Hello, The Internet

I've been over at trailjournals having a thruhike, but the thruhike is sadly over now.  Or not so sadly, if you're me and you were ecstatic to be home with husband and dogs and warm bed.  All at once because we sleep in a puppy pile.  But just like after my first thruhike, I missed writing afterward.  People suggested writing a book.  I might, but that involves a lot more brain than a blog post.  So blogging it is!

I'm actually gearing up for a section hike soon with my friend Neon, so I have equipment on the brain.  I thought I'd do a little bit of gear reviewing.

I plan to take the same tent I thruhiked with last year, the Zpacks Hexamid Solo Plus.  Not including stakes, it's 17.7 oz.  Mine is an ounce heavier because I got it in camo material, which is a little thicker.  My old Hexamid is in blue, and it's pretty dang see through.  The camo is not at all transparent.  On my thruhike last year, I suffered through weeks of attack acorns, and for the first time in my life my tent was punctured by an acorn.  Thousands of miles and decades of hiking, and this was a first.  But it happened, so be aware.  Cuben can be punctured by acorns.  Luckily it's easily fixed with a little tape.  I used Zpacks repair tape because I had it, but duct tape also works.

My camo Hexamid in the 100 Mile Wilderness

I used two different Zpacks quilts last year.  I used a 20 degree in chilly weather, a 40 degree in warm weather, and I layered them in cold weather.  I went for the extra wide version so I could still sleep in a pretzel shape while the 20 degree was fully zipped.  The 40 degree I only got straps on, no zipper.  Since I bought mine, they changed the baffle orientation to longways down the length of the sleeping bag, which should be a significant improvement over baffles running side to side.  The latter allow down to slide downhill to either side of your shoulders over time.  I was happy with mine despite needing to fluff the down back to the middle occasionally.  Both quilts gave me room to move around as needed.  I was able to use the straps of the quilt to attach to either of my sleeping pads, but I had to put my head at the narrow end of my larger pad to make it work.

I had a number of problems from wear and tear to discomfort to an extremely stupid trowel puncture, so I went through a lot of sleeping pads this year.  My very favorite was the Klymit Insulated Static V Lite. At 23" wide, it's enough for me as a side sleeper to be comfortable.  The V structure let the pad form around my sprawling sleeping form better than a more rigid pad.  At 19.6 oz it's a little heavier than some options, but the comfort was worth it.  After that was NeoAir Xtherm.  The large (AKA the wide) weighs 20 oz, so almost the same as the Klymit.  Mine weighed less because I cut a foot off the end of it, so it was about 18 oz.  It was significantly warmer, but slightly less comfortable to sleep on than the V shaped Klymit baffles.  I sent for it when the temperature got down to around freezing.


On the personal hygiene front, I loved the Intimina Lily Cup Compact.  It collapses to the size of a quarter when not in use, was easy to clean, didn't stain, and felt like nothing once inserted.  Dealing with your period on the trail is not especially fun or pleasant, but at least using a menstrual cup means not having to pack out any grossness.  And because I didn't need to buy supplies in town, I never ran out at an inconvenient time.  The compacted cup was small enough to live in my ziplock with my toilet paper.

Scheduled my next thruhike

I decided to thruhike again!  Not that this is probably a big surprise to anybody who ever met me.  Unfortunately, I'm not doing it anytime soon.  Starting date is set for March 1, 2020.  Only 2694 more days!  Unless I lost my job, in which case I would go ASAP.  But for some reason my job has been oddly stable despite the economy, and as far as I know I'm in no danger of losing it any time soon. 

More's the pity.

Probably the only people who can empathize are the former thruhikers or multiple offenders, but I'm thinking about things I'd do differently.  (Note to self:  Look up post about things you'd do differently, written immediately following last thru.)  Like I'd hike the approach trail.  I never had the patience for it before.  I think I will by 2020, though.  I want to take the trail more deliberately.  I know it probably didn't seem like I was in a mad rush the first time, but I was going as quickly as I could.  I'd rather give myself an unlimited window to finish so I could go just as slowly as I wanted. 

Sometimes the terrain sets its own limits on you.  You can't stop if there's no water and no place to lay your aching bones.  But other than that, limitless.

