Book Review: Rough-Stuff Fellowship Archive

Chipps has got himself a copy of the Rough-Stuff Fellowship Archive, and thinks you need one too.

I’m going to annoy loads of people first off by mentioning the ‘C’ word. Yes, I know it’s months until Christmas, but you know that Aunty Nora is going to be asking your mum what you want for Christmas this year, what with you being hard to buy for because you don’t seem to like jumpers or ties… but now you’re going be able to tell her that you want the Rough-Stuff Fellowship Archive.

Put together from original slides and hand-drawn maps and typewritten stories, this is a coffee table book for the modern adventurer, full of inspiration, humour and a perfect snapshot of times gone by (and times still going on…)

If you’re not familiar with the Rough-Stuff Fellowship it was formed officially in the mid-1950s as an organisation for riders who liked to ride bicycles on off road adventures, which arguably makes it the oldest off-road bike club in the world. Still 600 members strong today, its members have pioneered rugged off road routes across Iceland and made the first unsupported ride to Everest base camp. Luckily, many members were photography enthusiasts and took numerous photos, presumably to delight audiences at church halls and W.I.s around the country on their return.

Inside The Book

Over its 200 pages, divided neatly into seasons, this weighty book shows some of the pioneers of our sport, taking on mountains and distant hill tracks in all weathers – on touring bikes with full mudguards. Usually wearing a bobble hat and a cycling cape. While smoking a pipe.

At £28, it’s a chunky amount for a book, but it’s the perfect gift for anyone who’s ridden anywhere on a bike (including yourself). As a dip-in-and-inspire tome for your covfefe table, it can’t be beaten. What’s your excuse for not riding? Just have a look in the book and see riders in the snow, in leather soled shoes and plus-fours. Or carrying their loaded bikes down Greenup Edge, or winching them down cliffs with baling twine. Every page is an inspiration of not needing the right tyres, or gears, or even the right bike, in order to have a cycling adventure anywhere in the world.

The book itself is book-bound, with a thick card cover and some lovely, thick paper inside. Nearly every page holds one or two photos with that faded colour that only old slide film seems to give and there’s even a stitched-in facsimile of the original Rough Stuff Fellowship typewritten newsletter, along with an account of a 1958 crossing of Iceland.

This book, already in its second edition, was enthusiastically backed on Kickstarter, raising £51,000 of a £12,000 goal. And it’s likely that more books will follow, such is the quality and depth of the archives they have to work on.

The whole book feels (and smells) incredible and can either be approached from the start, or just dipped into, with a page or two a day. The photos themselves date from the earliest days of the Rough-Stuff fellowship in the 1950s up to the mid-90s. There are locations as local as the Lake District and Box Hill and as remote as Everest base camp and Iceland. All undertaken in a selection of long socks, jaunty, chunky-knit jumpers and bobble hats.

The Rough-Stuff Fellowship has to be applauded for appointing an archivist to sift through thousands of slides and scanning them all. There’s a real sense of being given a glimpse into the workings of a secret society. The photos are both entertaining and inspirational. Say what you want about carrying a touring bike around the Lake District, it’s incredible to see the places that the Rough Stuff Fellowship got to, in heavyweight kit that hadn’t changed much since the says of Scott and Shackleton. 

This is a book to read in front of the fire this winter, while making bold plans for next year as you get the maps open on the living room floor. And it’ll do more for your cycling enthusiasm than buying a carbon fibre pump.

Yes, Get One – or Two

If you want a window into the world of Dick and Inky, Pat, Mary and Albert and chums, seeing the world with a bike (and sometimes even riding it) then you need to get this book. Even if Aunty Nora buys you a copy, you’re bound to want to buy another copy to send to a friend. 

I already have a list of people I need to buy a copy for.

Review Info