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Easyhiker
12-20-2002, 14:46
I have read many a journal and in quite a few I have noticed that people carry some weird stuff on there hikes from inflatables, stuffed toyz, pet rocks, tuba's etc...

What are some of the weird things you have carried on the trail or seen carried by others?

gravityman
12-20-2002, 15:01
Bought in Damascus from the Dollar store by Paranoid (AT '99 PCT 2001) who was training for the PCT. We used them for nose rings in Quincys.. That was fun!
I carried it to Front Royal were we got off. The original plan was to carry it to the big K and propose with it to my hiking partner/GF, Tuffie. Didn't make it that far, but did propose with it on top of Mt. Manadnock on June 21st, 2001.
She loved it! Of course I did finally buy a real diamond...

Gravity Man

stranger
12-20-2002, 17:56
We left Franklin with wrist rockets...Left Gatlinburg with blow guns to hunt shelter mice (never got one but very entertaining) then the novelty wore off. Although a friend of mine could not understand how another friend of mine carried a blowgun, wrist rocket, frisbee, and paint pellets and had a total pack weight of 25lbs haha. There's one for the ultralights!

Brad
12-21-2002, 20:58
Is it in Bryson that someone carried scuba gear as far as Walasi-Yi before they were convinced to send it home?

Jumpstart
12-22-2002, 11:21
We carried these cheap $1.00 water pistols all summer and would sneak up on unsuspecting thru-hikers ahead of us and give them a bath. It was always appreciated and kept us cool and on our guard....

Team GAK
12-28-2002, 21:02
Well maybe not weird, but different. Being from Vermont we carried packets of Maple Sugar Candies. We put plenty of these in our Mail Drops. We gave these out to anyone who helped us on the trail as gifts of appreciation and thanks (PO clerks, rides, etc).

Easyhiker
12-28-2002, 21:08
I carried 2 b___ p____ that said property of a certain well known individual and left them in seperate shelters ...... im sure somebody got a kick out of them:D LMAO

since when is plug or butt censored

MOWGLI
12-29-2002, 08:05
I started the trail with 3 books including a 3-pound 600 pg. monster of a philosophy textbook. Had an overdue paper for school. In addition I had the AT databook and the ALDHA companion, and the ATC guide to GA/NC.

Sent eveything but the databoook and ATC Guide home @ Neels Gap. I was too tired to read anyway.

SGT Rock
12-29-2002, 14:44
Easyhiker,

It was wrong and I apologize.

Bandana Man
12-29-2002, 15:53
And I thought b-- p-- was back pack...:p

Grimace
12-30-2002, 10:24
We showed up at a shelter for lunch in TN hiking SOBO in '01. The register had these pictures drawn by Dude showing that something weird was going on in the area. Alien sightings around the water hole, shelter, etc. Sure enough we found a 6' tall inflatable green alien in the privy. We were 3 days from the closest town. He'd been carrying that for a awhile.

Perkolady
02-04-2003, 19:16
;)

gee,,,

when ya stop to think about it, isn't carrying a rock from Springer to Katahadin a little strange? (yes , of course i know .... tradition, tradition!)

I wonder how many rocks have been there and back, maybe even a couple times? LOL
:D Perk

Trail Yeti
02-04-2003, 21:37
I carried a 2 foot tall bright green leprechaun hat the whole way!
why? well, why not?

Haiku
02-05-2003, 11:25
A thousand years from now, scientists will discover a strange phenomenon: there are rocks that clearly originated from thousands of miles south on top of Katahdin. Maybe they'll know about the almost religious ritual of bearing a rock on a long pilgrimage, or maybe they'll come up with some other explanation....

Haiku.

Footnotes
02-06-2003, 14:06
I plan to carry a 1 pound SlingLite chair in 2004. I have a bad back and find it a bit painful to sit around without something to prop it against. Now I doubt that I will carry it the whole way due to ridicule and reality, but if I don't carry it for a while my wife will have a lot to say about spending $100 on it for me. So at the right time and after a proper number of days I will send it home. Hopefully, long before someone gives me the name "Chairman".

