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BenOnAdventures
06-17-2015, 11:27
Hey adventurers, its super rainy here and is supposed to pour all week long. So with that in mind, what is it you like to do on rainy days? Go!

Moosling
06-17-2015, 11:50
I'm guessing your talking about on the trail? If its really raining hard and I don't feel like getting wet I Try to stay dry, Drink lots of Coffee, and Read a book, Dwell on how to decrease my pack weight. Basically what I do at home on a rainy day.

colorado_rob
06-17-2015, 11:53
Fugedaboudid... Just hike! Wet, schmet. Cools you off. Just keep you overnight gear dry.

Uriah
06-17-2015, 11:58
Fugedaboudid... Just hike! Wet, schmet. Cools you off. Just keep you overnight gear dry.

Exactamundo! Hiking in the rain offers an entirely wonderful experience (camping in the rain...not so much). People are fearful of getting wet it seems, and the trails tend to be a more isolated experience. All the better! (We've had one deluge after the other here in Rocky Mountain National Park, and even though it's a "crowded" National Park, the trails are completely devoid of humans in such conditions. It's awesome!)

Dogwood
06-17-2015, 12:00
Wash the car.

Dogwood
06-17-2015, 12:06
Dance and sing in the rain. A 1952 oldie but goodie. It always peps me up. I have it on my mp3 player always when hiking.

https://search.yahoo.com/search;_ylt=AgNH3KyUF3iR0BxYA3tMV.ObvZx4?fr=yfp-t-exclusiveBkt-s&toggle=1&fp=1&cop=mss&ei=UTF-8&p=gene%20kelly%20singing%20in%20the%20rain

Dogwood
06-17-2015, 12:08
https://search.yahoo.com/search;_ylt=AgNH3KyUF3iR0BxYA3tMV.ObvZx4?fr=yfp-t-exclusiveBkt-s&toggle=1&fp=1&cop=mss&ei=UTF-8&p=gene%20kelly%20singing%20in%20the%20rain

Sarcasm the elf
06-17-2015, 12:09
On rainy days I go hiking on popular trails, usually I have the place to myself. There are a few heavily used local trails that I will only hike on if it is pouring rain.

Dogwood
06-17-2015, 12:12
Get this into your soul: LIFE isn't always about waiting for the storms to pass...it's about learning to dance in the rain.

Few things are as soul cleansing as a long walk in the rain. I love the woods in the rain.

Dogwood
06-17-2015, 12:19
I use music to inspire and energize me on hikes having a rainy day collection I always carry with me purposefully listening to it when its raining reminding me that I always should appreciate everything. Doing this helped me turn around the negative attitude about hiking in the rain I once had. Try it.

RangerZ
06-17-2015, 12:20
Continue to hike - anybody can do it on a sunny day.

Tipi Walter
06-17-2015, 12:20
Exactamundo! Hiking in the rain offers an entirely wonderful experience (camping in the rain...not so much). People are fearful of getting wet it seems, and the trails tend to be a more isolated experience. All the better! (We've had one deluge after the other here in Rocky Mountain National Park, and even though it's a "crowded" National Park, the trails are completely devoid of humans in such conditions. It's awesome!)

I pulled a long April trip with a friend and she was on a "forced march" to finish her thruhike of the BMT and so in order to keep up with her I had to hike in a week of cold April rains. Left to my own devices (and solo) I would've camped earlier or pulled in-tent zero days during the worst of the deluges and stayed dry and mainly STAYED WARM.

If you must backpack in the rain, hope and pray it's a warm rain with ambient temps in the 90s. Then it's an easy exercise in just moving forwards. Otherwise, hiking in a 40F rain for a week becomes a daily struggle with hypothermia and loss of motivation. Just hope you can find overhangs or porticos or small roofs to keep you sane.

http://tipiwalter.smugmug.com/Backpack-2015-Trips-161/18-Days-with-Amy/i-K9hh9tx/0/L/TRIP%20164%20115-L.jpg
Amy Willow preparing lunch under a bathroom's roof edge.

http://tipiwalter.smugmug.com/Backpack-2015-Trips-161/18-Days-with-Amy/i-ZKjNSjJ/0/L/TRIP%20164%20140-L.jpg
Trying to stay dry under the eaves of a bulletin board. Cold rain sucks.

twilight
06-17-2015, 12:26
Just spent a couple days on the Tuscarora. Monday morning around 1:30am a storm blew in while I was at Dugan Hollow shelter. 6am I was up doing my morning chores and it was still raining. 7am I was hitting the trail to hike out that morning. Rain finally stopped around 9am. Hiking in the rain is just another part of the trail experience. So is hiking in the snow for that matter. And I agree with Dogwood's last post. I to love the woods in the rain.

Twilight

Uriah
06-17-2015, 12:30
I pulled a long April trip with a friend and she was on a "forced march" to finish her thruhike of the BMT and so in order to keep up with her I had to hike in a week of cold April rains. Left to my own devices (and solo) I would've camped earlier or pulled in-tent zero days during the worst of the deluges and stayed dry and mainly STAYED WARM.

If you must backpack in the rain, hope and pray it's a warm rain with ambient temps in the 90s. Then it's an easy exercise in just moving forwards. Otherwise, hiking in a 40F rain for a week becomes a daily struggle with hypothermia and loss of motivation. Just hope you can find overhangs or porticos or small roofs to keep you sane.

