and satellites. Waking as the sun rises, realising you slept in your garden (something you may not have done since childhood), you feel more relaxed and cheerful than usual first thing in the morning.
Action List
Many adventurous alter egos are restricted by 9-to-5 jobs. But what about the 5-to-9? Those 16 hours of freedom between leaving work in the evening and returning the next day? Get the 9-to-5 out of the way and then cram the rest with as much activity as possible. Life is more complicated — longer hours, evening commitments — but at least consider it: what adventure could you squeeze in between 5pm and 9am, if only just once?
Sleeping on a hilltop is a cheap and straightforward microadventure. A sleeping bag and a Scotch egg on top of a hill may be all you need for a quick fix of re-focusing, re-prioritising and contentment. Strolling into work you might look a bit crumpled, especially if you used your bundled-up suit as a hilltop pillow, but it’s a small price to pay.
Principle
The very best hill is the one close to where you live — that makes it more likely you will actually go and climb it. If you have difficulty climbing a hill, sleep in a field, a cave, a snow hole, a cemetery, or even your garden. Just squeeze an adventure into your 5-to-9. And if you learn that you actually are happiest just staying at home, congratulations — that’s a nice thing to realise.
In a busy city it is easy to forget that somewhere out there are fields and rivers and peace. Commuter microadventures are the very epitome of seeking out fragments of beauty in built-up places.
Getting off the roads and following fields and footpaths is when a journey starts to feel good. The air fills with the distinctive aroma of summer evenings — cut grass, willowherb and cow parsley. When rain comes, choose not to let it annoy you: “there is nothing either good or bad, but thinking makes it so.” If you can persuade yourself to enjoy rain, it can feel sublime, especially in summertime.
One way to engage with the wild world is to pit your wits and skills against it by trying to catch a fish. There is something deeply relaxing about spending a couple of hours beside a river.
Entering a race is a way to do something difficult that serves as a stepping stone towards other, bigger adventures. Events that are already organised are the simplest to commit to, and since committing is by far the hardest part of any adventure, entering a race is a straightforward way of starting off.
Persistence is the key to doing almost anything interesting in life — you’ve just got to get out there and do it, making the very most of now. Sleeping under the stars without a tent is a powerful experience the first time you try it. Add an espresso and a bacon sandwich, a swim in the sea and a fast bike ride to work and you have a happy start to a working day.
Heading into the hills produces a distinct lightness in your step and a release of pressure all over your body. You breathe more easily. Several factors contribute: being somewhere new, away from places you associate with stress or boredom; being unable to address (and therefore less inclined to worry about) all the busy, annoying demands of life; a slowing down in your pace of thought; and the simple pleasures of fresh air, natural scenery and physical exercise.
The key perspective is to see these outings not as big, complicated hassles, but as something you can do on a normal, commuting weekday. In no time at all you are back at the station, back into the city, swallowed up by the busy world once more.
Key Insight
By all means dream of big adventures and begin planning to make them happen. But why not concoct the smallest possible distillation of your big idea and begin with that? If you want to cycle round the world, first try cycling across England. If you want to climb K2, begin with some local hills. If you want to walk to the North Pole, see if you can hack walking across your county.
Just a couple of hours’ ride or walk from any city will take you to somewhere new, somewhere wild, somewhere beautiful. And when the alternative would have been to do nothing, you can feel pretty happy with more or less making it from coast to coast in whatever short chunk of spare time you have available.
Being out in wild places can leave you feeling uplifted, at peace and inspired in a way you rarely feel in the “real world.” You stop fretting about work, your bank balance or future ambitions. Out there you are able to just live in the present and relish it.
Credit card cycle touring is popular for people who like the idea of a bike tour but prefer a hotel to a bike laden with a tent — a very pleasant way to travel. Even an ordinary day out on your bike can feel transformed when you follow a famous route, viewing everything through different eyes and daydreaming like a child on the downhills.