Blue Jay
02-06-2003, 15:50
Hey, a good wife is worth carrying a pound from Georgia to Maine. Let the knuckle heads laugh.

Cascobay
02-06-2003, 21:59
This brings up a question I have been researching lately. Backpacker guitars. Martin makes one that weighs in at less than 3 lbs. I can't find one anywhere but magazines and would like to see how they play and sound. Does anybody have one or know about them?

MedicineMan
02-07-2003, 02:47
1 pound chair too heavy.
if you carry a thermarest get their converter that changes the thermarest into a chair,,,,probably 10-12 ounzes if that much

MedicineMan
02-07-2003, 02:49
one thing I carry that may seem a little out of the ordinary is a
Tomakawk....
yep I can throw it and if ever needed it can split wood besides heads, has a hammer opposite the blade so pounding is good.
weight: 1 pound 2 ounces via Cold Steel

Peaks
02-07-2003, 08:25
Originally posted by Cascobay
This brings up a question I have been researching lately. Backpacker guitars. Martin makes one that weighs in at less than 3 lbs. I can't find one anywhere but magazines and would like to see how they play and sound. Does anybody have one or know about them?

Takoma Ted carried some kind of a backpacking guitar with him in 2001. It sounded just fine to me, but then again, I cerainly don't have the ear to tell the difference. Anyway, at the urging of friends, Ted has made a CD with some of the songs he wrote and entertained us with along the trail.

cburnett
05-03-2003, 15:30
I'm considering carring a pitch pipe with me. I enjoy music so I can sing / analyze to myself jazz heads while I hike.

I don't my enjoyment to of music to interfer with other enjoyment of silince. So do instrustments have place in the backcountry? I lean towards saying NO, but if noone is bothered by someone strumming and you lugged it along, by all means enjoy yourself

Don
05-04-2003, 08:27
I don't carry an instrument, but my son routinely carries a native-american flute with him when he travels the backcountry. He carried a home-made ocarina on his A.T. thru-hike...other hikers did't seem to mind and some wrote in their journals that they enjoyed having the music at night...

Kerosene
05-04-2003, 17:59
I've read of a number of thru-hikers who have brought guitars and harmonicas. Then there's the guy who carried his tuba, which may have saved him when he slipped off a knife-edge on a rainy day and landed on the bell of the tuba!

TJ aka Teej
05-04-2003, 20:34
Weird things recently carried (no, not by me):
A kitten, riding on top of a backpack
Lifesized cardboard cutout of Kathy Ireland
Wiffle bat & ball
Soccer ball
inflatable life raft
pool cue
makeup kit (with lightup mirror!)
:O)
Tuba-man didn't carry one of those big parade style wrap around tuba, it was much smaller, kind of like a french horn.

DebW
05-04-2003, 21:03
Isn't there a guy carrying a chicken this year? Is he still on the trail? Heard he got one fresh egg per day.

Presto
05-05-2003, 12:20
The backpacker guitars sound a little tinny and it takes a while to get used to playing them cause you really need to use the strap since it has no body to rest on your knee. Those things said they are really great for backpacking and we saw 3-thrus carrying them in 2002. Sometimes I wished I had one - luckily Redman and the Mass-4 were cool enough to let me use theirs when we were camped out together.

Also saw a mandolin, harmonicas, pipe-flutes and recorders. All pretty cool.

EarlyRiser
05-09-2003, 15:37
i should take my tuba, riiight. sounds like he took a baritone if it was that small. although some tubas can be pretty light, still to heavy to carry id think though. perhaps a trombone....

MadAussieInLondon
05-09-2003, 17:22
my frivolous item is an aussie boxing kangaroo flag. when not dangling off my pack (its a full size one), being flown off teh top of some yanky peak! it may bet worn as a sarong or knotted around me head as a overly large bandanna with neck duster... or not...

oh and a can opener.

jojo0425
06-16-2003, 17:20
I didn't think it was weird, but everyone seemed very intrigued that I carried a can of cheeze wiz.