Classic pictures Walter! I can't even begin to count how many times I've stayed or slept in such structures! They can be (and have been) real life-savers. The need for warmth and aridity and a roof overrides even the stench! Naturally, I detest the experience at the time, but I always look back on it, on them, with a laugh and a smile. Cooking in a *****ter...what a lovely experience!

Tipi Walter
06-17-2015, 12:53
Just spent a couple days on the Tuscarora. Monday morning around 1:30am a storm blew in while I was at Dugan Hollow shelter. 6am I was up doing my morning chores and it was still raining. 7am I was hitting the trail to hike out that morning. Rain finally stopped around 9am. Hiking in the rain is just another part of the trail experience. So is hiking in the snow for that matter. And I agree with Dogwood's last post. I to love the woods in the rain.

Twilight

Good post. "Hitting the trail to hike out that morning" is the key phrase. On the last day of a backpacking trip any amount of rainy crap can be endured. Why? Because I'm heading to my car or evac or shuttle and could care less about wet gear or wet clothing or anything else.

AT hikers often hike in terrible conditions because they are headed into a town to do a laundry or are anxious to reach the next rat box shelter to get out of the rain. When food resupplies are every 4 or 5 days, there's no problem with hiking in the rain as you'll soon be at a laundry mat to dry your gear.

It's another story to be out for 3 weeks with no towns or clothes dryers or food resupplies. Extra care is needed to keep dry--- Ergo in-tent zero days during all day deluges.


Classic pictures Walter! I can't even begin to count how many times I've stayed or slept in such structures! They can be (and have been) real life-savers. The need for warmth and aridity and a roof overrides even the stench! Naturally, I detest the experience at the time, but I always look back on it, on them, with a laugh and a smile. Cooking in a *****ter...what a lovely experience!

When we stopped at the bathroom eaves, a bloated tourist came over to use my side of the toilets and while he was struggling behind a closed door to give birth to an 8 lb turtlehead I was sitting 10 feet away eating vegetarian sausage links.:)

Dogwood
06-17-2015, 13:11
LOL. Always throwing something interesting into the mix TW. BTW holing up in a shelter isn't the only way to keep hiking under your well pointed out different than customary thru-hiker scenario.

rocketsocks
06-17-2015, 14:07
Nothin like guttural windy noises to dine by.:D

wrap89
06-17-2015, 14:24
I don't let the weather dictate what i do out on the trail, so i hike through it, i love hiking in the rain.

Astro
06-17-2015, 15:13
Keep walking. :)

Carbo
06-17-2015, 16:22
On rainy days I usually get wet.

Another Kevin
06-17-2015, 20:03
Good post. "Hitting the trail to hike out that morning" is the key phrase. On the last day of a backpacking trip any amount of rainy crap can be endured. Why? Because I'm heading to my car or evac or shuttle and could care less about wet gear or wet clothing or anything else.

Be it known that for all the rhetoric about rolling sofas, Tipi Walter has a car!

(Sorry, TW, couldn't resist the dig. You've kidded me about driving to a trailhead!)

Monkeywrench
06-20-2015, 20:21
Wet days are good for making miles. There's not much else to do. Sitting around on mountain peaks and overlooks isn't very pleasant, so you might as well just keep walking.

Bronk
06-21-2015, 13:34
I just spent a whole day in a downpour on a canoe trip. We knew it was going to rain on the second day before we left but weren't going to skip a trip and miss the first good day in order to avoid the rain on the second. We were really glad we went. But I'm not above laying in my tent all day and reading either.

runt13
06-22-2015, 10:39
Get wet!

RUNT ''13''

greeter
06-23-2015, 11:22
31077Sidney Tappan campsite lunch break. Maine SOBO to the Hudson River (stiff sore knee pulled me off the trail after 785 miles). 2010. It was cold and wet. This was the only place I could take a short break out of the weather and stay warm while I lunched.

SouthMark
06-23-2015, 16:44
Had a fiend ask me once if I hiked in the rain? My answer was "not on purpose".

rocketsocks
06-23-2015, 19:39
If it's rainin' on a Wednesday, I take a bath.
if it's Sun, Mon, Tues, no need, to soon...just took one on Sat.
If it's Thurs, Fri, no need, gonna take one on Saturday anyway.

Drybones
06-23-2015, 20:31
I'd rather be hiking in the rain than sitting around a shelter or in a tent doing nothing, actually, I like hiking in the rain, didn't like staying wet 11 days in a row though.

Zach ADK
06-23-2015, 21:43
On rainy days when the high temp will be at least in the 60s I hike in a swimsuit, and as always I wear sandals. I put the rest of my clothes in the dry bag with my sleeping bag and put a rain cover over my backpack. I stay warm enough as long as I keep moving and when I get to where I'll be camping I can set up my tent and my dry clothes are waiting for me. My tent is a Eureka Spitfire which is big enough for me but there is not much room to hang things up to dry in it. I only have backpacked in summer so that made it a lot easier.
Zach

CarlZ993
06-23-2015, 22:42
I don't particularly like to hike in the rain. But I do. I've been spoiled w/ some of the hikes I've down out west where there was infrequent rain (hiked the entire JMT w/o getting rained on in 2004). On the AT in 2013, no such luck. The worse rain I had was my first day in the Smokeys (4/4/13). It was a cold rain that froze on the vegetation. Man, that was miserable. It took me 5 min to open a Snickers bar. I was freezing!

'No rain, no pain, no Maine.'