Re: Hiking/Camping/Outdoorsy Types
 

i like to do just about any outdoor thing.....

camping
climbing
paintball
off-road
mountain bike
dirt bike
boating
water ski
ski
snowboarding (spent half the time on my butt)
cliff diving


got some pretty good stories if anyone wants to hear em...

Re: Hiking/Camping/Outdoorsy Types
 

ok, how long can a post be?

When I was in college I started going backpacking every June. One trip was a 100 mile loop through the Allegany National Forrest in NE PA. 10 day trip. Went with a close friend. First day our packs weighed 60 lbs each, and we stopped every 40 minutes or so and collapsed.

Your first night out, when it starts getting dark everything is dead quiet and this panic comes over you. You start thinking "This is stupid, if we pack up now we can make it back to the car by midnight" but its too late to leave. Strangely the next morning you feel right at home in the wilderness. I think its something eveyone should do, it changes your whole perspective on life.

The last day we were out we could not find water along the trail all morning. By noon we were getting pretty thirsty, and there was a good size stream we were due to cross. For some strange reason I had a sudden craving for beer, which is weird cause I dont really like beer. We come across the stream, and sitting on a rock, right in the middle, with water flowing half around it, is a can of beer! The sun was shining down through the trees, like a spot light, on the can of beer. We just stood there in disbelief, and yelled out to see if anyone was around. it was like someone was filming a commercial.

My friend gets an idea, and runs downstream a bit, and finds another can. Someone must have put them in the stream to cool, and left them.

So we are both standing there, still with our packs on (now mostly empty), when we hear this clamor coming up the trail from the other direction. We start thinking (ut oh!).

These 6 college kids come up to the stream, drenched in sweat, drop their packs, and start drinking from the stream. they barely noticed us at first. Then they started asking us:

How long have you been out here? ten days
How far did you hike? about 100 miles

they had started out that morning, only a few miles down the trail. After a long pause, one finally asked, "Where did you get the beer?!"

I looked him straight in the eyes and said, "Didnt you guys bring any beer?"

He shook his head and said "you got any more?"

I finished the can, crushed it in my hand, and said "Sorry, last one!"

You had to see us to fully appreciate, we were in great shape after 100 miles, we still had our packs on, standing there with our worn hiking staffs. They stared at us with their mouths open, like they were in the presence of some sort of Lumber-Jack Gods.

The other thing I really love to do now is sailing. There is a mystical quality when you pull in the main sail and the vessel accelerates silently through the water. Everytime you sail the conditions are different. I have been out in 8 foot whitecaps, where I could just barely keep the boat under control, and I have been in the bay in 2mph winds, where my HobieCat slid across the glassy water like a hot air ballon drifting through the sky.

And trapping out, where you are hooked into a harness that runs to the top of the mast, and you stand on the outside of the windward hull of the catamaran, leaning back sideways. when the hull lifts up out of the water you dont think about ANYTHING else but the next wave you are about to crash through, and the subtle changes of the wind on your face, as you instinctively work the tiller and mainsail to keep the boat up on one hull, flying along at 20mph.

Its something everyone should be required to do, at least once.

Re: Hiking/Camping/Outdoorsy Types
 

I'd do the outdoorsy thing if there weren't any bugs out there.

Re: Hiking/Camping/Outdoorsy Types
 

Go sailing...or water skiing...no bugs on the water (usually).

Re: Hiking/Camping/Outdoorsy Types
 

Every summer I work at a camp up in Vermont, and during the second week, we take the kids on hikes. The younger kids just hike either to a pond about 8 miles away, or to a big field about the same distance away. But the oldest campers (ages 15 & 16) we take on a 15 mile hike through backtrails to these awesome stables. There's nothing like hiking through woods - smelling the trees and plants, and feeling the warm sun shining on you, and then finally reaching the stables and lying out in the fields at night and seeing all the stars above - it's just breathtaking.

Re: Hiking/Camping/Outdoorsy Types
 

I can't swim... :o

Re: Hiking/Camping/Outdoorsy Types
 

I also am going on a cruise to Alaska and going down a mountain in Danali National Park for my senior vacation.

Re: Hiking/Camping/Outdoorsy Types
 

If you stay in the boat you don't need to swim.

Re: Hiking/Camping/Outdoorsy Types
 

But whats an adventure on water, if you can't swim? Learn to swim koko ed, you'll thank yourself forever!

Re: Hiking/Camping/Outdoorsy Types
 

Outdoorsy?

Hmm-
Those who know me know I am big, out of shape and generally lazy.

But I spend my summers doing one/all of the following-

1. on expedition to a tropical zone somewhere- I always keep an eye out for grants
2. mining mineral specimens in a quarry or the claim my buddies and I work- been into minerals for 30 years or more
3. photographing wildlife and plants
4. visiting the wildest places I can drive to with my tent in the back of the van.

Favorites in the US-
Chiricahua Nat Mon on the Mexican border, Az- great snakes there!
Stephen Foster SP in Georgia- canoeing the Okeefenokee (more bugs)- gators galore
Carlsbad Caverns, New Mexico- everyone needs to see it before they die- stay for the bat flight

Anybody else have similar interests?

WC

Re: Hiking/Camping/Outdoorsy Types
 

I never go out without my life-vest.

you dont need to swim, as long as you can float :^)

now I must tempt you severly! this was taken a few years ago, late in the fall: http://members.aol.com/wittlief/hobieMe.jpg

Re: Hiking/Camping/Outdoorsy Types
 

Ahhhhhh....... Philmont. How I miss thee.

In any event, I went to Philmont twice as a participant ('01 and '03) and then went back last summer ('04) to work as a Ranger. I'll be heading back again this summer ('05) to be a Ranger again, so if anybody's making the trip, stop by and say "hi".

As for other outdoorsy stuff, I also spend a fair amount of time climbing (you can't not climb if you spend the entire summer in New Mexico!) and doing personal backpacking/climbing trips.

-Rob

Re: Hiking/Camping/Outdoorsy Types
 

Ken, I prefer a slightly larger boat... :)
For bonus points, who can name all the sails flying on Vigi in this picture?


Wetzel

Re: Hiking/Camping/Outdoorsy Types
 

Sweet! I would love to get a cruiser someday and bounce around the carribean for a year or two

read "Sailing around the world alone" by Joshua Slocum, the first person to do so (around 1890) and you will be infected.

I like my 16 foot hobie though, esp going 20 knots, flying a hull while hooked out on the trapeze wire, and blowing the hatches off 60' monohulls as I fly past them :^)

like these: http://www.hobiecat.com/sailing/gall..._num=15&res=hr

http://www.hobiecat.com/sailing/gall..._num=12&res=hr

BTW, I can name those sails. The one on the front I name Bob, then Mike, and the back one: Sam

and the one all curled up on the bow: Curley!

Re: Hiking/Camping/Outdoorsy Types
 

I've had a lot of fun outdoor experiences.But one that sticks out was a couple of summers ago, I was on a mountain biking trip down some melted ski slopes in west Virginia, having blast, and hitting jumps like crazy. That year we used a rental company so we didn't have to hall our bikes to west Virginia. I regret that. Half way down the slope I lost my brakes and started to go faster than I wanted to go. To say the least, I ended up with a stick stuck in my head and had a helicopter trip to UVA. What was cool was that I was conscience the whole time. I'm OK now. But it was fun.