Neil
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- Apr 26, 2004
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After putting Marcy on the back burner Tripod and my hard-earned trail loomed large in my mind. It hadn’t snowed since my fateful visit to that 3 legged piece of the Earth’s crust and it was case of now or …much later so out the door we went.
I have been reading an assortment of random remarks (some of them snide and hurtful) related to the hiker’s triad of fitness, early start time and gear. These comments may be droll but they are totally lacking of any scientific merit. So, today I decided to conduct a scientific experiment whilst bagging Tripod.
I consider myself fit and we got an early start so I decided not to take any gear with me for this winter bushwhack hike.
That’s right. No gear.
This would not have been a problem if I was going solo but in this case I was with my very sensible wife. As soon as she saw me start the hike with no pack the jig would be up and the experiment would be over. So, like most scientists I applied creative thinking to my problem and came up with the idea of stuffing my pack with wadded-up newspaper.
I looked like a real mountain jock as I strolled down the 9N with a bulging pack to the start of the hike. I decided that water wasn’t gear and that a map and compass were too light to be considered as gear so I had those with me. Also, they acted as aids in averting suspicion.
I had carefully selected the newspaper from full-page ads of hiking and camping gear so, in a way, I had sleeping bags, a tent and all sorts of extra clothing. For food I tore out pages of supermarket flyers and was thus equipped with lightweight roast beef, chips, pudding, beer, milk and ice cream.
My pack weighed one pound! This was a great experiment.
We followed my old trail and it was very surprising to see just how much it had melted back. It was still visible and we stuck to it like glue. Then when my trail entered into a drainage we lost it completely due to the profuse rain and melting that has been going on lately.
Sylvie said, “use your gps tracklog from before to get us back on the trail like you did on Gray". This was a delicate moment because my “GPS” was made of cardboard and I had stuck a picture of a RINO 130 on the front to give an allusion of a real one. I improvised and luckily we found my trail easily enough. We would lose it briefly once or twice more but nothing serious.
We got to the end of my trail in 2 leisurely hours (it had taken me 4 to getthat far) and put my plan into action. This involved traversing a zone of deadly spruce traps and ascending a ridge to our right. The spruce trap zone was nowhere near as difficult to plow through as when I had first gone through 10 days earlier but it was still pretty bad. We got up on the ridge and overall it was a pretty mild climb to the top. I visited 3 prominent bumps and was satisfied that we had bagged Tripod.
Sylvie wanted to descend part-way and then eat lunch so that is what we did. She brought out of her pack a sandwich, raw carrots, chocolate and a thermos of hot Chai Tea. Reluctantly I pulled out a few pieces of balled-up newspaper and attempted to get the wrinkles out by dragging them back and forth across my knee. Delicately I placed a photographic representation of a plate of pork chops, a loaf of bread and a big piece of cheddar cheese out on the snow around me.
"What the hell is that"? Sylvie wanted to know.
“Oh, just my lunch. Hey look! Chickadees” I rummaged through my supplies and found what I was looking for. An ad for a bird feeder. Sure enough, I soon had a small flock of cute little birds pecking away like mad at my “feeder”. On the other side was an ad for cat food with a handsome tabby and when I flipped the page over the birds scattered. When I turned the page over again they all came back.
I of course had to explain my scientific experiment to my wife and she was not impressed. Not one bit. But just like Koch (or was it Pasteur?) who drank a beaker of virus particles to prove he was immunized I had, at great risk to myself, proven to the world that if you are fit and get an early start that you don’t need to carry gear or food with you.
Pictures
I have been reading an assortment of random remarks (some of them snide and hurtful) related to the hiker’s triad of fitness, early start time and gear. These comments may be droll but they are totally lacking of any scientific merit. So, today I decided to conduct a scientific experiment whilst bagging Tripod.
I consider myself fit and we got an early start so I decided not to take any gear with me for this winter bushwhack hike.
That’s right. No gear.
This would not have been a problem if I was going solo but in this case I was with my very sensible wife. As soon as she saw me start the hike with no pack the jig would be up and the experiment would be over. So, like most scientists I applied creative thinking to my problem and came up with the idea of stuffing my pack with wadded-up newspaper.
I looked like a real mountain jock as I strolled down the 9N with a bulging pack to the start of the hike. I decided that water wasn’t gear and that a map and compass were too light to be considered as gear so I had those with me. Also, they acted as aids in averting suspicion.
I had carefully selected the newspaper from full-page ads of hiking and camping gear so, in a way, I had sleeping bags, a tent and all sorts of extra clothing. For food I tore out pages of supermarket flyers and was thus equipped with lightweight roast beef, chips, pudding, beer, milk and ice cream.
My pack weighed one pound! This was a great experiment.
We followed my old trail and it was very surprising to see just how much it had melted back. It was still visible and we stuck to it like glue. Then when my trail entered into a drainage we lost it completely due to the profuse rain and melting that has been going on lately.
Sylvie said, “use your gps tracklog from before to get us back on the trail like you did on Gray". This was a delicate moment because my “GPS” was made of cardboard and I had stuck a picture of a RINO 130 on the front to give an allusion of a real one. I improvised and luckily we found my trail easily enough. We would lose it briefly once or twice more but nothing serious.
We got to the end of my trail in 2 leisurely hours (it had taken me 4 to getthat far) and put my plan into action. This involved traversing a zone of deadly spruce traps and ascending a ridge to our right. The spruce trap zone was nowhere near as difficult to plow through as when I had first gone through 10 days earlier but it was still pretty bad. We got up on the ridge and overall it was a pretty mild climb to the top. I visited 3 prominent bumps and was satisfied that we had bagged Tripod.
Sylvie wanted to descend part-way and then eat lunch so that is what we did. She brought out of her pack a sandwich, raw carrots, chocolate and a thermos of hot Chai Tea. Reluctantly I pulled out a few pieces of balled-up newspaper and attempted to get the wrinkles out by dragging them back and forth across my knee. Delicately I placed a photographic representation of a plate of pork chops, a loaf of bread and a big piece of cheddar cheese out on the snow around me.
"What the hell is that"? Sylvie wanted to know.
“Oh, just my lunch. Hey look! Chickadees” I rummaged through my supplies and found what I was looking for. An ad for a bird feeder. Sure enough, I soon had a small flock of cute little birds pecking away like mad at my “feeder”. On the other side was an ad for cat food with a handsome tabby and when I flipped the page over the birds scattered. When I turned the page over again they all came back.
I of course had to explain my scientific experiment to my wife and she was not impressed. Not one bit. But just like Koch (or was it Pasteur?) who drank a beaker of virus particles to prove he was immunized I had, at great risk to myself, proven to the world that if you are fit and get an early start that you don’t need to carry gear or food with you.
Pictures
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