still fuckin with climb cuz climb pays: the ILX hiking thread

oh nm i understand that i thought yall were talking about those weird hydration tabs

used the filter in the smokies and in big south fork. just stuck it in some creeks. water looked clean, tasted clean. pretty handy.

i used an MSR miniworks for a while, but i just replaced it with a platypus gravity filter (half the weight, and way more convenient to use). i'm paranoid about drinking unfiltered water, and i even carry chlorine dioxide tablets in case the water looks really nasty (i've only ever used them one time, though).

i'm guessing most water filter Cos would tell you their filters are fine for south america but somehow i do not trust that so i suspect i will just stick to bottled water as wasteful and annoying as that seems.

xp to tza- i know you didn't say that, but it actually sounded kinder than "tza laughed at a picture of me wearing my hydration pack."

also, filters don't filter out viruses (no companies claim that they do), so if you really were going to drink from a water source you found, you'd need some sort of chemical additive as well.

(or you could boil it.)

well i'd definitely not drink from still water. running water though i guess doesn't freak me out too much. partly because i grew up playing in the woods and drinking out of creeks (even though my mom said not to).

i think we used this filter, but i don't remember for sure.

and yeah, i'd be more paranoid in south america too i guess -- even though there might not be any logical reason to be. (i don't honestly know. everything you hear about bad water in the south seems to be to do with public water systems. is mountain water in peru really dirtier than mountain water in the u.s.? i have no idea.)

ohhhh mannnnnnnnnn you guys i wanna cry suddenly my family is like 'altitude is too bad we can't hike colca we have to do it on a bus tour' and i want to cry :(

!!!! that is so unbelievably sucky! how high is it?

esbit stoves: yay or nay
recommend a camp stove?

Esbits are good mostly for boiling water that you can use to rehydrate dried food, or make tea or coffee with. They are light, simple and pretty foolproof. Some people complain they smell sort of fishy. You can't really "cook" on an esbit stove and there is no way to control heat except to move the pot higher or lower above the flame.

They are not especially cheap (about 50 cents a pop for maybe twelve minutes of burn time to boil maybe four cups of cold water). You can blow out the tablet and save the remainder, if your water has boiled.

I use an MSR pocket rocket stove that burns an iso-butane mixture that comes in canisters. I like it. You can control the flame output and it is really simple to use. The biggest drawbacks are that it is hard to tell how much fuel you have left in a canister unless you weigh it with a gram scale, and in sub-freezing weather you lose efficiency, so it isn't much good for winter camping.

There are also alcohol stoves. Some are made by small companies like Trangia or Brasslite. You can also find descriptions of how to make your own alcohol stove using things like cat food cans or pepsi cans, so the cost is close to zip. The type of alcohol to burn is not rubbing alcohol, but denatured alcohol, like the auto product HEET in the yellow bottle.

People who use alcohol stoves are often pretty fanatic about them for some reason. Maybe because they home made them. Alcohol burns a bit cool, so it takes a bit longer to boil water. The fuel is cheap! They are silent (so is esbit). If you spill some burning fuel, the flame is almost invisible, so you have to be careful.

For any camp stove I would recommend a wind screen.

the rim is 13-14,000 ft.
v v high. i was at 10,000 last summer and it was crazy.
but :(
i don't want to be stuck on a bus!
i mean, i get it. but. still!

dadrza has a weird heart so it may be too risky. i just hate the idea of being on a bus.

oh man hiking u guys wtf how did i miss this thread it is the best

i have ~opinions~ about the HIKING IN NEW ENGLAND and how GABBNEB might actually be sort of CORRECT on like that one point, about katahdin

but srsly i know it's busy and shit but franconia ridge????

has there been a controversial history of the AMC yet, and, if not, ~why not~

feel like the true story behind some kind of storied and olde enthusiast's assoc. is pretty ripe for some laughs

Trekking poles? Never used em. Never needed em. I can pass on that people whose knees are shot seem to swear by them, so if your knees need help, it's probably worth investigating them.