Bivvying in rural spots is even simpler than finding a B&B for the night — the simplest, most relaxing accommodation there is. The views and atmosphere beat a 5-star hotel, though the bed is a little less comfortable and the mini bar is BYO. Travelling ultra-light means absolutely no spare clothes and a bin bag for a raincoat. A disadvantage is having nothing to use as a pillow — the solution is to strip off, bundle your clothes up for a pillow, and climb into your sleeping bag.
Action List — Famous Routes at Microadventure Pace
It can be as simple as stopping at a supermarket, loading a basket with food and a bottle or two of cheap red wine, and heading out of town. It is so easy to escape — from a town, from a computer, from a routine — if only you take the difficult step of making it happen. You don’t need to be heading somewhere particularly beautiful or planning anything exciting: you just want to get away, or give yourself the illusion of getting away, for a night. Sleeping in a wood is a perfect way of doing this.
Consider the full range of landscapes available to you: river, mountain, ocean, lake, desert, islands, urban, and underground. Dungeness is Britain’s only desert. For an underground option, Great Douk Cave to Middle Washfold is an excellent first underground adventure — search online for advice.
Rivers are a superb starting point for hatching microadventure plans. When you have a frog’s-eye view, the world suddenly becomes wild, wherever you may be. The perspective from which you look at the world dictates how it reflects back at you. A full moon swim is a magical thing.
Principle
Even when the water is cold, you never regret going for a bracing wild swim — you just perhaps dread it a little in advance. Wild swimming is a metaphor for attempting difficult stuff in life: daunting in anticipation, tricky at first, not nearly as bad as you expected once you get going, and delightful, rewarding and uplifting once you have accomplished it. Tip-toe in and surprise yourself. Try to include a wild swim in every microadventure you do.
Walking along a holloway — a sunken path worn down over time by millions of feet — is an impressive visual reminder of all the footsteps and all the stories that came before. For a few days, you move no faster than your feet can carry you.
Generating an illusion of remoteness and distance is almost as refreshing as the real thing. Unrolling your sleeping bag on soft sand and falling asleep looking up at the stars, listening to waves rolling onto a private, secret beach — that is a sea microadventure at its best.
A realistic back-to-basics microadventure means packing a frugal amount of food, a few tea bags and a box of matches, leaving the smartphone behind, heading out alone into the woods and attempting to still your racing mind. Food tastes better when you’ve earned it.
The stuff you encounter, the things you see, the thoughts you think along the way — these will probably be more interesting than the random point on the map you picked as a destination. But without having that destination to aim for in the first place, you are unlikely to do the hardest part of any adventure: begin.
Action
Roll a dice to decide your plans: 1 = bike, 2 = walk, 3 = run, 4 = swim, 5 = canoe, 6 = you decide.
The worst thing that can happen is that you hate it and decide that actually you love your normal life and a warm, comfy bed more than you had realised — and that’s not a bad conclusion to reach. But it is more likely that you will treasure the microadventure and get a better perspective on your normal life, the “real world” that lies off your island and across the cold, clear lake. Grab a chance and you won’t be sorry for a might-have-been.
A regular theme of this book is conjuring up arbitrary journeys simply to create a reason for heading out the front door. You could ride from your primary school to senior school to university, or visit your great-grandparents’ graves. The point is simply to think of a journey that has meaning to you, and then go and do it.
Follow any river, any river on Earth, from its source down to the sea and you will find an interesting journey. The simplicity of life out on the river allows you to switch off from your thoughts and worries.
Key Insight
Busy people need microadventures to prevent the benefits of adventure from being squeezed out by the very busyness which makes it all the more vital. Adventure must not become a peripheral part of your life — a fun but occasional thing like a game of tennis or a trip to a circus. Adventure is more important than that.
Midweek microadventures are so invigorating, so good for the soul, that you’ll more than make up for lost hours with better quality work once you return.
Action List — Staying Warm
Even the illusion of wildness — those tiny forgotten pockets squeezed behind your town — can refresh the soul. But there is still something extra special about the proper wild places.