What else?  Well, ideally I'd find some other slowpoke to hang out with.  Company is nice.  My lowest days on the trail have been about loneliness, not about weather or my feet or the fact that I'm sick of all my dinners.  I do like my alone time, but it is really nice to see a friendly face.  I realize that some people never spend a night alone on the trail, but that has not been my experience.  AT ALL.

I think I'd explore the towns a little more.  One of the awesome parts about thruhiking is getting to see small town America.  I loved meeting people all up and down the trail, and visiting the businesses along it too.  Maine showed me that Whoopie Pies are in fact good.  (I had doubts based on our honeymoon trip to Freeport.)  Pennsylvania had such a unique run down Germanic feel.  I want to see it more.  Again.

I'd love to fix all my health problems before my next trip, but that seems wildly unlikely.  The cards dealt to me involve defective digestion and degenerative disk disease.  I work around them as much as I can.  I really seriously hope that I can eat wheat products again in the future, because A) they're really hard to avoid, and b) I want pizza.

I might be able to lose weight, but I've been working on that for all of my adult life and then some, and it doesn't appear to have made any difference.  Perhaps I should just buy a voluminous scarf and go with the babushka look.  Perhaps adopt an accent. 

Oooh, you know what's good about planning so far in advance? SO MUCH GEAR.  I'm certain that everything I have now will be worn out by then.  I'll have to buy all new ultralight stuff!  Eeee!  Although if I lost my job that would be less exciting.

Oh that reminds me.  Today was Eddy's 90,000 mile service. It took him nearly 10 years to get there so more things needed to be replaced than if it had only taken a year.  Still, it's going to cost more than he's worth.  Sigh.  But still less than a new car, and he's still plenty driveable. Sooner or later I should do something about the marks where he was shot, though.  That's a little more trashy than called for, even in a ten year old car.

Trail Journal Entry 3/25/2012 - near Byrd's Nest

I spent an uneasy night alone in the shelter. I woke often. Finally around 5:30 I woke up for good. I stayed in my bag but turned on the phone and read a book for a while. Around 6:30 it was light(ish) so I retrieved my food bag and ate breakfast. Even with dilly dallying I was packed up and ready to go by 7:30. I slowly walked up to the car and got in. I turned on the car and started the heater to keep warm. I was surprised to see that the outside temperature was 45. It had felt much warmer to me. In fact I had been a little too warm in my sleeping bag. 

Weaver and Sarge were a bit late. They intended to arrive between 8:30 and 9 but with whiteout fog to navigate they arrived at 9:30.   We changed our plan for the day to shorter mileage. Then Weaver's husband helped me shuttle my car a few miles down the trail. My permit now lies about my car location and my campsite. I doubt the rangers will care too much. 

Weaver and Sarge walked a couple of miles while we were moving cars. I walked north to meet them, then we proceeded south. They both have very heavy packs. No services in Shenandoah are open right now so they are carrying a whole lot of food. Unfortunately none of us thought of stashing most of their food in my car. That would have been a good move. Alas. 

The weather was hypothermia weather all day. We didn't stop much, and when we did I added a layer right away. We made out all right, but we were all tired by it. 

We contemplated trying to stay at Elkwallow, but there was no good, legal place to stay, and all the illegal places were too high visibility. Instead we made a hot meal and used the privy, and got water. So much water. We knew we would have to camp dry so we carried a lot of water for the last hours of the day. My shoulders have convinced me to finally get rid of my Gossamer Gear backpack. It just doesn't provide enough support, leaving the weight of my pack to dig into my shoulders and neck. It was bearable for a short trip but I'm done with it. 

Weaver and Sarge found a nice protected spot for their tent. Mine is rather less protected. This will be the first real test of my cuben fiber Hexamid tent. We have plenty of rain and wind. If I'm going to get wet in it, tonight will be the night. I expect I'll be drying the tent out in my bathroom again when I get home. With luck, my seam sealing job was sufficient. And my tent-setting-up skills. 

