Keeping a bushwalk diary

[mikethepike]

I stared keeping a bushwalking diary about ten years ago and now have several exercise books of diary recording dozens of walks in the Flinders Ranges and interstate and NZ. It's just something that I've found interesting to do at the end of the walking day. whether walking solo or as part of a group. I've also kept diaries of several past family travel holidays interstate. Mostly, I haven't so far generally reread any of the diaries but expect they might be nice to read in my dotage. Last night I read (now don't take that the wrong way! ) my Bibbulman Track diary and it did remind me of a lot of details that I'd forgotten. Until I bought a digital camera a few years ago, I used to also do sketches in the diary rather than take a film camera. Even so, I think that diaries tell you things that photos can't. A couple of years ago I lost my hard-cover 'Tasmanian' diary at Launceston Airport when flying back to Melbourne and despite much effort by myself and a friend who lived nearby, never recovered it. It had the dairies of four previous visits over the previous 7 years. The walks were all memorable so I consider it a big loss. Funnily enough I helped a friend sail his boat from Hobart to Adelaide a few years ago and though I imagined myself diary writing like some kind of modern day Joshua Slocum, I never felt the inspiration to wrote a single sentence. Somehow just plotting location, barometer readings and sea conditions was enough.
I would encourage people to consider keeping a walks dairy. I wonder how many others do this and would be interested to know.

[taswegian]

I've been a very spasmodic diary keeper.
Mainly entries in my work diary about the family member(s) accompanying me and a few comments as to where.
But I always carry a small notebook and made sketches.
It is fun, and adds an extra dimension to the memories.

[GPSGuided]

In 2013, try a multimedia trip report. Can be done in basic MS Word to Wordpress for online blog publishing.

[whynotwalk]

Nice thoughts Mike. The old fashioned journal is a lovely way to go, and if you can sketch, so much the better. I tend to write mine up afterwards as blog posts, pix included. I do lose some of the immediacy and detail that a journal/diary allows, but I like that I can edit and polish.

On a recent trip my wife used the "journal" function on iPhoto (which is now available as an app on iOS7). It lets you turn your selected pix and words into an on-line journal that can look as good as a colour magazine. You can just keep it for your own record, or send it to people and/or the cloud.

I'm about to try out an app called Mobily Trip, which can supposedly do the same as iPhoto journals, and also incorporate any gps info from your pix. The motive is the same, whatever the technology: it's great to capture your trips in words and images (and sounds/videos/music too, if you get fancy!)

Cheers

Peter

[GPSGuided]

The key thing with these digital apps is to make sure they are future compatible. Too many use a proprietary format that does not allow export of core data. As a result, in a few years when the app is not longer supported, so are the records. So make sure the chosen program can save/export into a widely accepted standard format eg. PDF, plain text or similar.

[north-north-west]

Somehow it makes you remember better when you write it by hand. Or so I found.
Have heaps of bits and pieces - sometimes I feel like writing, sometimes I don't. Found a few notes I'd forgotten about during the move. 'One day' it will all be written up properly and co-ordinated with the photos (yeah, right! ).

[awildland]

excellent post mike. I'm with you and have notes written up for all our major walks in my journal - one of my favourite parts of the bushwalking day is sitting in camp and jotting down what has happened that day. Sometimes I am so exhausted at the end of a big day's adventure that I just write bullet points but, it is amazing how poetic some of those little points can appear when you look back on them. It is a great way of securing some of the wonderful detail of a walk that my otherwise shifty memory loses. And the beauty of a notebook and pencil - cheap, no technology needed, no batteries, smash proof, lightweight.

At one point I made up an actual Adventure Journal - having done years of scuba diving I used to have to fill out a dive logbook for every dive with things such as depth, time, air, current, weather, ocean temp, location, and then notes on what you saw - so I made up a bushwalking journal that was similar with headings like location, map name, date, weather, flora, fauna, & general comments. It's a great reference - especially when we want to write up a blog piece on a trip that is a few months old. It was bit formalised though and felt too much like homework so now I just jot down thoughts and observations as we go. I like to write though, it helps make sense of the world and it helps acknowledge the wonders around me.

[headwerkn]

I keep a hike log in digital format (Pages document), basically just what, when, how far, weather, etc. with notes on how we went and how the gear performed. I'm in the process of updating some of my kit and trying to take less stuff to lighten the load, so I like to collect my thoughts on how everything worked, whether not taking something turned out to be a dumb idea, what clothing combinations were comfortable or even simple things like how well I slept wearing a down jacket to compensate for the cold. I try to record ideas and suggestions for the next hike too, things I need to ditch or where my spending priorities need to be!

Might look at doing a blog for 2014 - dunno, we'll see.

Cheers, Ben.

[climberman]

I keep some notes in a little 'rite-in-the-rain' notebook. It's more times and trips, with the odd thought and wonder. It's great for remembering how long things took, etc. I have quite a few years' worth now.

[neil_fahey]

I log my trips on paper, but only really so I can get them up on Bushwalking Blog when I get home. Having said that, I've got so many now that haven't made it to the blog yet that I probably should've been writing them in a nice leather-bound journal or something. They're all over the place. :/

[davidmorr]

I have a friend who has been keeping a walking diary for 50 years. He records where he went and what he saw - landscape, geology, aboriginal sites, etc - in a stenographer's notebook. Ask him about some trip and he has them all.

I have never done it for walking trips, but I have for big overseas trips. Spend an hour each night writing what I did, what I saw, bit of history if I know it, how I felt, etc. Can go back and read it years later and it reminds me of many things I have forgotten. The funny thing is that it often triggers memories about things I have not written down. So all tose memories are still there, it's just hard getting the entry into them.

[mikethepike]

In early January 2012 I woke up to see a large black funnel web spider crawling over my sleeping bag towards my face! I hadn't zipped up the inner doorway and the only reason I know this now is because I was just checking my dairy about something and read it! I had totally forgotten. You never remember the cold, the misery of strong wind driven rain or your weariness as it really was but ever only recall an experience much tamer than it was. I think that the mind has a good way of blotting out many discomforting memories so that you can get on with life because if you remembered them all you would possibly give up doing many things, eg., what you might reasonably foresee as the tougher bushwalks - too hot, too cold, too long days etc. Apart from that, in retrospect, the diary can also possibly help justify the time you spend in the bush.