Everyone has them, surely: dirty little secrets about their personal tramping habits.

We all have a secret tramping shame, I theorise. A shame held within, clutched tightly like a cuddly toy at bedtime. 

I was in a mountain lodge when my friend Jason (yes, Jason of the Tinder article, Wilderness July 2022) volunteered to make me a coffee. I had made him one the day before, so he saw this offer as reciprocal; fair’s fair. 

“Nope, no worries, I’ll sort it,” I said. 

He insisted. 

“No, it’s fine, I’ll do it.”

He insisted further. He would really like to make me a morning coffee. 

“No, I’m fussy with my weird coffee, so I’ll do it.”

Jason’s coffee is supremely simple: a teaspoon of instant coffee, hot water and a dash of milk. Respectable. 

“Just tell me how to make it,” he insisted. “Half a teaspoon of coffee, three turns left, half a teaspoon of milk, one turn to the right, hop four times, wave it at the sun and serve?”

“Okay, seriously, I’m trying to hide my secret coffee shame from you. It’s a teaspoon of instant decaf, a teaspoon of sugar, and a disgusting amount of that instant Jarrah coffee mix, no milk, just hot water and a dash of cold.”

“Like three teaspoons of Jarrah?”

“Maybe more, like five?”

Jason looked on with revolt as I constructed my complicated morning drink. And as I sipped, I thought about those of us who have secret tramping foibles. 

Another tramping friend takes along her pyjamas. Others wear their merinos or polyprops to bed, but she quietly gets changed into her fuzzy PJs, in the dark so nobody notices, depriving them of the opportunity to heap their scorn on her for carrying such an unnecessary and wholly frivolous item. 

I’ll admit I, too, occasionally take proper nightwear. I tramped to Blyth Hut on Mt Ruapehu recently with some friends for a night of toasting marshmallows by the fire. It’s only a short (1.5hr) walk, and I took my warm pink PJ set. We had an extremely pleasant evening in front of a roaring fire on a cold autumn night, eating toasted marshmallows the colour of my PJs. Another time I took a pink onesie with black paw prints on it. Two hunters looked at me, exchanged glances, packed up and left without a word. 

Jason admits, too, that he often takes a pair of lightweight pyjamas when tramping. This is because, as a healthy Large Format Male, he generates a lot of heat inside his sleeping bag and often ends up sweating directly on to the down bag itself – not great for longevity (of the bag, not Jason). 

He posed a hygiene question to me: “Sometimes I unzip the bag and end up lying partly on the plastic mattress; it’s sweaty skin on mattress. Am I supposed to clean it afterwards?” (Dear reader, answers on a postcard please.) I said yes, for general health and wellbeing in this Covid-inflicted age we live in. Readers, you will surely have questions at this point: Has he ever cleaned the mattress? Why doesn’t he take a silk liner? Can a list of huts where he has recently sweated onto plastic be provided so we can avoid them? 

Nightwear has further application in the tramping world. A friend, Alex, returned from the Heaphy and commented: “It’s so easy you could do it in Crocs and a nightie.” So three of us ladies tramped it wearing frilly nighties over merino tops and leggings. It was entirely comfortable and practical and made for excellent group pictures as well as on-track and in-hut conversations with astounded onlookers.  

Facebook’s targeted advertising has more recently decided that the ‘Oodie’ is for me. It’s a sort of oversized fleecy hoodie that only teenagers should wear, a mixture of blanket/hoodie/dressing gown. They look bulky, but are potentially lightweight and thoroughly enjoyable in front of a fireplace inside a hut that’s not too far from a road end. They’d probably go well with Crocs. I shall report back.