We had a very nice dinner together. I'm really glad I took the time to come out and hike with them as they restarted their thruhike. And that they wanted me here. They're good people, as JD says. Even when we're tired and sore and cranky, I like their company. And they told me that if my setup fails and my sleeping bag gets soaked, I'm to come to their tent and they'll figure something out to get us all through the night. Now those are good friends. So far so good on the tent though. I think my major concern might be dense fog wetting out my bag. I'm all bundled up and expect to take off a layer or two overnight. I desperately hope it stops raining so I can water a tree without soaking my sleeping clothes. 

In the morning we'll walk down to my car at Panorama, and I'll drive them into Luray for lunch. Then I'll drop them off back in the park and drive home to my real life after a nice little interlude in faux thruhiking. And they'll walk south for several hundred miles. 

It isn't usually the customer that goes postal, is it?

I tried to do something nice today.  At least I think it was nice.  And technically I succeeded, but I didn't feel that nice by the time I was done.

That box full of goodies that I put together yesterday, to mail to a thruhiker?  Was supposed to be a flat rate box.  The awesome thing about a flat rate box is you stuff it as full as you want, and there is no tedious weighing or measuring.  I marched into the post office at work and asked if they had flat rate boxes.  The woman nodded and asked me which size I wanted out of the ones displayed.  I pointed to the little one.  She charged me $5.20, put $5.20 worth of stamps on it, stuck a "flat rate envelope" sticker on it, and handed it to me.  And she said I could mail it from anywhere.

So I came home, jammed it full of goodies, taped it up securely, and left it in plain sight so I'd remember to mail it in the morning.  I left the house a wee bit early so I could do that.  And got to the post office half an hour before it opened.  Doh!  I couldn't just leave it, because there was a plaque saying you couldn't mail things with stamps on them if they weighed over 13 oz.  And there was no scale for me to check the weight.  It felt heavy though.

So I stopped in at the work post office.  It's closed Fridays.  Sigh.  No scale there either, and same admonition about 13 oz. 

Next I went to my office and found the address of the next nearest post office to work.  I headed over there and stood in line.  They did have a scale, but it was hooked up to a computer so you couldn't just check the weight on something easily.  Hence going over and standing in line to have it weighed.  I expected they would check my ID, or something, if it were over 13 oz, and I'd be on my way.

When I got to the counter, the lady said "that's not a flat rate box".  I pointed at the flat rate sticker.  She said that didn't make it a flat rate box.  I told her a USPS person had sold it to me as a flat rate box.  She denigrated my work post office.. and then she showed me a real flat rate box.  Which was slightly smaller than the box I was holding. 

I started feeling a little ragey.  Do you ever get a red film over your vision when you get mad?  I do.  (I would have made a good berserker.)  I struggled to maintain a grip on my temper.  I said "Could I at least get my $5.20 back?" She looked confused.  I pointed to the stamps. 

Postal lady was not going to refund my $5.20.  My only real option was coughing up whatever additional funds it would take to send the package by non-flat-rate priority class mail.  And that is what I did.

She mumbled something about calling the work post office to tell them they couldn't do just stick flat rate stickers on other boxes and call it good, and I said they probably wouldn't like what I said if I called.  She clarified that *she* would call.  Which is for the best, really.  The postal lady had been firm but friendly and professional with me, I must say, even in the face of my obvious piss-off-ed-ness.  I really couldn't fault her.  She wasn't the one who stuck a flat rate sticker on a random box and sold it to me.

Still, I generally felt screwed by the USPS and it took the shine off my day.  I had purchased the damn box in good faith.  I shouldn't be expected to memorize the exact size of all of their boxes, nor all their procedures.  If a postal worker sells me something, I have every reason to believe it is what they says it is. 

Anyway.  Not loving the post office right now.  Am hoping a good night's sleep, riding a horse, and seeing a good friend tomorrow will make everything all right.

Being homeless = :(

I didn't hit yoga tonight.  I felt a little too pitiful, with cramps and nausea.  A bean burrito and a couple of beers set me right.  (Go figure.)  And I've been doing extra yoga this week anyway.  Mostly because I had to. I got a freaky pain in one arm that (according to Marsha) is likely due to a pinched nerve.  So I was stretching away, doing the towel under the neck thing, and not doing upper body work to avoid aggravating it.  And so far so good.  I had the opportunity to get adjusted today and skipped it, so I hope agonizing pain doesn't come back over the weekend.

