Leave No Trace: The Seven Principles
Leave No Trace Center for Outdoor Ethics
The Leave No Trace Center for Outdoor Ethics sets out its seven principles - planning ahead, durable surfaces, waste disposal, leaving what you find, campfires, wildlife, and other visitors - with the reasoning and field practice behind each. Free, short, and the one piece of ethics material every other backcountry curriculum assumes you already know.
More resources on Hiking & Backpacking
The Dirtbag Diaries
Long-running storytelling podcast from Fitz Cahall about climbers, skiers, hikers, cyclists, paddlers and travellers, told through personal narratives and interviews. Listeners hear how people plan, risk, fail and persist in outdoor pursuits and in lives built around them.
Be Expert with Map and Compass, 3rd Edition
Orienteering handbook covering map symbols, contour interpretation, taking and following bearings, declination, pacing, terrain association and relocating when lost, with graded practice exercises and a section on GPS. Readers learn to navigate cross-country confidently with map and compass.
r/Ultralight Wiki
Community-maintained reference on reducing pack weight: base-weight definitions, shakedown conventions, category-by-category gear discussion, budget kit options and LighterPack workflow. Represents accumulated argument among thousands of practitioners rather than one author's preferences. Community-consensus counterweight to the single-author books - it is where gear orthodoxy gets stress-tested and where budget alternatives surface.
Backpacker Long Trails: Mastering the Art of the Thru-Hike
Thomas covers the logistics that separate multi-month hikes from weekend trips: permits, resupply boxes and mail drops, mileage progression, town stops, budgeting, body maintenance and injury management. Won the 2017 National Outdoor Book Award in the instructional category.
Wilderness Navigation: Finding Your Way Using Map, Compass, Altimeter & GPS (4th Edition)
Mountaineers Books textbook on backcountry navigation covering topographic map reading, compass bearings and declination, altimeters, GPS receivers and phone apps, and routefinding on trails, through forest, in alpine terrain, and on snow. Readers can plan routes and find their position without marked trails.
The Ultimate Hiker's Gear Guide, Second Edition: Tools and Techniques to Hit the Trail
Skurka explains how to select clothing, footwear, packs, shelters, sleep systems and stoves by matching them to specific conditions and trip objectives, drawing on 30,000-plus trail miles. Also covers foot care, campsite selection, food and hiking efficiency. Despite the title it is a skills book: it teaches the reasoning behind gear choices, which survives product turnover.