Cycling UK Forum

Hi all,

Just wondering something - I did a lot of stealth camping, wildcamping or whatever you want to call it in South America and I'd say I'm quite experienced in it. But out there it tends to be wilderness very friendly small-scale farming communities who are only too happy to grant you permission to camp in their fields. I'm a bit anxious about doing it here as I just imagine people being a lot more suspicious of some bloke with a tent and bicycle. Any experiences or tips?

Always best to seek permission if you can. Lone backpackers or cycle tourists are not very threatening and are generally well received. I'm often surprised and overwhelmed by the generous hospitality of complete strangers. Pubs are often good places for initial enquiries.

Sadly on the rare occasions that I've been refused its often the behaviour of previous campers that is cited as the reason.

In Scotland you have the right to wild-camp, with some sensible restrictions. See http://www.outdooraccess-scotland.com/sites/default/files//docs/Scottish_Outdoor_Access_Code_-_Part_2_Access_rights.pdf.

Thanks Norman - that's good to know. I guess things are never as bad as you imagine them to be.

Pitch late, leave early. Wild camping in the UK is easiest from Autumn to Spring.

Hi there Longhaultrucking, the advice given by the earlier respondents is true, and because you're already a dab hand at this in far flung places, you might find my little guide for wildcamping in UK and Ireland helpful. http://www.farawayvisions.com/wild-camping-beginners-guide/

A lady in my cycling club who does a lot of wild-camping in England advises to be careful of what may happen on farmland at night. It may seem like a useful trick to go through a field gate and conceal yourself behind a dry-stone wall or a hedge, and indeed she has often done that. But she has discovered that farmers may:

- Drive around their fields in the dark in tractors or quadbikes, sometimes without lights, not expecting to find tents in their fields
- Make stock movements at night, so the empty field you put your tent up in can be full of cows when you awake

And you really don't want to camp in a field full of cows. They can trample your tent, even with you in it. People have been seriously injured like that. I have a couple of times had to contend with a herd of cows coming through where I was wild camping, in places where I had no reason to suspect it, and this is really the most worrying thing that has happened to me. My wife once had to deal with a thief cutting into her tent with a knife while she was in it, which would have been even more worrying.

In the hills just go for it. Low profile helps. In rural lowland areas ask.
Pub often are helpful especially when you say that you want to eat and sleep in the same place and they do bar food.

iviehoff wrote:A lady in my cycling club who does a lot of wild-camping in England advises to be careful of what may happen on farmland at night. It may seem like a useful trick to go through a field gate and conceal yourself behind a dry-stone wall or a hedge, and indeed she has often done that. But she has discovered that farmers may:

- Drive around their fields in the dark in tractors or quadbikes, sometimes without lights, not expecting to find tents in their fields
- Make stock movements at night, so the empty field you put your tent up in can be full of cows when you awake

And you really don't want to camp in a field full of cows. They can trample your tent, even with you in it. People have been seriously injured like that. I have a couple of times had to contend with a herd of cows coming through where I was wild camping, in places where I had no reason to suspect it, and this is really the most worrying thing that has happened to me.

That's happened to me a few times too, though I find cows tend to keep away from the tent. I wonder if farmers do it deliberately.

khain wrote:

iviehoff wrote:And you really don't want to camp in a field full of cows. They can trample your tent, even with you in it. People have been seriously injured like that. I have a couple of times had to contend with a herd of cows coming through where I was wild camping, in places where I had no reason to suspect it, and this is really the most worrying thing that has happened to me.

That's happened to me a few times too, though I find cows tend to keep away from the tent. I wonder if farmers do it deliberately.

Woke up with a bull standing on the corner of the tent about four inches from my head a few years ago in Harris.
Got up pretty quick and out of tent to encourage it to move on.

lucky you it looks as if it was about to drop some stuff

Holy crap if he does a drop you really want to have the highest waterproof rating from that tent!

Yes, that sounds scary to me, and that is one of the reasons I never trespass gates into a closed field.
If I have to, I prefer to find a quiet road and look for woodland that has a patch of flat and decently clear soil. The more distant is form the road or the path, the better it is.
Of course, one needs to put on some Mtb overshoes to not end in drenched feet.

Blimey, that bull is enormous!

I once had to get out of bed in the middle of the night to scare off a rutting stag in Glen Etive, that was wandering round the tent making an awful racket.

My efforts at using the flash of my camera to scare it off were unsuccessful but at least I got this (admittedly crap) photo.

Rather an interesting pic, and post in that the forum robot censor clearly allows crap, but not micturate (never knew that last word existed until the robocensor changed a pretty innocent usage of mine.

khain wrote:Blimey, that bull is enormous!

I once had to get out of bed in the middle of the night to scare off a rutting stag in Glen Etive, that was wandering round the tent making an awful racket.

My efforts at using the flash of my camera to scare it off were unsuccessful but at least I got this (admittedly crap) photo.

looks more like a werewolf, u had a lucky escape