What can I say, I love cheese and that was the only way I could think of carrying it without spoilage. Plus, EVERYTHING taste better with cheese.:D

Smiley G

Sleepy the Arab
06-16-2003, 22:00
Say, I carried a can of cheese whiz too! It never ceased to amaze me how many people were fascinated by it. I had it in a mesh pouch on the side of my pack - very visable too. Every nitwit tourist felt compelled to point and say, "Hey, CHEESE WHIZ!" Hey thanks for telling me you waste of skin!

But by far the oddest thing I ever saw being carried was a lawn chair. The guy picked it up just before entering Pen-Mar park in the middle of the woods ("Hey, no one else was around and it still had a price tag!"). Every time I saw him from Pen-Mar to Delaware Water Gap he had the chair. Several times he had the urge to chuck the thing but would change his mind when he sat down in it. I lost track of the guy and the chair after the Water Gap. I wondered what happened to the chair for many miles. Then, one evening, I arrived at Mark Noepel Lean-to on the flanks of Mt. Greylock, and there, on the top shelf of the loft was a lawn chair...

PushingDaisies
06-17-2003, 13:25
This year on the trail I have seen:

a guy with a cat on top his pack
a child's windmill toy
several stuffed animals sown to packs
wiffle ball and bat
kites
umbrellas

and I am carrying a figurine of Roger Rabbit for my original hiking partner who had to leave the trail due to injury.

Mala
06-17-2003, 23:20
The last time I saw Doc and LLama, Doc was carrying a $6 lawn chair. Does anyone know if he still has it?

Kerosene
06-18-2003, 09:28
Last summer I ran across a section-hiking teenage girl who was lugging this huge yellow Tonka truck toy in one hand. Turns out she had bought it at a flea market for her young nephew since it reminded her of one she loved when she was a kid. Frankly, I would have stashed it by the side of a road and come back to pick it up on the way home instead of lugging it for 50 miles!

PushingDaisies
07-05-2003, 09:29
Originally posted by Mala
The last time I saw Doc and LLama, Doc was carrying a $6 lawn chair. Does anyone know if he still has it?

Yes, he is still carrying it. :cool:


To add to the list of strange things carried, I've seen a few people with rubber ducks tied to their packs lately.

tygerlily
07-15-2003, 02:16
Last month we had a bright orange smily face stuffed animal and a jolly roger accompanying us from fantana to winding stair gap.

Downunda
07-26-2003, 23:31
For Cascobay, in 2000 Fiddlehead carried a Martin Backpaker guitar and it sounded great. He visits forums from time to time, so maybe someone knows his email so you can ask him about it.

In 2002 I carried a bunch of small Koalas. I gave them out trail angels and children I met along the way.

Potato Man carried a bag of Maine pins that he handed out to all thru-hikers he met. The belief was that having the Maine on display in Maine guaranteed royalty treatment. The people of Maine certainly treated me like royalty, so it must have worked.

icemanat95
07-28-2003, 19:22
Is that the same Fiddlehead who hiked the Trail at least two times before, real name Glen Fleagle? If so, he's a great guy, likes his MJ a bit too much, but a great guy.

EarlyRiser
08-01-2003, 20:24
this last week i carried a small key id found on the ground in a little town i was passing though out in west virginia, it was lashed to my pack and seemed to have brought me good luck and good weather for two weeks in SNP.

smokymtnsteve
08-02-2003, 10:53
......

Aswah
08-28-2003, 22:24
strange... not really strange but when I hit boiling springs my pack weighed 22 pounds with five days food, 2 quarts of water, 150 crayons, numerous stickers and colored pens, walkman, external speakers and and forty tapes... it's all about the party...

Doctari
10-30-2003, 11:37
I carry a 15OZ PVC flute (in d minor) for my own entertainment. The first few days out I don't get it out, but when I get my trail legs, It's great fun. And many at the shelters have commented on how nice it was to listen to.
Sadly, it is no longer made as the guy what builds them has gotten very ill.

I also have one made by a friend in A, so may have a source if any are interested. It only weighs 13 Oz.

Doctari
10-30-2003, 11:47
The guy carring the cat is "Hot Dawg" the cat is "Stubby cat" When I last saw them at Erwin, she had walked about 5 feet of the AT :D she rode the rest of the way on Dawgs pack.

