Can I borrow your ???

[Dogwood]

Walked into the Muir Trail Hut with a decent looking middle aged weekend hiker type female fidgeting with her bra strap. I caught her by surprise. Since we were both alone it was awkward for her momentarily. Kinda awkward for me too. She didn't want to readily admit to her "gear" issue but it was obvious to me what her problem was. My first thought was what the heck are you doing hiking in a strapped bra with clasps anyway? I thought that! I didn't say it out loud. She eventually lightened up enough to tell me she had a clothing issue. I offered her one of the small safety pins I always have attached to the outside of my pack. I didn't have to say anything. I just went outside for a few mins. Came back in and we both shared a few smiles and laughs. She blushed slightly as she thanked me. I do what I can for you ladies.

Story doesn't end there. A few yrs earlier on a Oct JMT thru-hike I had a zipper on a sleeping bag malfunction potentially causing some serious sleeping discomfort in the single digit temps and a howling wind with a sleeping bag temp rating that was marginal for the hike to begin with. I decided to emergency shelter at the Muir Trail Hut as a result. When I got there two young female hikers offered me some safety pins to close my sleeping bag and keep me warm enough to weather out the night.

It's funny, when I offered her that safety pin bra fix I wasn't consciously thinking about safety pins being offered to me in that same place yrs earlier.

[Dogwood]

It's not so much things that people want to borrow it's what they regularly offer. I get many offers of food from day and weekend hiker types because they overwhelmingly have a tendency to carry way way too much food. Combined with the wt of their gear and their often out of shape physiques they are all too happy to unload food on me. NPs have some of the most loaded with scrumptious food hiker boxes around!

[peakbagger]

My friend has a major boot fail once in SNP in the off season, there was one other hiker in the shelter. My friend stated to no one in particular that he wished he had some barge cement. The other hiker dug down in his pack, pulled out a tube and handed it to him. My friend glued this sole back on and I think he used the boots for several more years. I have lent my stove once or twice and have supplied a few O-rings for the old MSR whisperlight pumps.

[garlic08]

My AT pack weight was sub-10 pounds and I gave out stuff several times, never requested anything. Stuff I gave out was mainly for first aid, a safety pin and duct tape for repairs. As stated above, anyone who skimps an ounce off a first aid kit or repair kit is definitely not an experienced or smart hiker, no matter what the total pack weight is.

Once on the AT I carried weight for an injured and over-packed hiker a few miles into town, where we shared a fun meal, answered her questions about pack weight, and cemented a long friendship. Hearing about her subsequent joy over lighter-weight packing was one of the lasting pleasures of my AT hike.

The point is there's such a thing as over-packing and it can do some damage. It takes a while and maybe some mistakes, and maybe even some help from kind strangers, to achieve balance.

Ditto Dogwood's comment about food from day hikers and weekenders. I love stopping near those folks as they're going through the huge food bag, wondering why they packed so much. I recently hit a jackpot on the Wonderland Trail, at a hiker box at the Mowich Lake ranger station. There was so much expensive food there, I actually packed it out two days to my car and took it home.

[GoldenBear]

Believe it or not, I somehow managed to not bring any spoon or fork on an overnight.

Amazingly, a fellow hiker let me borrow his spoon for my meal-- THANK YOU! THANK YOU! THANK YOU!!

I cleaned it off with alcohol hand wash before and after my using it, and it doesn't seem to have been any HEALTH issue for either of us.
However, I fully understood his look of disgust at me when I asked for help.

I now ALWAYS carry three plastic spoons -- one to use, one to lose, and one to loan.

[Another Kevin]

"Can I borrow your eyeballs? My spectacles are here next to the sleeping bag... somewhere."

GoldenBear - We're all guilty of sheer stupidity, sometimes.

Last trip I had, my spork didn't make it into my pack - for the first time, ever, in all the years I've been out. OMG, was that what they call a "senior moment?" I found my bag of small things, lying right where I'd packed the pack, when I got home. Just Bill came to my rescue. I boiled his spoon before returning it. I got off trail right after borrowing it, for other reasons.

[Bronk]

One guy chose to not carry toilet paper, we couldn't refuse but shamed him into getting some at the next town. Another guy would drop his poncho a few hundred yards coming out of the shelter knowing someone would pick it up and carry it to the next shelter. The third time I carried it back to the shelter.

This is brilliant.

[Starchild]

- As a uniformed Ridgerunner (and AT thru hiker class of 2013) I had a thru hiker (who knew this) really try very hard to yogi some food off of me (it appeared from talking to him that yogi'ing was his main method of resupply since his plan is not to leave the AT even for town stops), which I told him I have just enough for my remaining 4 day patrol and had no extra. Since he did not seem in medical distress, nor could I find any reason that this plan could not work (so of sound mind), so i just radioed it in to dispatch and noted it in my report.

- I had my hiking partner Splash, who sows and wanted to repair a piece of gear for another hiker, ask to have (not borrow) a piece of cloth that I used to ID my pack since the 2nd day of the AT. She asked me if she could use this as a patch when we were in Maine. Yes I carried this cloth with my name, trail name and address sharpied on it safty pinned to my pack almost 2000 miles at this point and she just wanted to give it away to someone who would never have understood what it meant. So I gave her a 'do not remove under penality of law' piece from IIRC a sleeping bag instead. I still have that cloth today

The other thing was to 'borrow' body heat one night in a shelter, since it was helpful to me too and of opposite gender, I didn't mind one bit

[Deadeye]

Like Golden Bear, I also carry extra plastic spoons and a few other extras. Plenty of people forget/break/lose things on the trail a it's nice to be able to help out now and then.

[tiptoe]

I was able to help out a fellow hiker whose glasses had lost a screw. Just passed him my little eyeglass repair kit before I went to sleep and asked him to return it the following morning. He did, with thanks.

[LittleRock]

One time I loaned my Gold Bond cream to a guy who was complaining about chafing. It was kind of funny because I forgot to warn him how much that stuff burns when you first put it on... everyone got to hear him hollering behind the shelter.

[Miami Joe]

Good memory, Tipi. After you wouldn't let me borrow your flashlight I broke my nose groping in the woods but then met my future wife and groped her in the woods.