Definition — Type 2 Fun
Type 2 fun is ploughing stubbornly forwards in the hope of one day gaining retrospective pleasure. All misery is acceptable — the theory goes — in the hope that at some indeterminate point in the future, you will look back at this moment and be glad you persevered.
A lot of the microadventures in this book feel as though you are just playing — and it took some time to not worry about that, not to feel defensive or fear it was a waste of time. Children play because it is fun and escapism, but also because they are learning and developing.
Building a wild hut from natural materials and then sleeping in it is a memorable experience. You can construct separate beds with a three-sided pyramid roof above, cutting branches to the right length and tying them together with biodegradable garden twine — the only man-made material in the structure. Whether you have a warm, comfortable night depends completely on your own hard work and skills.
Action List — Other Things to Try to Build
There is a good rule for travel: the slower your journey, the richer the experience will be. It’s exciting to head into the unknown — all the greatest adventures are marinated with the spice of uncertainty, and the same applies on a quiet Wednesday afternoon on a gentle river in a small town. Inner tubes can transform from fabulous watercraft to fabulous armchairs, perfect for digging out enamel mugs and toasting an epic river journey.
When you’re in the city, escaping seems as though it ought to be more difficult than jumping on the 5:15pm train, meeting your mates for a quick pint, and sauntering up a grassy slope in the same clothes you wore in meetings all day. The hint of gentle madness and subversiveness is one of the best bits about microadventures — telling someone at work “I’m just meeting a few friends for a meal. On top of a hill” draws looks of amusement, astonishment, and envy.
The sweet vagabond’s perfume of campfire smoke lingers on your clothes into the next morning, mingling with the commuters’ aftershave and polystyrene coffees on the train back to town. Einstein said that “creativity is the residue of time wasted,” and you can certainly do worse with an evening than sitting around a fire with your friends.
Key Insight
Persuade your friends that the next time you all meet up, you should do it on a hilltop. It’s nothing particularly different — you’ll spend time together, eat good food, drink and laugh together, and be back on your normal train into work the next morning. It’s nothing particularly different, but it is so different that you’ll still be talking about it a year from now.
Cool moons and seasonal moments are worth planning a microadventure around. Search online for precise dates: Spring Equinox, Summer Solstice, Autumn Equinox, Winter Solstice, Harvest moon, Supermoon, Blue moon, Lunar eclipse.
Travel from the highest point of your county to the lowest. An ingenious beer-can camping stove is a masterpiece of frugal, manly minimalism. And take on a simple campaign: from now on, don’t just leave no litter in the countryside — actively take home a little bit of extra litter and help improve the countryside for everyone.
Action List — County Challenges
Principle — Rules of the Bivvy Challenge
Rules are for the obedience of fools and the guidance of the wise.
This is an adventure to stir the soul. Set sail from your home, head out and keep going until you return. It could be a lake or a loch, your county, a small island, or even a ring road. Don’t plan too much — just go.
Try removing your watch. Challenge yourself not to care about the time, about where you are or where you are going, but only to enjoy where you are right now. Go with the sea on your left, or on your right. Keep going, following that coastline, into whatever experiences and landscapes it throws up. Let the journey unfurl like the road before you. ‘Tis not too late to seek a newer world.
One of the easiest yet most enjoyable ways of hatching a microadventure plan is to simply recreate somebody else’s journey. Two themes that lend themselves to replication are historical journeys or journeys made in books.
Many microadventures feel childlike — in a good way, not “childish.” Building a raft in the sunshine can remind you of childhood, playing beside a river. Enjoying a journey even more knowing that someone made the same trip a hundred years ago is part of the magic — the views that different generations enjoyed can be identical even a century apart, as can the simple enjoyment of paddling very slowly through the countryside.
A triathlon of challenging microadventures through fine landscapes — mountain biking cross-country to the sea, paddling over the sea to the mountains, then attempting a formidable ridge — is an exceptional kind of experience. Failing at such a challenge is impressive in itself. Britain is not a particularly rugged place, and you don’t tend to get beaten by the landscapes, so there’s a twisted satisfaction in being humbled by ancient, awesome mountains.