I had been thinking about getting "my" thruhiker a flat rate box in which to send a care package, and today I finally got off my duff and did it.  I'll put it in the mail tomorrow.  I hope he likes it!  The care packages I got last year were a huge big deal to me.  Out on the trail, you spend so much time alone that any contact with somebody who actually cares is enormous.  So, Goose, I hope you like it as much as I liked mine last year.  If not, spread the wealth.

I was thinking today about thruhiking (as one does.)  It's very hard on the body, of course.  One day of hiking is no big deal.  One week of hiking is a lot.  One month of hiking starts to turn you into a hiking machine.  Three months of hiking starts to see serious wear and tear on your joints, your skin, and your equipment.  Many thruhikes have been ended prematurely due to ACL tears, broken ankles, giardia, Lyme disease, and other afflictions common to those getting physical in the great outdoors.

I think, though, that the biggest strain of thruhiking is emotional.  Very few hikers have a partner the whole way.  Those who do, may not actually *like* their partner the whole way.  Spending 24x7 with someone doing something strenuous is pretty stressful.  When the reason you are doing it is internal, and you may have different reasons for doing it, conflicts can arise.  I want to take time off to rest and heal, and you want to push your physical limits.  I want to get to the shelter 20 miles away, and you want to stay in this pretty glen.  I need to be done by September 15 and you need to be done by October 11.  Hiking with somebody else is tricky.

So a lot of people end up hiking alone.  Not ALONE alone, there are still people out there.  But with no constant companion.  That can be a very lonely thing.  Most of us are used to having a home.  Being set adrift is alienating.  It leaves you feeling lonely and at a loss, for no readily definable reason.  Sometimes you just want to see someone and have them already know your name.

Home doesn't have to be much.  It can range from a full on mansion to a townhouse to an apartment to a trailer.  It doesn't matter.  Everybody knows what home feels like, and it's a good thing.  "Coming home" every night to a place where you feel you belong is such a subtle and accepted thing that I doubt you ever think about it until you don't have a home anymore.  It can be freeing.  But it means that you never get the feeling of safety and security every night that most people take for granted.

Not all hikers are truly homeless, of course.  I had a home to go to.. I just wasn't anywhere near it.  My tent or my spot on the shelter floor was my home every night.  I got used to it, but it definitely did not leave me feeling as safe and warm and welcome as coming to my house every night.  I woke up when coyotes howled, when trees creaked, when thunder rumbled.  When I was camped with friends I got a fleeting sense of security from the mass of humanity around me.  Even one hiker (Cody!  Miss you!) was enough.  But I spent a great deal of time alone on my hike, and it was hard.  I had no idea how hard it would be until I did it.  It wasn't enough to make me quit, but I did recognize the strain.

I know I will encounter this feeling again.  And I know there are thruhikers out there right now experiencing it.  Keep it up, my friends.  It is not a comfortable feeling.  But it is worth it to experience it.  It may make you more appreciative of friends and family.  It may help you reach out to strangers with a smile and a kind word.  It may help you appreciate humanity.

hiker in a fishbowl

I had a dream last night about being a thruhiker.  In my dream I was sitting at a shelter eating lunch, and tourists came by to look.  I felt like I was a specimen at a zoo.

The thing about the dream is it was pretty true to life.  Multiple times I've just been going about my business, being a backpacker, and people have come and stared like I was part of a diorama.  They don't usually talk to me, though they do talk to each other.

What's up with that, do you think?

I mean, when I'm out there, whatever piece of the earth I'm sitting on is my home.  So when you walk up to me and stare at my backpackerliness, you are effectively walking into my house.  I have nowhere to retreat to, nowhere else to be.  Where I am is where I am.  It feels like an intrusion on my privacy.

And that's weird in itself.  You don't *have* privacy on the trail.  You don't own the place.  You can't lock the door and wall other people out. 

We all kind of rely on the invisible walls.  The ones that keep us all from staring when we're changing clothing or scratching ourselves.  However, the walls do not work on tourists.  A tourist's whole job is to stare.  And they don't give a rat's patootie if you feel like you are an exhibit or not.

Next time I think I'll wave and smile.  And scratch myself.