He tell that when he first brought the pack home he leaned it against the wall, she climbed on top as if to say "well lets go" has been there ever sence.

A note about Stubby, she is a terror to the shelter mice, but I have heard from people who were in the shelters after Dawg & Stubbs, the Mice were unbearable. Revenge? Makes you wonder don't it.

Jack Tarlin
10-30-2003, 16:33
In 2002, as a favor to my friend Jester, I carried this extraordinarily hideous stuffed rabbit from the Nantahala Outdoor Center to Killington, Vermont. Dunno fer sure, but I think that's around 1400 miles. The two of us took turns carrying this thing from Monson to Katahdin this year, thus completing over 2200 A. T. miles for the creature. We intend to send the rabbit's summit shot from 9 october to Hugh Hefner......after all, bunnies are everywhere. Jester thinks this will absolutely get us invited to the mansion.

Sometimes I wonder about Jester.

MOWGLI
10-30-2003, 20:03
Jack, although we have never met in person, I was at NOC in April of 2002 after spending 4 days backpacking in the Joyce Kilmer Slickrock Wilderness. My companions & I ate breakfast at the great restaurant there. While sitting in my car, I noticed you photographing said stuffed rabbitt with a lit cigarette that you placed in its bunny lips. Twas one of the strangest things I ever saw. Frankly, I thought you were wacked.

How did I recognize you? From photos on hobocentral.

A-Train
10-30-2003, 20:56
I carried 20 extra pounds in my stomach for the first couple weeks. THought is would make it more of a challenge

Jack Tarlin
10-31-2003, 16:24
TJNED--

Then you probably also saw me offer the bunny a drink.

Sorry you had to witness this, but it at least proves I didn't make the whole story up.

MOWGLI
10-31-2003, 17:47
Originally posted by Jack Tarlin
Then you probably also saw me offer the bunny a drink.


It was still morning. Do bunnies drink before lunch? In dry towns?

Jack Tarlin
10-31-2003, 18:06
THIS bunny does....you shoulda seen him at the Gathering; then again, maybe it's best you didn't. I gather not everyone approves.

Oh, and the next time you see me on the Trail, by all means take a minute and say hello!

Blister
10-31-2003, 18:44
I have seen the tuba, scuba gear, chairs of various assortments, even good friends with the bunny. The bunny actually had sex on top of my tent with another furry friend in 2002 at trail days. I missed him finishing the trail this year however I heard he was in good company up until the Gathering - what happened to him since? The funniest day I had in a long time on the trail was in a diner somewhere down south in 2000. I happened to be in Balt Jacks company as well as many others. When he went to pay his bill. Instead of carrying a ziplock or other light weight storage ditties, he pulled out a Altoids containers - the metal one. Well instead of $ and ID inside He had grabbed the wrong "metal" box which was fill with of course un-used condoms. The unreal thing is that he carried more than 2 meatal boxes in that monster pack.

MOWGLI
11-01-2003, 10:39
Originally posted by Blister
Well instead of $ and ID inside He had grabbed the wrong "metal" box which was fill with of course un-used condoms.

"Of course" - ouch! That was a shot across the proverbial bow. I don't know about you Jack, but I wouldn't take that one sitting down.

Jack Tarlin
11-01-2003, 13:09
No comment. Blister doubtless has me confused with another hiker.

Jaybird
11-01-2003, 14:41
Yo Peaks:

While my 2002 hike partner: "TeePee" & i were on the Ga-NC section of the A.T. a hiker calling himself: "the Mad Musician" was toting a Martin Backpacker guitar (& a gallon of whiskey).

the guitar sounded nice... tone was a bit thin (no pun intended) but nice enuff to strum out some tunes in a pinch.

to add to the weird things taken on the trail...how about a complete boyscout approved coleman 3 burner stove along with a boyuscout 5 lb hatchet????????????????

wasnt me....but, i witnessed this!



:p


jaybird
www.trailjournals.com/Jaybird

Blue Jay
11-03-2003, 09:03
I hope Will does not find this thread. That bunny needs to REPENT.