Key Insight
Mountains do not care how you fare on their slopes and summits. They were around for millions of years before your quests began, and they’ll still be standing, beautiful yet uncaring, when future generations feel the same restless, timeless urge to test themselves. Go and pit your wits, your skills, your guts, your luck against them. You might win, you might lose, but they don’t care either way. Maybe that’s part of their appeal. It’s a good metaphor for doing big stuff in life: do it for the doing, not for the praise of others.
For someone cursed with eternal “fernweh” — a German word meaning a craving for distant places — microadventures have been an excellent tonic. All you need is something challenging, somewhere new, and a bit of imagination.
To prove that microadventure is more about attitude and imagination than having access to great wilderness, you can seek adventure in the most boring place you can think of. Walking a lap of a motorway, for instance, proves a point: step just a fraction away from the main road, away from the conventional route that everyone else is taking, and you can see things differently, challenge yourself, and have novel, interesting experiences.
Principle
Modern life is played out in permanent sterility. We live in the light until we choose some hours of darkness. Getting back into the mindset and rhythm of life in the outdoors is a matter of stepping off the well-worn path — even slightly.
Create a calendar of microadventures that you can have throughout the year.
You might be able to borrow bits from a friend, and what you do have to buy can be bought cheaply or second-hand.
Principle — The Packing Test
For every item, ask: (1) Will I die or fail if I leave this behind? (2) Will I enjoy myself considerably less if I leave this behind? If you don’t answer “yes” to one of them, leave it behind.
Take all the basic kit, then layer on these upgrades as your confidence grows.
The bivvy bag goes on the outside of your sleeping bag. If you are organised, set this up before leaving home rather than later in the dark and rain. Pull the bivvy bag all the way up over your head, pull the drawcord as tight as you wish, then manoeuvre your head into the hood of your sleeping bag. It requires wiggling and fidgeting, but try to leave a small gap to breathe in order to minimise condensation build-up. You’ll soon get over the claustrophobia.
Panniers are the best way to carry your kit on a cycling adventure, but you’ll need to fit racks to your bike (on the back and perhaps the front too) and get hold of some panniers.
A twig-burning titanium stove appeals to both lightweight and bushcraft types, and is very eco-friendly compared to disposable gas canisters — though a carefully-positioned trio of stones achieves more or less the same job.
As a general rule, only light fires in places where nobody is likely to come by until all trace has grown out. If possible, dig a hole before lighting a fire — this keeps it out of the wind and contains the fire. Replacing the earth and turf in the morning (once the fire is absolutely extinguished) helps prevent ugly scorch marks. Never use soft, hollow or wet rocks as they could explode.
Begin with a small pile of tinder (dry grass, leaves or paper). Build a pyramid of kindling on top of it (very thin dry twigs). Have more kindling close to hand, as well as larger sticks and a few larger branches. All the wood you use at first must be dry; once the fire is roaring you can get away with damper stuff. The best is dead wood found hanging in trees rather than lying on the ground where it absorbs moisture. If cooking, build a pan-sized tripod of rocks in the fire to position the pan on, allowing air to circulate.
Key Insight — Corn on the Cob
Buy corn cobs still wrapped in the green leaves of their husks. Place them on the hot embers and turn occasionally. They will likely be the highlight of the whole meal and the best corn on the cob you’ve ever eaten, particularly if you bring butter and salt.
Photographing and filming trips can help you pay more attention to the places you are in and the way they make you feel. But the major caveat when considering gadgetry is to ensure that it adds to your experience rather than distracts from it. Trade tweets for birdsong. Take time away from your camera to sit still, really look, listen to the silence, feel the winter air nip your nose, and spend quality time either with yourself or with your fellow microadventurers.
Whether it is recognising birdsong, picking out stars, or knowing that Cirrostratus clouds suggest you won’t get rained on tonight — the more knowledge you have about the natural world you are immersed in, the more satisfying your microadventures will be.