Ahhh... the great outdoors, the sparkling brooks and pine-fresh air! What better way to charge up the soul than to commune with nature, to get tired and ravenous from long walks, to wake up at dawn with a white dew all around, and to rid your head of that nagging metaphysical ennui that plagues the weary minions in their fast-paced concrete jungles. Switch off your computers and pack your bags - we're going camping and preparing for a feast!

Food

Don't waste your time buying 'camping' food in a 'camping' store. There are many kinds of foods that are perfect for hikers:

• Energy boosters
• Dried eggs
• Bacon bits (to put in the dried eggs)
• English muffins, tortillas, pita bread
• Cheese
• Dried soups
• Dried fruit
• Margarine
• Dried milk
• Instant noodles with sauce
• Instant rice (an excellent quick meal is a bowl of instant rice made with just a little extra water, with a packet of dried soup thrown in - French onion or cream of broccoli are quite good this way.)

• Kendal mint cake is a great energy food - as are jelly (in block form, undiluted) and dextrose tablets.

• Small strongly-flavoured sweets are excellent for waking up your taste buds if you're going a long time between meals and are particularly nice for morale on long walks in miserable weather.

Know Your Nuts (and Berries)

Nuts and berries seem to grow virtually everywhere in the countryside. If you know what's what, they can make the basis of a meal, or a good snack. Blackberries are possibly the most common berry in Britain and go well with apples. Hazelnuts are also quite common in Britain. Elderberries are very refreshing; if you have the time, you might like to juice them for a thirst-quenching drink.

Dead nettles look exactly like ordinary stinging nettles, except for the long white flowers, (they won't sting you!) and if you pick one of the flowers and suck the base, you will get a short, sweet taste of nectar; a great energy boost! If you pick a stinging leaf by mistake and you end up getting stung, there should be a dock plant nearby. Pick a leaf, and scrunch it up a bit to get some of the juices flowing. Rub this on your sting - it should help to ease the pain.

Equipment

The camping stove is a luxury item, but essential if you want a hot meal. If you want margarine for your muffins and eggs, you'll need to buy some food tubes - plastic tubes with a screw cap at one end and an opening at the other. Fill these with your substance of choice, then use the clamp provided to seal the opening. Very handy - just be sure to pack them in Ziploc bags, in case they leak. You'll also need lots of water bottles, and a canteen. If you've got tins of food, take a proper tin opener - make sure it works! The type you find on a penknife sound like a good idea, but in the experience of many Researchers, they are too much trouble, especially if you are hungry! A sharp knife is incredibly useful and absolutely essential - conversely, a blunt knife is very, very frustrating.

Lighting a Fire

Dead wood still attached to trees is often put forward as a good substitute if all the fallen wood is soaking wet. After all, it should be drier than that lying on the ground (Old Man's Beard lichen makes a Good firestarting material apparently). However, the problem with any wood that is still connected to the tree is that you can not be sure that it really is dead. If you take wood that looks dead, but leave a wound, the tree can get infected and die. So you should only take dead wood from a tree if it is vital that you do so. Also, you don't know how long it has been dead on the tree, so it may still have sap, making it harder to burn.

Another thing to consider while your gathering wood is to also gather something to extinguish the fire. Loose dirt, sand or available water are great for putting out a small campfire safely, and these methods beat stomping on it with your shoe. Also remember to have a good clear area around the fire so it can't jump the gap. And if you're going to be building a fire on grass, dig out a sod slightly larger than the size of the fire you want to build, trying to keep it intact (easier said than done sometimes). Keep the sod somewhere, and light your fire within the small pit. Then, when you are finished and the fire is out, replace the sod and stamp it in firmly. This means you aren't burning grass or leaving your campsite in a mess when you leave. You can improve the likelihood of keeping the sod intact by making the mud you keep with it be 1.5 to 2 inches deep.