You don't have to be happy all the time

I got faked out this morning.  I became aware at some point that JD was still in bed, which meant his work was delayed.  I figured "Great!  More sleeping in!"  And I turned off my alarm.

When I eventually got up (eight-ish) and stumbled downstairs, I found email from my job saying that there was no delay, i.e. get your lazy butt in to work.  JD was still home, and had made blueberry pancakes and bacon.  (NOM!)

So I ate pancakes and bacon and got to work late.  Again.  After spending half an eternity scraping snow and ice off my car.  Seriously?  That wasn't worth a couple of hours of delay?

It was a very quiet day at work.  Even though we had no delay or anything.  I guess everybody was hunkered down.

I was supposed to have yoga this evening, but I nevertheless bundled up in the afternoon and went for a nice walk in the snow.  It was very pleasant.  It all had that snowy smell to it.  I realize that snow isn't supposed to have a smell.  I guess it's more of a lack of dirt smell.  Lack of dirt plus cold smells like snow to me.

Also I could easily see footprints.  Cats, dogs (or foxes?), bunnies, deer, birds, and even two people.  One of the people walked approximately twenty feet into the woods, turned around, and left again.  I wonder what that was all about?  You're up to walking in the snow for twenty feet but that's it?  Why go in the first place?

When I got back I found email that yoga had been canceled, and then I was doubly glad I went.  Sane-making walking time PLUS the only exercise I got today.  I miss yoga. My whole body misses yoga.  It said so pointedly the other day by aching between my shoulder blades.

While I was walking I thought (as usual) about thruhiking.  And happiness.  And how though I was pretty happy, I wasn't happy 24x7 when thruhiking.  Is anybody super happy all the time?  Maybe some monks in some Tibetan order?  Or somebody on heavy medication?  Anyway, it doesn't seem to be the normal state of being.  Mostly you're busy, or something hurts, or you're having deep thoughts.  Happiness seems to me more of an emotional spike than a constant.  I wouldn't say I was mostly *unhappy*, either.. that's a spike in the other direction.  It seems normal and okay to me to be happier sometimes than others.  And I think it's perfectly okay to be unhappy sometimes.  There are good reasons for it!  Like discovering you have run out of chocolate and it's two days to the next store.  Or your boots have suddenly started supplying you with intractable blisters.  Or there's a jackhole in the shelter with you who won't shut up about something with which you disagree vehemently.  Even the monks might lose their glow.

And yet, every so often, last year on the trail, somebody (usually a weekender) would tell me that if I didn't love every instant, I should go home.  Which makes me wonder how they maintain a long term relationship.  Or a job.  It also makes me wonder why they felt qualified to judge me, but since they were strangers I guess I'll never know.

So.  My personal feeling about these feelings is:  it's okay.  If you are generally miserable for days on end, perhaps this is not the right time or place for you.  But if sometimes you're happy and sometimes you're not?  That's just life.

PS:  Speaking of happiness, I spent half an hour cuddling kittens on the guest bed, and that's very happiness-making.  Except for the part where Nazca tried to jump up, failed, looked horrified, and ran away.  That made me a little sad.  He still hasn't come out of hiding.  Poor little guy

What I'd do differently in the event that I got to thruhike again

I took a sick day today after all.  But I felt better throughout the day, so I'm thinking tomorrow should be back to normalcy.  However my day off today left  me with a lot of thinking time.

So I thought about thruhiking.  As one does.

I thought I'd do a "What I'd do differently" list.  Some things would stay the same, at least the same as the end of my attempted thruhike, if not the same as the beginning.  In fact I also need to do a "What I'd do the same" list for comparison.

