Christmas gifts for walkers: useful presents for the short days

Think about the walks they do in December, not July. In midwinter the sun sets before four o'clock across most of England, and before half past three in the far north of Scotland. Every winter walk is a race against the light, so the best presents are the ones that help a walker win it, or lose it gracefully.

The second test is use. A walker's kit cupboard is full of things that seemed a good idea. The things that come out every time are small, light and do one job well. Anything on this list should earn a place in the rucksack, not the drawer.

And if you are buying for someone who walks with a van and a dog, read our guide to gifts for campervan and motorhome owners too. This one is about the walking.

• A head torch. Mountain Rescue England and Wales puts a torch and a head torch on its kit list, and in winter, the charity says, it goes dark early. A head torch keeps both hands free for a stile or a dog lead. It turns the walk that ran late into a story rather than a worry.
• A small power bank and a short cable. The same charity says many accidents happen towards the end of the day, when both you and your phone are low on energy, and tells walkers to charge the phone before they set out. A power bank is the back-up.
• A whistle. The smallest item on Mountain Rescue's list. Six good long blasts in a minute is the signal for help.
• A small first aid kit. Also on the list, with room for the walker's own medicines.

None of these are glamorous. All of them get carried every time, which is the point.

The NHS's advice for avoiding frostbite reads like a winter walker's shopping list: several loose layers with a waterproof outer layer, a hat and scarf to protect the head, neck and face, gloves or mittens, and thick socks and boots. Every item on it makes a good present.

• Thick walking socks. The cheapest present here, and the one a walker never has enough of. A pair for each day of a trip is a generous gift.
• Good gloves, or mittens. Two pairs are better than one: a thin pair for the walk and a warm pair for the stop.
• A hat and a neck warmer. The neck warmer is the one people forget they need until the wind turns on the top.
• A flask. The NHS also says to eat and drink regularly when you are out in the cold for long. A flask that keeps tea hot for hours makes the stop at the top of the hill the best five minutes of the walk.

Sizes and fit matter more than brands. If you are not sure, a gift card for an outdoor shop is not lazy; it is honest.

• A paper map of their favourite patch. Mountain Rescue lists a map and a compass for every walker, and the know-how to use them. A paper map of the hills or coast they keep going back to lives in the car or the van for years. The Peak District book's walks point to the OS Explorer OL1 map for the Dark Peak.
• A compass, paired with the map, and a promise to learn it together on a short walk in the new year.
• A map case. For the map, the phone and the car keys on a wet day.
• A walking guide. A good guidebook gets read on the sofa between Christmas and New Year and used all spring. Look for one with times and distances from a named source and the date it was checked, so the walk on the page is the walk on the ground.

Some of the best winter walking presents are days out.

• A seal boat trip from Morston Quay. Blakeney Point has England's largest grey seal colony, with around 9,000 pups born between the end of October and mid-January, the National Trust says. In the pupping season you cannot reach the colony on foot, so the Trust recommends a boat trip, and says trips must always be booked in advance. A trip booked for the spring or summer makes a present with a date in the diary. Our guide to the seals at Horsey and Blakeney has the operators and the rules.
• A starling evening. Murmurations run from November to February, just before dusk, the RSPB says. A day out with a flask, a short walk and the birds coming in to roost costs very little and is hard to forget. Our starling murmurations guide has where and when.
• A membership. National Trust members park free at the Trust's car parks, where non-members pay: £8 for a campervan at Horsey Windpump, and £6 for up to four hours or £8 all day at Mam Nick for Mam Tor. Around half the walks in the Park Up & Walk guides are National Trust routes, 129 of 250 in the ten regional books. RSPB members, likewise, avoid the parking fee at Ham Wall, one of the Somerset starling reserves.

The dog is often the reason for the walk. On a winter coast or hill, the rules for dogs are mostly about leads: a short lead near seals at Horsey, the Friends of Horsey Seals say, because seals see dogs as predators; a lead on Mam Tor for the grazing animals, the National Trust says; and no dogs at all on Blakeney Point from 1 November to mid-January.

• A good short lead, and a long one. The short one for seals, sheep and cattle; the long one for the places a dog can roam a little.
• A light for the collar. For the last walk of the evening, on a dark campsite or a lane.
• A towel that dries fast. The car is small and the dog is wet. Every walk.
• A guide that says where dogs can go. Every walk in the Park Up & Walk guides says whether dogs are allowed, and on what terms, with the source and the date it was checked.

Ten minutes of your time on Boxing Day. If anyone in the family has hearing or speech difficulties, register their phone with the emergencySMS service, which lets them text 999 in an emergency; it only works if they register first, Mountain Rescue England and Wales says, by texting 'register' to 999 and following the instructions.

Then sit down together and fill in a walk plan: the route, the start and finish, the time they expect to be back and who to call. Mountain Rescue England and Wales asks every walker to leave those details with someone reliable. Offering to be that person is a present in its own right.

• The early starter: a head torch and a flask.
• The hill walker: a map of their favourite range, a compass and a whistle.
• The coast walker: binoculars, which the National Trust suggests even for a close-up seal trip, and a seal boat trip from Morston.
• The one with the dog: a collar light, a fast-drying towel and a guide that says where dogs are allowed.
• The one who is always cold: thick socks, mittens, a neck warmer and a flask.
• The planner: a guide to a region they have not walked yet.

For a walker who travels with a van, the Park Up & Walk guides are written for exactly that day: park up, walk from the van, finish at the pub. There are ten regional guides, from Cornwall to the North Coast 500, and Winter Walks, a Christmas edition with 36 walks chosen to fit a short, cold day. Pair it with our guide to winter walking and the short days and the free Winter Campsite Index, and the present comes with a plan.