I’m off for an eleven day 115 mile backpacking trip.

Not that you’d even notice I was gone, with the lack of posting at this pathetic site.

But now you know. I’ll be in the wilderness of Southwestern Virginia. The weather looks to be awesome and I am more than ready to get out there and go.

Maybe a few days in the woods will re-ignite my desire to write. Maybe it won’t. We’ll see. That doesn’t matter anyhow, I’m not doing this for inspiration.

Think of as re-boot of the mind and soul. I go out there for a bit, let the stress and clutter of the everyday world sweat out of me as I’m walking. I’ll enjoy the cool mountain nights and bright Virginia sun. The old woods of this part of the world are awesome. And while I’m out there, it is a magical feeling.

When I come back, the real world will infect me again, but at least I’ll be starting fresh.

Peace.

Backpacking.

Need I say more? We went backpacking. Me and three guys from work: Shutter, our Sr. Network Analyst, and a Jr. Technician. On the trail I call Shutter ‘Dead Weight.’ The firewall admin is the WAN-Man. Grayson, the tech didn’t have a trail name, but one usually presents itself.

He’d gone with us once before. He carried almost no supplies, just a very small tent, a lightweight sleeping bag, and an old school backcountry stove. We razzed the shit out of him for carrying so little, but it was August— You can get away with that in August. This trip was something different. The forecast called for a Nor’easter. Rain and wind would sweep in from the west, and if that wasn’t enough when the storm hit the ocean it would pick up energy and draw cold air from the north. High winds, rain and snow would come back across the mountains from the east.

We discussed canceling the trip. Grayson said no way… he was fearless! We decided to give it it a go, but with the understanding that we wouldn’t walk far on Saturday. If the weather was bad Saturday night in to Sunday, we would go back to the car, otherwise we would walk 14 miles or so to the next campsite.

Saturday morning we met at my house, it was overcast, but not too windy or cold. It actually was decent weather for hiking. We packed up and headed north. We left my truck at the ‘end’ and piled into the WAN-Man’s little Subaru. we drive 30 miles south to the ‘beginning.’

We started out on a blue-blazed trail that would take us up the mountain to join the Appalachian Trail. We climbed the mountain for a mile and found the AT. We set out looking for a good place to camp. Before we’d walked another mile, we found one.

We set up our tents and sat on the fallen trees that some hiker from years past had arranged around a small fire circle.

“Weather’s not too bad.”
“Just wait…”
“Yeah, look over there.”
“Shit, those clouds look ugly.”
“No worries, I’ve got my fleece pants and jacket to wear if it gets too cold, plus my waterproofs.”
“Me too.”
“I brought my snow pants, I won’t be cold.”
“I’ve got what I’m wearing.”

We all turned and looked at Grayson. He was wearing UnderArmour ColdGear pants and shirt, camp pants, a shirt and a fleece jacket.

“What are you going to do when it gets colder?”
“You do know it is going to cold…”
“and windy!”
“I’m fine. I don’t get cold.”
“Come on man, it’s not like you can go ‘inside’ and warm up.”
“I’ll just to my tent and get in my sleeping bag.”
“What is it rated?”
“45 degrees.”
“Shit. It’s 45 degrees now…”
“You are clueless.”

I looked at my friends and I looked at Grayson.

“Fucking Bear Bait,” I said. The other two burst out laughing. He just looked at me. I explained that we didn’t have to fear bears, with his lack of preparation the bears would undoubtedly go for him first.

We cooked dinner and talked trash about people at work. We had a good time.

The sky grew darker as the clouds moved in from the southwest and the temperature dropped. Each of us added layers, except Bear Bait, of course. We started cleaning up and getting our gear ready for the night, trying to be sure everything would stay dry. We hung our food from a tree. (First we had to get Bear Bait to take the midnight snacks out of his backpack and put them in his food bag.)

“See. Bear Bait.”
“Come on man. I’m not even cold either!”
“Polar Bear Bait!”

We waited for the rain. It started around sunset. We went to our respective tents. I changed out of my clothes and into my fleece pants and jacket. I climbed into my ‘15 degree’ bag. After a while I fell asleep, nice and warm, to the sound of rain gently falling on my tent.

I awoke in the middle of the night to hear the raining falling in sheets and the wind roaring in gusts out of the valley and up on the ridge we were on. I did a quick check and saw that my tent and gear were dry and went back to sleep.

I woke up sometime right before dawn. I’m not used to going to sleep that early. The wind was still gusting and the rain still falling. I got out of my bag and changed back into my layers for waking. I took my camp pants and put them in a ziplock bag to keep them dry for later. I started packing up my stuff. Once everything, but then tent I was sitting in, was packed, I put on my boots and ventured out.

It was cold and rainy. The wind was still gusting. But it wasn’t really worse than other weather I had hiked in. The real concern was what would happen through the day and that night.

