Start with the mindset

Low-impact camping isn't a list of expensive kit you have to buy. It's a way of moving through the hills so that the only evidence you were there is a flattened patch of grass that will spring back by the next morning. Most of us go to the hills precisely because they feel wild and undisturbed; the whole point is to keep them that way.

In practical terms, that means three things. First, leave no trace — nothing buried that shouldn't be, nothing burned that shouldn't be, nothing left behind at all. Second, give wildlife the right of way. Third, keep it quiet: choose a pitch out of sight and earshot of houses, paths and other people.

It also means thinking about numbers. A single well-behaved wild camper causes no harm; forty tents on the same grassy shelf above a tarn turns it into a muddy car park. If you arrive somewhere popular and the spot is already busy, walk on. There is always another pitch.

Choosing a pitch that gives back

The best pitch is usually one you have to walk an extra twenty minutes to find. Beyond that, look for ground that can take it.

• Choose durable surfaces: bare rock, gravel, or short, dry grass. Avoid moss, lichen, fragile heather and soft bog — these take years to recover.
• Stay 50–70 metres from water: tarns, streams and springs. It keeps your soap, food scraps and general disturbance out of the water supply.
• Avoid hollows and flat frost pockets: they are colder, wetter and often the exact spot where deer and sheep bed down.
• Look up before you lie down. Don't pitch under a lone mature tree or beneath dead branches — wind and lightning both have opinions.
• Check for ground-nesting birds between March and July. Curlew, lapwing and skylark nests are little more than a scrape in the grass, and you will not see them until you have already stood on one.

A small, low-profile tent in olive, green or dark grey goes almost unnoticed from a distance. Pitch late, leave early, and don't camp twice in the same spot if you can help it.

Lightweight kit, lighter footprint

Going light isn't just about your knees — every gram you carry is a gram of impact. A tarp or a small single-skin tent, a sleeping mat with a decent R-value, and a down or synthetic quilt will see you through most three-season nights in the British hills.

• Carry a trowel. A cheap plastic or alloy one weighs almost nothing and is the single most useful item in this whole article.
• Take a stove. A small gas or alcohol burner means no fire scars, no ash, no scorched turf.
• Pack out everything. That includes orange peel, tea bags, apple cores and used wet wipes. None of it belongs in the hills.
• Decant food into reusable bags to cut packaging before you set off, and take a spare bag for rubbish.
• Use rocks instead of pegs where the ground is thin, and put every one of them back where you found it.

Fires, and when to leave the matches at home

In most of upland Britain, the honest answer is: don't. Peat burns underground, heather and moorland catch in an instant, and a ground fire leaves a black scar that lasts for years. Many areas — including moorland and several national parks — now ban open fires and disposable barbecues outright, and forestry land is almost always off limits. Where fires are permitted, keep them small and contained.

• Use an established fire ring if one exists, and never build a new one on grass or peat.
• Try a mound fire: lay a groundsheet of mineral soil on a flat rock or bare patch, burn on top of it, then scatter the cold ash widely.
• Only dead wood, no thicker than your thumb, gathered from the ground. Never break branches from living trees.
• Douse, stir, douse again, then test with the back of your hand. Cold means cold.

Toilet etiquette: the bit nobody talks about

Plan for this before you go, because it will happen. Walk at least 30 metres from any water, path or pitch, and well away from anything that looks like a campsite. Use your trowel to dig a hole 15–20 centimetres deep — deep enough for the soil organisms to do their work, shallow enough that they still can.

Do your business, then deal with the paper. Burning it only works when it is genuinely safe to have a flame, and half-burned paper is worse than none. The reliable answer is to bag it and carry it out. Fill the hole, replace the turf, and scatter a little leaf litter over the top so it doesn't advertise itself.

For urine, move well away from water, paths and pitches, and use rock or gravel rather than vegetation. Deer and sheep are drawn to the salt in urine, and they will graze a patch of moss down to the bone to get at it.

Washing, waste and the walk out

Wash at least 50 metres from any stream or tarn, and use as little soap as possible — even the biodegradable sort. Better still, use plain hot water and a flannel, and save the proper wash for home.

Filter or boil your drinking water rather than relying on chemicals alone, and bring it to a rolling boil for a full minute at altitude. Before you leave, spend five minutes walking a slow circle of your pitch, picking up anything that isn't stone, grass or soil. If you can look back from a hundred metres away and see no sign that you were ever there, you have done it right. That is the whole craft of it, and it is worth learning well.