KEMPSTON HARDWICK

The secret diary of Bedfordshire’s greatest adventurer

Story | Kempston Hardwick Illustration | Dan Milner

Kempston Hardwick is a keen-as-mustard-adventurer and dad, in that order. Old enough to remember when car interiors smelt of petrol, Hardwick defies his rapidly amassing years by seeking outdoor recreation, and the mind-expanding escape from domesticity it offers at every opportunity. His irrepressible readiness to embrace al-fresco challenges has delivered him with worldly-wise opinions that he applies to every turn in life, whether bagging Munros or browsing the organic frozen pizza aisle of Waitrose. He sports a curiosity-of-self that’s akin to most adventurers, something that is largely attributed to Tipi-dwelling holidays on Anglesey with his carefree parents. It is believed he was named after the place where he was conceived, a disused railway station somewhere in Bedfordshire. He is good friends with Dan Milner.

Part 3: On Trend

Acouple of weeks ago, with a big mountain bike ride into the great outdoors looming, I decided to work on my bike. It was a task that I wasn’t relishing. That is, until I realised that if I replaced the term ‘work on’ with ‘dial-in’ then it all sounded a whole lot more attractive. As in I’ll ‘dial-in’ my ride. I even verbalised it, out loud, so Kate could both hear me and be impressed with my taking back control. Kaboom! Suddenly the irksome prospect of a tedious hour wielding a set of Allenkeys instantly became an ‘Exciting Opportunity to Hone my Cockpit Set-up’.

And so I dived in, unleashing a whirlwind of enthusiasm fuelled by the kind of doublespeak that would make Orwell proud. It was deep. Heck I even missed Line of Duty while Freeing Up some Real Estate on my Handlebars. Okay, I’m not sure why adjusting my brake lever positions is Freeing Up Real Estate, or why I’d want more ‘Real Estate’ on my handlebars, but I’d just read the term in a bike magazine, written by someone who knows about this stuff. And it seemed catchy and appropriate and, well… it made the job more purposeful. More empowering. And I love that. I really love the way our world of adventure is so positively emphatic. Truly. Life is good and adventures are even good-er, especially when empowered by jargon. If you’re like me, you live and breathe adventure. And as today’s adventurers we are lucky people; surely there is no other demographic whose self-focussed acts of reward-seeking are so encouraged and emboldened by creative terminology. Unlike our predecessors who squinted nervously through blizzards or puffed with uncertainty over demanding peaks in the hope of a mere sniff of adventure, we, the people, now literally own our adventures.

48 So I love the fact that every life experience, every tiny hint of adventure’s rewards, is deserving of the most magnificent and creative word re-purposing. Our adventurous lives are so incredibly amazing that hyperbole has never before found a more deserving home in which to gestate. When I contemplate the immersive experiences offered by the protagonist that is the big outdoors, I know the payback is worth scaling a paywall of pain for. And I also know that payback is a million times better if it has been enveloped in a literal, re-focussed curation of our efforts. Know what I mean? C’mon, I know you do. We’re on the same page, right? We’re cohabiting this moment. Together. We love jargon. Jargon is powerful. Jargon slingshots the trivial into the upper echelons of emotional connectivity. Doesn’t it?

Sometimes I even call my friends ‘operatives’ when I reach out to them to share a ramble or a paddle. It just seems to fit and gives our jaunt redefined purpose, or at least a deeper and a more earnest engagement. And engagement is good, isn’t it? And now my fellow adventure operatives and I roll out the jargon together, ring-fencing a buoyant raft of cool-speak and deploying it in our quest to summit our individual endorphin peaks. It all seems so symbiotic. When we’re wild-swimming in the River Avon or bartering for prayer flags in Pokhara we’re not just adventuring, but are exploring the very fabric of our emotional drives. Okay we’re all out there doing our own thing, pushing our own individual envelopes individually (but with space to grow) but simultaneously we’re all on the same page, brokering the same visceral experiences during our outdoor moments of magic-me-time - or memory gestation productivity (MGP) as I like to call it.

When we’re wild swimming in the River Avon we’re not just adventuring, we’re exploring the very fabric of our emotional drives. We’re brokering the same visceral experiences - or memory gestation productivity (MGP) as I like to call it

And going forward, our embrace of jargon can surely only lead to bolder, bigger and better things, to deeper immersion and most importantly more rewarding connects with the pure physicality of the objects that delineate our outdoor experiences. When I snuggle down inside my sleeping bag during a chilly night under the stars, I’m validating the silky Pertex-lined bag’s non-negotiables. When I sing the praises of trousers with zipoff legs, I am rejoicing in my appreciation of its deliverables. And when I snap photos of our mountain bike endeavour, I’m not taking photos, I’m harnessing assets. I’m cultivating likes.

I think product designers would feel immense pride to know that as we extol the virtues of their headtorch or duffel bag we have inadvertently embraced the very foundations of their brand’s ecosystem. It’s as if that designer - oh heck, the whole damn company - is an omnipotent forest spirit shepherding me through my open space optimisation with a fluidity of good intentions. Adventure is in their DNA (they tell us that) and I love that; now we can cosily wallow in a brand’s DNA like those happy, contented viruses in a two-star ski chalet’s tepid jacuzzi.

50 So appreciatively armed with this quiver of up-speak, finally I feel have harnessed an authentic proprietary connection with my gear’s brand manager - you know, that faceless but likeable guy who would really like me to like their stuff. And buy it. We might not have met, but through shared creative lingo, we have found an engaged purpose. I no longer just ‘use’ my gear, or Physical-Form-Assets (PFA) as I now call it. Instead, I ‘experience’ it. Of course I do.

My PFA and my experience are, in fact, the same thing. Yes, we adventurers are lucky people. We are fruitfully harvesting our outdoor quality time by endlessly crushing it out there, whatever it is, and whatever crushing means. Today, together, we are unified in rolling out and validating a carpet of user-honed experiences as we march, paddle and ride into fresh life-territories.

And we continue to hone those user experiences armed with not great, but bomber gear. It’s like we’re one big family. Smiles are our USP. Adventure is on trend, and Real Estate is out there for Freeing Up.