Hikerhead
11-03-2003, 09:17
Will is now preaching on Trailjournals. He saved us from Jack here, he's now saving those good people.

chomp
11-03-2003, 10:11
I carried a beer funnel for about 500 miles along the AT back in 99. I had picked it up at a friends place in Baltimore over the Fourth of July weekend. Anyway, we figured that at some point we might funnel a beer. I also figured that if I came to a slow-running water source, I could "pipe" the source with the hose, so it had TWO USES! Well, we never did funnel a beer, and the first time I came to a dry water source, I found that "piping" a spring is a lot harder than I tought. The funnel got mailed home at the next PO.

saimyoji
12-22-2004, 01:20
What the heck? I can only imagine why someone would carry scuba gear. If anyone has anymore info I would really like to hear. I'm a Divemaster myself, can't see the connection to the trail.

minnesotasmith
12-22-2004, 02:27
I don't think a SMALL umbrella is neccessarily a dumb thing to take along while hiking. I have a tiny (under 8 oz., about 10" long, 2.5" wide) umbrella I bought in a drug store that I took along on my last overnight hike. When you are at a shelter, and it is raining any amount at all, it sure is more convenient and effective than a poncho at keeping the rain off while you take a leak, get water, etc.
============================================

Haiku:

"A thousand years from now, scientists will discover a strange phenomenon: there are rocks that clearly originated from thousands of miles south on top of Katahdin. Maybe they'll know about the almost religious ritual of bearing a rock on a long pilgrimage, or maybe they'll come up with some other explanation...."

There is a common natural phenomenon well-known by geologists that results in exactly this type of situation. Glaciers erode away rocks from one location, often leaving them in another far, far away (sometimes at considerable elevation), where those rocks could not possibly have originated. These rocks are called glacial erratics.

Haiku
12-23-2004, 12:37
Haiku:

"A thousand years from now, scientists will discover a strange phenomenon: there are rocks that clearly originated from thousands of miles south on top of Katahdin. Maybe they'll know about the almost religious ritual of bearing a rock on a long pilgrimage, or maybe they'll come up with some other explanation...."

There is a common natural phenomenon well-known by geologists that results in exactly this type of situation. Glaciers erode away rocks from one location, often leaving them in another far, far away (sometimes at considerable elevation), where those rocks could not possibly have originated. These rocks are called glacial erratics.
The next time you find glacial rocks migrating from the south to the north (in the Northern Hemisphere), let me know. Never mind from below the extent of the furthest glaciers. :)

Haiku.

neo
12-23-2004, 13:12
i carried a toy lazer pistol in 2001,my yougest son issued it to me
in caSE SOMETHING TRIED TO GET ME,HE FELT BETTER,PLUS I HAD A LOT OF FUN WITH IT.:sun neo

Miss Janet
12-23-2004, 15:00
I have seen some interesting things over the years...

There was a guy that carried a huge stuffed gorilla attached to a big staff... the gorilla was green and he danced on the stick...

A young man from Israel had an aluminum and canvas camp chair that he cut a hole in the seat and duck taped the edges of the hole... Yep, made himself a potty chair! And he could sit on it in camp... 2 Uses!

In 1999 a guy lost a bet and had to buy and wear a full Cub Scout uniform... with shorts, kneehigh socks, neck scarf... the whole bit. He wore it for weeks!

I have seen lots of climbing rope, axes, lanterns, bear canisters and such over the years but not so many lately. Web sites like Whiteblaze are educating hikers better and I don't see as many bad choices of gear. Now, if someone is carrying something "weird" they are doing it because they CAN and WANT to!

minnesotasmith
12-24-2004, 01:45
"The next time you find glacial rocks migrating from the south to the north (in the Northern Hemisphere), let me know."

I could be wrong here, but I believe that glaciers can transport rocks as they retreat as well as when they advance; that's how terminal moraines get formed, I believe. As far as how far south glaciers went, it would be neccessary to specify which ice age. Keep in mind that the continents have move all over the place over geologic time, too. They have changed where they are WRT the poles and Equator, as well as there being periods that almost all of the Earth is very warm. Those are major reasons why there are oil deposits in northern Alaska and coal seams in Antarctica, where they would never form under today's conditions.