As the others woke up, we discussed our options: go on or bail. Shutter’s tent had let some water in and he was concerned about not being able to get it dry enough. Bear Bait was ready to go on, but he was shivering. The WAN-Man did fine through the night, but he had concerns about walking in the cold and rain all day. He said let’s not be stupid. Let’s bail.

So it was decided. I packed up my tent and put my pack together. When everyone was packed we started on the trail, back the way we came. As I was walking, I found my stride and was walking very comfortably. As I walked, I realized that this was no worse than many other days that I had spent on the trail. I stopped and waited for the others to catch up.

I proposed that we go on. We’d all, except Bear Bait, walked in worse. Shutter considered it and decided that since we had a shelter dry out in, he’d be okay. Grayson, Bear Bait, was all for it. He felt warmer now that he was walking. All eyes were on the WAN-Man.

“There are a few things to consider. First of all, what he is wearing is all he has…” he said, nodding towards Grayson.

I looked at Grayson. He fleece wasn’t going to keep water out much longer, he camp pants were already soaked. If he couldn’t change into dry clothes at the shelter, he risked Hypothermia. And his sleeping bag wasn’t rated anywhere near warmer enough for him to be able to just sleep in that, with out his clothes.

“You’re right. He’ll fucking die. Sorry Bear Bait, we need to bail so you don’t die!”
“Fine use me as a scapegoat, if that helps.”
“Ask me about hypothermia some day.”

We headed back to the Subaru, and drove back to my truck. We stopped for a big breakfast, and headed home in the rain.

That’s what the tell me.

Snow, hurricane force winds, rain and other fearful stuff.

This, of course should have tipped you off that we had planned our fisrt backpacking trip of the season for this weekend.

No. We did not cancel it. Because… well… Capt. Shutter is insane. And our young hiking buddy, who I’ll call Bear Bait for now, is too young and dumb to know better. Actually, he pronounced himself as ‘fearless.’ And that leaves the WAN-Man and me. And I guess we weren’t going to be shone up by these younger guys.

So I’m packed. My new ‘light-weight’ pack has so much shit lashed to it, that it kind of defeats the purpose.

Wet, cold, windy.

This is dumb.

I’ll take pictures.

Stay tuned.

And if this does mange to turn into a blizzard. And you turn on the news and hear about 4 foolish backpackers stranded in Central Pennsylvania. That’s not us. It’s four other guys.

Have a great weekend, slackers.

I’m back.

I went camping. Not backpacking, but car camping.

Car camping is so different. We had so much stuff. A big old stove, a propane lantern, a cooler, camp chairs! The funny thing is, compared to the other car campers we were roughing it. We hardly had any stuff compared to most of them. But when you compare it to backpacking, we were living like kings.

Shutter and I took his kid and my younger child out for an overnight camping trip. We had fun, but I have to admit I prefer camping with out the kids. I’m a jerk like that I guess. Don’t get me wrong, I had a good time and I’ll do it again.

Chasing kids around saying, “keep your hat on, keep your gloves on, don’t touch that” isn’t exactly a vacation for me. But I didn’t take my kid camping so I could get a vacation. My parents took us camping every year. I must ahve been about six months old on my first camping trip. Looking back on it, I suppose that economics had a lot to do with it. It is a hell of lot cheaper to go camping than go to Disneyland.

The result was that I (and my brothers too, I think) grew up with an appreciation for the outdoors. Many of my fondest childhood memories revolve around being out in the woods in the Adirondacks or the Blue Ridge Mountains. We would explore the woods near the campsite. I imagined that I was an explorer walking through woods that no one had ever set foot in before. There is something primal and satisfying about sitting around campfire at night.

The point, I suppose, is that I learned these things while camping with my parents. I feel a deep responsibility to take my kids out so that they can have the same opportunity.

To put it more simply, while backpacking is more enjoyable for me, I need to take my kids out to the woods so that they have the chance to learn to love it like I do. And I think they will.

As for this trip, it was a pretty typical camping trip ( except maybe colder than you would have expected in April.) We went for a walk. The kids “discovered” an amphitheater in the woods, a creek an d a pond complete with frog eggs.

We had hot dogs for dinner and S’mores for dessert. Only after feeding them the gooey combination of marshmallow and chocolate did it occur to me that the tradition of giving kids S’mores and then expecting them to be able to lay down and go to sleep is a bit stupid. But we must have worn them out enough, cause they went to sleep with out incident. We buried them in sleeping bags and blankets to keep them warm.

Having put the kids down, Shutter and I finally got a chance to sit down and relax. The temperature continued to drop, be we we dressed warmly and we built the fire up to a nice warm blaze. We sat and talked and laughed till midnight or so.

We woke up and ate a hearty camping breakfast of eggs, pancakes and bacon. And then set ourselves to the task of breaking camp. It is so much easier to break camp when you are backpacking.

We rounded out the morning by taking a fairly long walk up the Appalachian Trail. We walked to the point that is the “official” half way point on the trail. And then we headed home.

I think that it was a successful trip by any measure.

And better yet, I get to go backpacking next weekend.

I’m out of here.