What I'd do differently:
Call more cabs.  This is not always possible, but if it is, why not?  It's safer than hitchhiking, plus you can arrange a cab in advance.  Now, I'm talking about getting from trail to town and back.. not skipping ahead.
Either walk faster or accept lower mileage.  Longer days, hours-wise, leads to chafe-age.
Try to find other slow people to hike near.  Having friends around makes a huge difference in my daily mood.
Not get Lyme disease again.  My plan is to take Andrographis as a preventative.  I figure I'm a pretty good test case for finding out if that actually works.
Accept that I am not an ultralight hiker.  I am not one of those butch Marines that can "dry out my clothes in camp by wearing them."  That is a recipe for hypothermia for me.  Also, I need more than a tarp to sleep under.  I am a cold sleeper so I need to be warm, and I need to keep ticks off of me.
Think about taking glasses with me.  In case I need to read, or something.
Buy a brand new Marmot Precip right before my hike.  They're great jackets but they do age, so taking an old one is a bad idea.
Carry extra charging capacity for my phone.
Skip the "extras" that don't really appeal to me.  I generally don't care about waterfalls.  Home-style restaurants either.  But I should eat more Chinese food and read historical plaques.
Train more ahead of time.  That was the idea for this year, but the Snowpocalypse put the kibosh on it.
Wear my wedding ring or a cheap facsimile thereof.
Carry more of the AWOL guide at one time.  I often cut it too close, and had to wait until I picked up the next section to figure out how many days food to buy.
Ditch the bandaids.  I used sports tape for all my bandaid needs.
Carry stevia rather than splenda.  So my liver won't, you know, hurt.
Might try to find a pair of boots that doesn't rub my heel off.
Take more video.  It conveys things that pictures just don't.

What I would do the same:
Hike South to North.  You get more warm weather that way.  I like cool weather, but I don't like cold weather, and southbounders can get a whole lot of that.
My tent (Tarptent Rainbow), backpack (Gregory something or other), stove (AntiGravity Gear alcohol stove), pot (something titanium), and spoon (long handled titanium) are all fine.
My final hiking outfit is also fine:  convertible pants designed for curvy women, button down shirt.
Probably I would still carry all the maps.  I love maps.  They haven't been super useful, exactly.  It's not like I got lost and map and compassed my way out of it. I just like looking at them.


I am of two minds about my water treatment.  On the one hand, when the steripen works, it rocks.  But when it doesn't (mostly in cold weather), filters are also problematic. 

In other news, this is day three of my diet and I'm hungry.

That is all.

That burning sensation you feel is my envious stare

I've been reading http://www.traijournals.com/ and I am feeling an embarrassing amount of envy for the folks going out to do a thruhike this year.  Not that I really want to be gone from home that long, but the idea of it gnaws at me.  Even though I very clearly remember the times when I was sick or lonely or in pain, all the rest of it overwhelms those times.  Setting out on day one.  Meeting like-minded strangers at the shelters.  Sitting and gazing at vistas.  Having no other plan than getting up and hiking in the morning.  Craving, and then getting, cold cokes.  Feeling the strength and endurance of my body increase as I hike past the first 100, then 200, then 300 miles.  Exploring new small towns on foot.  Meeting people who live all along the mountain chain.  Learning how to shop for backpacking food from a dollar store.  Stopping to catch my breath and noticing, in the silence, the flame azalea way back in the woods.  Getting out of the tent for a privy visit in the night, and feeling the dark all around me like a cozy blanket.  Waking up briefly to roll over, and glimpsing a gorgeous night sky.  Feeling the absolute relief of taking off my boots at the end of a long and rocky day.

I miss all that.  Tremendously.

Maybe someday I'll do it again.

In other news, it appears that half my weekend has been wasted by sleep.  I'm planning to go to work tomorrow.  I hope.  I hate using up annual leave on sick days.  You may have guessed that I prefer to save them up for long hiking trips.  :)

Where I wish I could be, again

Stocking stuffers for your thruhiker

Someone you love going on a thruhike?  Don't know what to get them?  Here are some ideas.

$14  Long handled titanium spoon http://www.antigravitygear.com/vargo-titanium-long-handle-spoon.html (the plastic ones don't hold up).  Good for getting down into ziplock dinners without getting your hands all nasty.


$45 Petzl Zipka Plus Headlamp - plenty bright, plus red light for at night so you don't blind everybody.  http://www.rei.com/product/793268

$18  Swiss Army knife.  Use the knife to slice cheese.  Use the scissors for everything else.  http://www.rei.com/product/403028

~$6 No link, but go to Walmart.  Go into the garage/car section.  Buy a 50' length of lightweight nylon utility cord, in a bright color like red or yellow.  It should be about 1/8 to 1/4 inch diameter.  It makes an excellent bearbag line.  It's bulky but lightweight and doesn't tangle or mildew.  Should have a weight strength of 75 lb or so.

