Gift guides
Gifts for someone who loves walking.
Eight gifts for the friend who already has the OS map and the boots. The under-the-obvious things that proper walkers actually appreciate.
The risk with buying for someone who walks a lot is that the obvious answers — OS maps, hiking poles, a Cicerone guide, a pair of decent socks — are obvious to you because they’re obvious to them. They already have all of those, plus a slightly second-hand opinion on which brand is best, plus a small mental list of the gifts they’ve been given that nearly worked. Boots that nearly fit. A waterproof that nearly breathes. A guidebook for a region they’ve already done.
So this list aims slightly under the obvious. None of these are the first thing that turns up when you Google gifts for hikers; all of them are things I’ve given or been given by walking friends and seen used. The walking book I make is second on the list, because for a walker who has just moved house, a fresh routing of their new postcode is a much better gift than another OS map sheet.
1. Properly good walking socks, the merino kind.
The unsexy first answer that turns out to be right. Most walkers own one pair of merino socks and wear them on their birthday. Three pairs of Bridgedale Coolmax in the right thickness, or two pairs of SmartWool Hike Light Crew, and they’ll be in the wash rotation for the next six years. The trick: ask their shoe size and pick the cushioning level (light/medium/heavy) by what they walk. Light = day walks. Medium = hill walks. Heavy = winter mountain.
2. A walking book routed from their front door.
The thing I make. The reason it sits at #2 for this audience — particularly if the walker has just moved — is that they don’t need the 50th OS Explorer sheet. They already have the maps. What they need, on the first weekend in a new house, is the curated answer: here are ten walks from this address, sorted into four lengths, each one with a route and a commentary. The book is generated against the recipient’s postcode, printed in the UK, with their name on the cover. Ten walks across short / morning / half-day / full-day, the same mixed-distance pack convention used by Cicerone and the AA Pathfinder series.
I refund if the address can’t support three real walks. Try it on their postcode — the demo is free and you can see the cover and the first walk before paying.
3. A National Trust or Slow Ways supporter membership.
The infrastructure gift. National Trust at the higher end (£79 single, £130 joint) unlocks a year of paths and parking. Slow Ways — the volunteer-mapped network of walking routes between every UK town — takes £5 supporters and is the more under-the-radar gift; the kind of walker who’s heard of it will be quietly delighted that you have too. CPRE and the Ramblers are the more political-and-thoughtful versions for the recipient who walks for both pleasure and access reasons.
4. A small Páramo or Buffalo waterproof, in the right colour.
The unsentimental upgrade. If the recipient is wearing a five-year-old Berghaus that has stopped breathing, this is the gift. Páramo, made in Colombia, are the British-cult-favourite alternative to Gore-Tex; the Velez smock is the right walker’s uniform. Buffalo Systems in Sheffield make the same thing for serious cold weather. Risk: the recipient already has one. Mitigation: ask their walking-WhatsApp friend before buying.
5. A copy of The Old Ways or Walking the Bones of Britain.
The book gift, but the right book. Robert Macfarlane’s The Old Ways is the canon; almost every serious walker owns it; the rare one who doesn’t will be glad to. Christopher Somerville’s Walking the Bones of Britain is the geological-walk pairing — less known, equally good. Persephone Books reprint Country Things by Alison Uttley if you want a curveball. Avoid: 365 Walks in Britain compendia. Useless and patronising.
6. A serious walking thermos.
The under-given gift that gets used every single walk. Stanley classic 0.5L for one person. Thermos 1L stainless for couples and dogs. The trick is keeping it small enough to fit in a daypack — the mistake most thermos gifts make is buying the giant 1.4L bear-defending one that lives in the boot of a car instead of going on the walk.
7. A Cicerone guide for a region they don’t know.
The thoughtful version of the obvious gift. Don’t buy a guide for the region they walk every weekend — they already have it, or they have an opinion about why they don’t. Buy a guide for somewhere they’ve mentioned wanting to go: the Brecon Beacons, the Highlands, the Pennine Way. Cicerone are the gold standard; Trailblazer the slightly-more-detailed alternative. Pair with: a small note saying let me know when, I’ll come.
8. A hand-bound logbook.
The romantic one. Smythson Panama paper is the best paper money can buy; Lazaccordion in Edinburgh do hand-stitched logbooks in waxed canvas covers around £40. Walkers who keep walk-logs are a small but passionate subset, and a proper bound book is the kind of thing they’d be glad to have but won’t buy themselves. Walkers who don’t keep logs will use this as a notebook for everything else, which is also fine.
How to choose.
If the walker has recently moved house, the walking book is the strongest single answer on this list, because no one else will give it and it solves a real first-Saturday problem. If they haven’t moved, but you know they’re working through bad socks, give the socks — you cannot misfire on three pairs of Bridgedales. If they have nearly everything except the right waterproof, and you’re willing to spend £250+, do the Páramo. If you’re trying to be thoughtful at £25, the Cicerone guide for the region they’ve mentioned (with the note) beats almost any £100 generic gift.
The one trap to avoid: buying a walker the gift that says I think your hobby is cute. Tea towels with footpath-sign motifs. Mugs with I’d rather be hiking on them. Anything sold in a National Trust gift shop that isn’t a map. Walkers know when their hobby is being patted on the head, and the gift goes in the same drawer as the candle.
A note on the second gift on this list
The walking book is the one I make.
If your walker has recently moved — or if you simply want them to have a small, curated, printed guide to their own ten walks — type their postcode into the demo on the homepage. The book draws the routes fresh from the address in about a minute, and you see the cover and the first walk before you decide.