Too, only about 1% of rock strata that are formed survived until today; an out-of-place rock may be the only findable remnant of an entire widespread terrane.

Lastly, what are mountains today haven't always been elevated; mountains are repeatedly getting upthrust and eroded down. The Earth over hundreds of millions of years is a very dynamic place, and just because something being present in one location makes no sense now doesn't mean that it isn't from that location. That's why limestones (mostly formed in warm shallow seas) could conceivably be found lying (albeit unconformably) atop glacial tills.

The Appalachians are very old mountains if memory serves, much younger than the Rockies. I think they are PreCambrian in age, putting them over 600 m.y. B.C.E. However, the Earth is around 4.5 b.y B.C.E., which is 7+x as much time, to give some perspective.

TakeABreak
12-24-2004, 03:29
On the start of my thru hike (2/2000), the people at the Walasi Yi, told me the there was a guy that came through a year or two earlier carrying a 5 gallon propane tank, can't remember if they had a picture of it not (they do do of most of the weird things coming trough).

His reason for doing so, was that he had heard he would not be able to get fuel on the trail, they convinced him he would not need. They have got some really good stories there to tell.

atraildreamer
05-07-2006, 01:52
What...no roaming gnome? :confused:

Just a Hiker
05-07-2006, 04:58
I have a response to this as well. Last year I met "Team Vanity" in Maine. They had stuff that I am probably not allowed to even say in here.

dloome
07-02-2006, 11:10
Things I saw this year:

A guy on Springer who'd taken 2 days to do the approach trail with a 110 pound pack including: An 8" thick car camping mattress AND a Ridge Rest pad. (What the hell?), a big square Coleman sleeping bag, a propane stove with a metal one gallon propane cylinder.

Jolly Green Giant carries a purple fuzzy wand. Coconut Monkey carries a coconut that has been carved into a monkey.

I like the ridiculous food items people pack out of town- A watermelon (Sunshine), 12 pack of MGD (Team Steve), two liter bottle of soda (Lockjaw), a carrot cake (Kaptain) fresh vegetables, lettuce and avocados (Pinky)

I think the dumbest thing I ever carried was some "ultralight" Boston Creams from Dunkin' in Vernon NJ. I sucked out the filling to save weight. I'm a loser.

Wolf - 23000
07-02-2006, 13:13
Several years ago, I found a blow-up-doll in the shelter. I don't even want to think about what happen there so I moved on.

Wolf

Frolicking Dinosaurs
07-02-2006, 13:42
I ran into four young men in the Hampton, TN area years ago carrying a 10' x 12' tarp with net walls - the kind you put up over a picnic table to eat bug-free. It had to weigh 20+ lbs with the poles. I saw them all wet and shivering the following day after a blowing rain storm so I took pity. Helped them make a fire to dry out and showed them how to pitch the tarp portion as an A-frame so they would have some real protection.

mweinstone
07-08-2006, 16:37
each of the four militants had two bolt cutters and two gasmasks. they also had the sunday new your times with an artical about their causing a stage one alert at limmerik power plant. they put four bottles of wine in the spring and made camp.

a guy who thru hiked with a large spagetti strainer

a thru hiker chick wearing white levis and carrying a large bible at the pavillion in port clinton

minnisota smiths bear exstinguisher

minnisota smiths cans of water

minnisota smiths shelf stable bread and cheese

minnisota smiths canned octapus

minnisota smiths snow accumulation charts

treegirls pony tails (3.5lbs)

crazy horses knife in his gater and the back up in his pack and his 357

pirates b o

Uncle Silly
07-17-2006, 02:26
This brings up a question I have been researching lately. Backpacker guitars. Martin makes one that weighs in at less than 3 lbs. I can't find one anywhere but magazines and would like to see how they play and sound. Does anybody have one or know about them?

Sure. Any Martin dealer in your area can find one for you; they may even have one in stock.

How do they play? Like crap. They don't feel like a guitar (the balance is wrong due to how it's constructed). Try one and feel for yourself.

How do they sound? Not bad, but not really like a guitar. Try one and hear for yourself.