$27 Mountain Hardwear Power Stretch Gloves.   Comfy, washable, easy to get in and out of.  http://www.amazon.com/Mountain-Hardwear-Power-Stretch-om2860/dp/B001E5PKQY/ref=pd_sbs_a_2

$8 to $13 (or free if you have Reflectix to make it yourself) A pot cozy.  Keeps the contents of the pot hot after you cook.  Can be used to continue cooking your food after your stove burns out.  Technically doesn't fit in a stocking, but..  http://www.antigravitygear.com/antigravitygear-pot-cozy.html

$12 An alcohol stove.  This one is nice because you can sit your pot right on it.
http://www.antigravitygear.com/antigravitygear-alcohol-stove-4-oz-pepsi-style.html

$3 Mosquito headnet.  Nearly weightless, and invaluable when the gnats are bad.  Which is often.  http://www.antigravitygear.com/mosquito-head-net.html

$20 A Buff.  It's kind of like a bandana, kind of like a neckwarmer, and useful for many things.  http://www.amazon.com/Buff-Original-Color-Pink-Print/dp/B003ZTPIVE/ref=sr_1_1?s=sporting-goods&ie=UTF8&qid=1292181132&sr=1-1

$4 A plain old cotton bandana or three.  Very, very useful.  The swiss army knife of clothing.  http://www.rei.com/product/246097

Variable price.  Check out Minimus.biz for single servings of almost everything.  Shampoo, coffee, and most importantly food.  Wouldn't some hummus taste great on the trail?  http://www.minimus.biz/

My thoughts on the major gear decisions for thruhikers

Just got a call from somebody my mom pointed my way.  He's a hiker in his 60's who wants to do the trail in 2011.  We chatted for 20 minutes, mostly about gear.  A prospective thruhiker has a lot of decisions to make, and there is a LOT of information out there to sort through.  If you haven't been backpacking recently, there are a lot of changes in default gear.  I thought I'd tell you what I used, and what else I saw a lot of on the trail.

The major items most use are:

shelter
sleeping bag
ground pad
stove
backpack
raingear
water treatment

For shelter I used a Tarptent Rainbow. It weighs just over two pounds.  It is a single wall tent, meaning there is no inner mesh tent.  That makes it lighter, but it also means there is nothing between you and the condensation.  I carried a camp towel and used it to wipe down the walls during times of heavy condensation, such as during heavy rains or when camped on grass.  I liked that it had plenty of room inside.  I could sit up easily without brushing my head on the roof, and there was room for a 6' sleeping pad and also my whole backpack plus its contents spread out.  When the gnats were bad I spent a lot of time in it.

Other tents I saw a lot of were the  MSR Hubba (pretty much just room for your sleeping pad) and the Big Agnes Fly Creek which was a little roomier.  Both had the advantage of the interior tent plus fly setup.  Less condensation, plus in hot weather you can set it up without the fly.  This way you're still protected from insects but you have much more ventilation.

An up and comer is the LightHeart Solo.  It's based on the old Wanderlust design, but with improvements.  Everybody I saw with one of these loved it.  Plus the LightHeart lady is really nice.

I used a Montbell Ultralight Down Hugger 30 degree bag (no longer available).  I loved it because it was very stretchy so I didn't feel confined.  However, it was nowhere near warm enough for the beginning or end of the trail.  I layered it with a Nunatak Arc Ghost that I already had, and that was very warm. 

Montbell Super Spiral sleeping bags were common on the trail and their users were happy with them.  Western Mountaineering bags come highly recommended as well.

I slept on a Thermarest NeoAir pad.  The short was too short, even for me.  At 48", it left too much of me dangling uncomfortably over the edge.  The medium and long worked fine.  These pads have a design flaw which causes some of the interior panels to delaminate over time.  They'll still hold air, but they'll get bulges.  Also they are not self inflating.  You have to spend a minute or two blowing them up every night.  For me the comfort was worth it.  Because the NeoAir doesn't have real insulation, I carried a Gossamer Gear Thinlight pad to layer with it at the beginning of the trail.

