PDA

View Full Version : Lack of water lead to my rediscovery of why I got into hiking/camping



Berserker
10-26-2016, 12:49
I appreciate everyone's responses on my other threads asking about water availability, and I hope that information is useful to others. I was going to do part of GSMNP last weekend and flirted with the idea of doing part of PA instead. However, I ended up in Slickrock Creek Wilderness, and I'm glad it worked out that way. So what's the point of this thread you might say, well it's just to say that I now remember what I developed a love for hiking/camping. Let me explain a little further.

A good buddy of mine and I have been section hiking the AT since the end of '07, and we are about 3/4 of the way done. So since that point in time the hikes have been almost exclusively AT sections where we have had to meet a predetermined schedule if we wanted to finish the section in the allotted amount of time (i.e. we both have families and work so we can't just take extra days off on a whim). Before that this same buddy and I used to just hike in the NC National Forests and Wilderness areas doing shorter routes and a lot of hanging out and relaxing.

So back to this past weekend. My buddy and I met up at a hotel in Waynesville, NC to get staged for hitting the trail the next day having already canned the idea of doing anything in PA because my buddy had a non-refundable room that was pretty pricey (due to it being leafer season I presume). I got to the hotel having already talked myself into doing GSMNP and having to carry a ton of water to the first shelter we had reserved (Mollies Ridge) since reports were that it was dry as I assumed my buddy was all in on that. I had already attempted to plant a seed with my buddy that we could do something else and mentioned Slickrock Creek (which we have hiked multiple times, but it's been at least 10 years). So I roll into the room thinking he's gonna be gungho on GSMNP, and to my surprise he's wanting to do Slickrock Creek.

We decided to go in a Big Fat Gap trail head with a bunch of extra crap (since we weren't gonna be backpacking all over the place), and setup camp down at the Gap next to Slickrock Creek. We then settled into 3 days of sitting around camp and day hiking. The main day hike was a loop going up the Slickrock Creek trail to the Haoe Lead trail out onto Hangover, and then back down to Big Fat Gap via the Big Fat Gap trail. The Slickrock Creek trail is pretty nasty for the last couple of miles up to the Haoe Lead trail, and actually reminded my of stuff in the Whites I saw back in July. The other day hike was a nice easy trip out to Wildcat Falls.

The trip was super relaxing...no schedule to meet...no high mileage days...no dealing with crap I wasn't in the mood for because I had to meet a schedule...it was awesome. So yeah, I now remember why I first developed a love for hiking and camping. I'm still gonna try to finish the AT and I love hiking the AT too, but from now on I think there's gonna be some other trips mixed in there to balance things out.

JC13
10-26-2016, 14:35
The real question is: Did you have any wild Tipi Walter sightings?

Ashepabst
10-26-2016, 18:06
sounds like fun! that day hike up to the Hangover and back may not have been huge mileage, but sure t'weren't easy.

that seems to be my default trip when I can't think of a specific route I want to do.... pick a river trail in a wilderness somewheres and plan to set up camp right on the creek.

Berserker
10-27-2016, 08:48
The real question is: Did you have any wild Tipi Walter sightings?
That's funny because I actually thought about that when I was out there. I've never met the guy and only know of him from on here, but I thought I'd keep an eye out to see if I might run across him...never did though. I was also thinking of his "heavy" pack style because that's what I was doing out there...the priority was not on light weight hiking, but on being comfortable in camp.

Mr. Bumpy
10-27-2016, 10:10
Berserker,
Everything has its season and I can speak to the opposite theme of your post:
For the past 10 years or so I have almost exclusively been hiking low miles with no agenda with my young son. We base camp and hike around, or if we are goal oriented it means something like doing a 50 mile hike or loop but taking five or six days to accomplish it.
Last week I did a solo thru hiked the Foothills Trail starting Sunday evening and finishing up Friday at mid-day. It was a completely fun experience to get back into the idea of setting milage goals and hiking relatively big miles each day. I did miss some of the sit around time that I have become used to, but traded it for several hours of night hiking which is something I don't do enough. I did mange to go swimming several times and spent several hours just sitting at night in my darkened camp.
Backcountry provides many different diversions, and I'm as happy to reconnect to goal oriented get it done hiking as you are with chill out base camp hiking. Cheers.

Another Kevin
10-27-2016, 12:59
Berserker,
Everything has its season and I can speak to the opposite theme of your post:
For the past 10 years or so I have almost exclusively been hiking low miles with no agenda with my young son. We base camp and hike around, or if we are goal oriented it means something like doing a 50 mile hike or loop but taking five or six days to accomplish it.
Last week I did a solo thru hiked the Foothills Trail starting Sunday evening and finishing up Friday at mid-day. It was a completely fun experience to get back into the idea of setting milage goals and hiking relatively big miles each day. I did miss some of the sit around time that I have become used to, but traded it for several hours of night hiking which is something I don't do enough. I did mange to go swimming several times and spent several hours just sitting at night in my darkened camp.
Backcountry provides many different diversions, and I'm as happy to reconnect to goal oriented get it done hiking as you are with chill out base camp hiking. Cheers.

Sure, there's always a place for both!

This site, however, does tend to focus on the goal-oriented Big Hike types. Not often being one of them (the longest trail I've thru-hiked is the 138-mile Northville-Placid), I definitely am aware of being a contrary voice and Devil's advocate around here. It's nice to hear someone else noticing that there's more to life than the Life-Changing Big Hike. The Big Hikers always seem to have a "yeah, sure" pat on the head ready for me. It's nice hearing someone defending something closer to my usual style (short mileage but often in pretty gnarly conditions).