If you look into them, have some one who knows show you the proper use. I guess there's a bit of technique that, if you know it, is a big improvement over randomly stabbing the poles at the ground as you walk and hoping for the best. Do not assume the salesperson at the outdoor store knows anything on this subject. That's a crapshoot.

how do you hike 20 mi w/just a water bottle? no replenishing along the way? camelbaks are the way to go def.

this weekend: http://www.localhikes.com/Hikes/Maryland_Heights_8872.asp

used to play a game where you find a creek and race your friends upstream until you find either a] a spring or b] something interesting, good times

love big south fork btw, i have a really detailed trailbook from the late 70s somewhere in the uh attic maybe? i should dig it out and pick out some stuff.

it seems like i only hike when i'm camping, i don't do day hikes any more...maybe i should? red river gorge is only a 40 min drive from here.

I thought about doing harper's ferry around now,though I remember it bring a little underwhelming. Gonna be hot this weekend.

yep, but it's a sister fun day and it will be swell.

i have the day off tomorrow... it's either hiking or mountain biking, and i can't decide.

what have you done more of lately? do the other one.

i was already leaning toward mountain biking, but that clinches it... thanks, tza.

hi dere i'm going on an 84-mile trek starting tomorrow, got my bag packed and everything

holy wow! where?

hadrian's wall (http://www.nationaltrail.co.uk/hadrianswall). i'm taking six days over it, camping along the way.

a friend of mine did that, said it was great!

i am thinking about doing the superior hiking trail, up north

Esbits are good mostly for boiling water that you can use to rehydrate dried food, or make tea or coffee with.

this is all i need! maybe i will get one

I did not make it to Harper's ferry because we did not have enough time but we did a v easy hike @ great falls and I have some pretty cellpwn pics.

i really advise against esbit stoves. they take forever, they smell like crap, the chemical in the esbit tablets is super toxic, and they barely work if there's any wind. i know they're really cheap, but that's about their only advantage. you find a good deal on any pocket canister stove (olympus, MSR, snow peak), take a small fuel canister, and have a nice little setup that is light and costs less than $40. i'll get off the hatin' train now, just wanted to say it one more time.

also- was mountain biking today and came across a dude who MANGLED his legs in a crash. when i first saw him, he was limping a little bit, and then when i realized how fucked his legs were, my stomach lurched a little bit- his flesh was torn to ribbons, blood everywhere, weird blue lumps where there should be no lumps, and both of his socks were completely soaked with blood. definitely the worst on-the-trail injury i've ever seen. i got out my first aid kit and helped him out as best i could (he was with two friends who looked shellshocked), but he was insisting on walking out, rather than staying put and getting evacuated. i did what i could, but i hope he got out okay.

ok i didnt know they str8 sucked

xpost wow.

i have always wondered about waiting to be evacuated, how long it would take, and how long it would take to even get in touch with someone in the first place assuming you are in a place without cell phone reception.

poor dude.

i have only been evacuated one time- luckily it was on a fire road, so the fire department was able to put me in a jeep, instead of having to pay big bucks for a more involved procedure. i had fallen and hit my head, and i had a concussion, so i couldn't walk more than a few paces without getting dizzy and falling again. i was probably out there for about a half hour until another biker passed me and went and got help.

today, it was really crowded on the trail, so i knew that if this guy had an emergency, it wouldn't be more than a few minutes before they saw someone else. if it had been really remote, i probably would have stayed or somehow made sure he made it back.

xpost- that's why i always carry a medical kit, even if i'm only going on a day hike or something.

was he on foot and crashed with a mountain bike????

no, he was a rider. wait, so does that make this story inadmissible in this thread, since neither person involved was hiking?

you were hiking, right?!

no, he was on a bike too! gtfo this thread, impostor!

haha

its ok, its still relevant to hikers.

oh man yall harkening back to something upthread, at deathfest a guy offered me whiskey from a nalgene flask with an entombed sticker on it, pretty much fell in love

one time me & my bros were out exploring in big south fork (menifee co ky i guess?) and found some repelling bros who had seen our band in richmond haha, what a day.

this guy micah we were camping with spent that whole 5 day camping trip borrowing our lighters then throwing them into the fire that night and scaring the shit out of us. also by the end of the trip he was the only one with a lighter, which kind of gave him a lot of POWER.

camping!

a friend of mine did that, said it was great!

it was! amazing weather, too.

i am thinking about doing the superior hiking trail, up north

this looks awesome

yeah, i'm pysched about it