Save your $300. Go buy a quarter-size or half-size guitar -- you should be able to find one for maybe $50 (or less -- but don't pay anywhere near $100 -- $75 is a reasonable maximum). It'll sound like a real guitar, feel like a real guitar, and you can break 6 of them for the price of 1 Martin Backpacker.

Plus, a quarter-size kid's guitar will probably weigh LESS than that 3-pound Martin.


Oh, and to give you an idea of my cred, I put 1100 miles on a $60 beginner A-style mandolin last year. Martin also makes a Backpacker Mandolin, with all the disadvantages of their Backpacker Guitar -- expensive, poor playability, and poor sound. Why bother, when you can save $250?

Ridge
07-17-2006, 02:42
Seen a guy carrying a personal sized "Fire Extinguisher" during his thru-hike. Real strange.

fiddlehead
07-17-2006, 08:38
This brings up a question I have been researching lately. Backpacker guitars. Martin makes one that weighs in at less than 3 lbs. I can't find one anywhere but magazines and would like to see how they play and sound. Does anybody have one or know about them?

I don't think i'll ever hike again without my backpacker (wore 3 of them out already) guitar.
It's true it is more difficult to play than a full size guitar as there is no place to rest your hand. It takes about an hour or two to get used to that.
And it isn't very load due to the small soundbox. But in the woods, that can be a good thing.
I've carried my backpacker on 2 AT hikes, a PCT thru, and most of a CDT hike. As well as other long distance hikes. I've left it behind a few times also and usually regretted it.
I jammed one night with the tuba man and he was amazing: he played all David Gilmore's solos on any "Floyd" that we did and didn't miss a note.
I've played Baby Taylors, and small guitars but the reason i like the backpacker the best is because it is the lightest. Weighs in at 2 lbs plus the case. There are no wasted parts of this guitar and it holds up well. The reason i wore 3 of them out, is because i use them hard and carry them everywhere. (the desert is especially hard on them) Martin has always replaced them for me free of charge.
Right now, my Martin is up in northeast Thailand at my wife's home up there so that i don't have to carry a guitar with me everytime we go up. (i don't have to worry about the locals playing it as they can't figure out what it is.)
Carrying my guitar with me on my thru-hikes has been one of the best decisions i made. It gave me lots of time to practice and without it, i wouldn't know the repertoire of songs i do now. I'm now playing professionally here in Phuket, Thailand.

mrc237
07-17-2006, 09:26
Found an old horseshoe on the PCT near the top of Mt. Baden-Powell. Being an ole' Scouter I took it as a sign of good luck to follow. I carried to the Yosemite Valley. It now hangs over my rear porch.

Barrel Roll
07-18-2006, 00:55
On my SOBO hike last year, I came off the trail in Hanover NH to meet some of my friends. One of them won me a Batman stuffed doll from one of those claw machines, which I swore (stupidly) to carry all the way to Springer Mt...

Well, he made it, and he inspired most of the people in our trail family to win prizes in claw machines in gas stations up and down the entire trail, to the point where each of us carried two to three vanity items won from said machines.

Picture of our bounty celebrating on top of Mt. Springer attached : )

Skidsteer
07-18-2006, 06:34
Yup. Looks just like a typical group of hikers. :p

Nightwalker
07-18-2006, 14:53
Yup. Looks just like a typical group of hikers. :p
I'm not quite sure what that'd look like. It'd be scary or funny, at the very least. :sun

Alligator
07-18-2006, 16:01
I'm not quite sure what that'd look like. It'd be scary or funny, at the very least. :sunFunny or scary, it'll smell bad either way.

Skidsteer
07-18-2006, 16:48
I'm not quite sure what that'd look like. It'd be scary or funny, at the very least. :sun


Funny or scary, it'll smell bad either way.

I imagine those stuffed animals did smell as bad as the hikers by the time they hit Springer.

Ewwwww....

Alligator
07-18-2006, 16:56
I imagine those stuffed animals did smell as bad as the hikers by the time they hit Springer.

Ewwwww....For sure. Especially the polka dot monkey. Everyone wants to touch the monkey...