Others use (and I often use on short, cold trips) the Big Agnes Insulated Air Core pad.  It weighs a little more than the NeoAir, but is much warmer on cold nights.  Durable and simple to use Z-rest pads were common with younger hikers who didn't need as much padding.  Heavier but self inflating Thermarest pads are very common too.

I used an Antigravity Gear alcohol stove for most of the hike except the month of summer where I went stoveless.  Alcohol stoves of that type were very common.  Also common were the fast and fuss-free Jetboil stoves, which require shipping yourself canisters via ground mail, or hoping to find canisters at the occasional outfitter.  There are still a few Whisperlite liquid fuel stoves out there.  It's easier to find fuel for them than the canisters for the Jetboils.  The Whisperlites tend to clog and are far too fussy for me.

I first used a Gossamer Gear Mariposa backpack, but after a few hundred miles I decided it didn't have quite enough support for what I was carrying.  I hated to give it up due to its light weight and wonderful pockets, but I bought a Gregory Jade 60 women's pack to use for the rest of the trip.  It is a *wonderful* pack.  The pockets are not as awesome as the Mariposa's, but the suspension was worth the extra three pounds.  If I could get a Gregory suspension with a Mariposa pack, that would be the ultimate for me.  I don't need the super durable Gregory fabric for the pack body.

The Gregory packs were mostly what I saw on others, especially toward the end.  A number of people were wearing ULA packs.  I love ULA backpacks (I have several of them myself) and would recommend them to others.  Also Brian Frankle, the brains behind ULA, is great to deal with.

I tried several silnylon raincoat options and they all kind of sucked.  Too much condensation.  I might as well have just gotten wet from rain.  I ended up going back to my old favorite, the Marmot Precip. That is mostly what I saw on others, though a few went with European brands that seemed to work great, and of course some people when with old fashioned ponchos.  Ponchos move around on me too much, sadly.

I also swear by my ULA rain wrap.  It keeps my shorts dry, it keeps my modesty intact when I'm doing laundry, and it can be used as a small tarp or to sit on.  Love it.  Some people use a Hefty bag for the same purpose.

I have a love-hate relationship with my Steripen.  I got the version with the LCD screen.  It was a bitch to get working in cold weather.  I had to open the thing up and warm the batteries to get it working.  Also the LCD screen quit working halfway through hike.  However, the pen itself kept working the whole time.  It left my water tasting delicious, and I didn't get giardia.  I did prefilter the water through a  dedicated square of camptowel, to remove silt.  I carried a backup bottle of iodine tablets in case of pen failure.

Few people used Iodine tablets.  It's not really such a great idea for long term use.  But it makes a good backup.  Get the PA plus and use the vitamin C tablets AFTER THE IODINE HAS HAD TIME TO WORK to get rid of the iodine flavor. 

A lot of folks use Aqua Mira chlorine dioxide drops.  I used to, but discovered that my intestines were irritated by the chlorine.  The drops are lightweight, but must be mixed and then left to sit for several minutes, then you can't drink the water for half an hour.  The sitting and waiting is irritating when you want to be walking (or there are gnats and mosquitoes near the water source, where you've stopped for water), and it's even more aggravating to wait half an hour to drink when you're thirsty.  All of which is why I don't use the stuff anymore.  But like I say, lots of folks use Aqua Mira and love it.

Quite a few people used various brands of pump water filters.  I hate them and can't recommend any of them.  However, I do recommend gravity filters such as the Platypus Filter.  Delee has one that we use regularly for local camping trips.  It's a little bit heavy, but works wonderfully and is less labor intensive than most other methods.

Of course, there are lots of other decisions to make too.  What kind of hat?  Gloves?  Wicking shirt?  Shorts, kilt, zip off pants, mini skirt, sundress?  Underwear or no underwear?  What kind of socks?  Boots, trail runners, bare feet, sandals, Vibram Fivefingers?  Titanium or aluminum pot?  Which hiking poles?  Tampons, pads, or menstrual cup?  Trowel or no trowel?  The list goes on ad infinitum.  The answers are not the same for any two different people. 

I hope somebody finds this helpful.  If not, at least I can use it as a gear list next time I pack up.  :)