The first summer I camped I left a small pile of things I could not be bothered to carry out, and I have thought about that pile for years. A piece on Camp Bits made me realise how little effort it would have taken. Here is how I do it now.

Everything comes out with me, including the things with no obvious place. Bottle caps, the plastic ring off a pack of sausages, tea bags, the crumbs at the bottom of the food box, the bit of foil that came off a chocolate bar at some point in the afternoon and vanished into the grass. I take a bin bag and treat it as part of the kit, not an afterthought.

Washing up happens well away from streams, with a bowl so I carry the water instead of pouring it. A small sponge and cold water do most of it. Food scraps get strained out and go in the bag. Soapy water goes on the ground, not into water that somebody downstream is drinking.

Fires stay small, and only where they are allowed. Some nights the honest answer is that there is no fire, which is a boring answer and the right one.

Staying on the path is less about rules and more about what a hundred pairs of boots do to a bank of moss. It does not grow back quickly.

In the evening I keep quiet, because sound carries in a valley in a way it never does in a town. Other people are trying to sleep, and the wildlife was here first. It costs nothing.

None of this is difficult. It is a little slower, and the place looks the same next time.