RabbitHole
07-31-2014, 20:59
I hope I one day see someone with one of these.... http://www.rocket-packs.com/

Damn Yankee
08-01-2014, 01:49
Didn't make it that far, but did propose with it on top of Mt. Manadnock on June 21st, 2001.

I proposed to my girlfriend at the time on the same date and married her on the same date one year later.

Damn Yankee
08-01-2014, 01:54
And I thought b-- p-- was back pack...:p

It is! Just don't ask to push in my stool

rocketsocks
08-01-2014, 02:36
I heard tell of one fella who brought one of these.

27944

rocketsocks
08-01-2014, 02:37
I heard tell of one fella who brought one of these.

27944...a full body pillow that is.

Traveler
08-01-2014, 06:41
Some years ago as we were trying to get across a swollen stream, we ran across a small plastic figure that caught my eye. It was a plastic indian figure from a cowboy and indians figure set sold in the 50s. The indian is in full head dress, in a partial crouch, and carries a spear in the ready to use position. We have named him Chief Squatzalot, who resides on the back of any pack I take into the woods. His primary purpose is to be a talisman to ward off danger and provide a direction of travel where a coin toss would be used. So far, Squatzalot hasn't called a direction/trail choice wrong and we have not been eaten by bears, captured by Bigfoots, or molested by space aliens, so he must have magical powers.

rocketsocks
08-01-2014, 06:45
Some years ago as we were trying to get across a swollen stream, we ran across a small plastic figure that caught my eye. It was a plastic indian figure from a cowboy and indians figure set sold in the 50s. The indian is in full head dress, in a partial crouch, and carries a spear in the ready to use position. We have named him Chief Squatzalot, who resides on the back of any pack I take into the woods. His primary purpose is to be a talisman to ward off danger and provide a direction of travel where a coin toss would be used. So far, Squatzalot hasn't called a direction/trail choice wrong and we have not been eaten by bears, captured by Bigfoots, or molested by space aliens, so he must have magical powers.+1 on the talisman, very nice. I have a small yin and yang pin that resides quietly on my pack, and help to remind me to always seek the balance.

Rolls Kanardly
08-01-2014, 18:39
;)

gee,,,

when ya stop to think about it, isn't carrying a rock from Springer to Katahadin a little strange? (yes , of course i know .... tradition, tradition!)

I wonder how many rocks have been there and back, maybe even a couple times? LOL
:D Perk

One of the oldest pieces of art is a rock that has two indentations and a small grove that approximates a mouth. The rock suggest a face. It was found twenty miles from the closest bed of similar rock. According to what I remember reading, they said it had to be carried to its new location since it could not have migrated there by itself. It is 30,000 plus years old. So a Neanderthal was out hiking one weekend and carried the art form in his pocket to the next location. Someday someone in Maine is going to find a rock from Georgia and they will ask the important question. Wonder if this was a Thru Hiker?
Sign your rocks fellow hikers. You never know.:D
Rolls

lemon b
08-02-2014, 11:20
That rubber chicken Bomber had takes the cake for me. Thats a funny story Baltimore Jack from 2003. Spoke to you only once over a camel. Years ago. Think I saw you asleep leaning up against a stump in Southern Vt. South of Maine Junction. Glad you mentioned your open to conversation, but only way I'd wake you is with the smell of frying bacon. I'm from the let the tired hiker sleep. But it is nice to know an AT expert such as yourself is open to conversation.
Also have the feeling your the type whose friendship is easy to come by and still meaningful. Glad ya still post here also. Nice to hear from a very human hiker with an overflow of experience on the AT.

dangerdave
08-02-2014, 14:31
His primary purpose is to be a talisman to ward off danger...

It's not working! :)

RockDoc
08-02-2014, 17:03
http://whiteblaze.net/forum/vbg/showimage.php?i=56877&catid=member&imageuser=12038
This fellow carried a kitty cat on his back the whole way.

RockDoc
08-02-2014, 17:06
OK I admit to carrying a Wista 4x5 film camera, tripod, light meter, etc all the way through Shenandoah. Too busy hiking to take many photos, though. Still kept pack weight under 30 lbs.