crackers
06-30-2007, 03:14 PM
The following is an adapted version of a post on my blog. I've added some hiking specific stuff. And no, I didn't really use Poison Ivy...But we did experience all the fun that comes of planning a trip at the absolute last minute, just throwing your stuff in the car and going for it...
Trail Conditions:
On the walk in and 3/4 of the walk out, the trail was suprisingly hard with very little serious mud. It poured on the walk out, and by the closing sections of the mud trail, the true nature of Adirondack mud was making itself felt.
The Bugs:
None to speak of in comparison to other experiences I've had in the ADKs at similar times of year. Is this the year bug free, or were we just lucky?
The Story:
My wife went to South Africa for work. So I went to play in the dirt rather than mope around our home missing her and looking for her in all the nice nice spots. My friend Chad has been helping me with stuff here at my business making packs for the past couple of years, so I took him with me to discover the joys of the Adirondacks, their mud, and the child stealing vampiric black flies. Of course, we epiced a bit; but we did identify some easy steps to ensure that you can epic too.
0) The hangover. Preferably, you skip dinner and drink a few beers before realizing you skipped lunch too. Don’t sleep more than four or five hours in your eagerness for an “alpine” start.
1) Get stuck behind every single garbage truck, moving van and other vehicular obstruction possible.
2) Forget something kinda important (hiking shoes) and return to your friend’s house to get it.
3) Forget some other trivial possession that might be necessary in the land of the Black Fly (tent) and go by your storage unit to pick that up. But don’t forget to take the wrong turn on the way.
4) It should take no less than 2.5 hours to accomplish the above steps. You’ve got to be careful though: 4 hours and you might just stay home.
5) In the course of conversation realize that incidental details were forgotten to be mentioned: climbing shoes, harnesses, sleeping bags…that kind of thing.
6) Take a completely out of the way detour to attempt to purchase some of the above items. Run into friends, visit with them, amuse the owner of the store with your wayward attempts to get out of town. Amuse the store owner even further with your outlandish plans. It should be about 11 am now, and you’ve been on the move since 6am. And you’re still hungover.
7) In a moment of pique, buy a quart of jack daniels. Maybe he’ll be your friend. You need a friend. After all, your long detour did not result in a harness, nor a helmet, nor a sleeping bag. You call a friend who’s stuff lives up here, but there’s no answer.
8 ) Drive towards your friend’s house, more or less determined to break into his home. Encounter a downed powerline closing the road. Drive back and around. Scream in rage, perhaps it will prove cathartic.
9) Break into the wrong house.
10 ) Break into the right house. As you’re crawling through the window, your friend should call you to tell you that the key is under the mat by the front door or something.
11) Try to assemble a single functional camp stove from the parts of three. Try to discover the least ********************ty boat anchor size cam that you’re going to borrow, as you wonder how a twenty something year old guide has U stem camalots, cams of unknown origin apparently made from duct tape and only broken helmets.
12) As you’re putting the booty into the car, discover a pair of climbing shoes that fit your friend!
13) Drive extremely slowly. This is number 13, you’ve just wandered through two houses, and the last thing you need is a speeding ticket.
14) Forget that you still don’t have anything to eat and drive past several easily accessible grocery stores.
15) After another detour to buy food, eat at McDonalds.
16) Don’t buy gas.
17) Drive 60 extra miles to get that camping stove. Almost get into a work conversation, saved only by the grace of the esteemed gentleman who said “yeah, it’s your day off. get out of here! have a good trip!”
18) Realizing that not buying gas was a tactical error, coast downhill towards a gas station. Get off at the wrong exit in order to make the process more painful.
19) Pack your pack in the parking lot. Notice that the hipbelts didn’t seem to make it.
20) Make the 3.8 mile approach a 4.5 mile approach with several wrong turns.
21) McDonald’s normal intestinal results in such a strong need for toilet paper that is strangely lacking from the mass of crap that you’ve lugged up the trail that in your effort for maximum points you grab poison ivy in your haste.
22) Get rained on.
And after all of this, you know what? While I did have that strange kind of fun that is a good epic, I have to say I just missed my wife. I came home, and looked in all the good hiding places, and she still won’t be back till Sunday.
Only slightly embellished…
Trail Conditions:
On the walk in and 3/4 of the walk out, the trail was suprisingly hard with very little serious mud. It poured on the walk out, and by the closing sections of the mud trail, the true nature of Adirondack mud was making itself felt.
The Bugs:
None to speak of in comparison to other experiences I've had in the ADKs at similar times of year. Is this the year bug free, or were we just lucky?
The Story:
My wife went to South Africa for work. So I went to play in the dirt rather than mope around our home missing her and looking for her in all the nice nice spots. My friend Chad has been helping me with stuff here at my business making packs for the past couple of years, so I took him with me to discover the joys of the Adirondacks, their mud, and the child stealing vampiric black flies. Of course, we epiced a bit; but we did identify some easy steps to ensure that you can epic too.
0) The hangover. Preferably, you skip dinner and drink a few beers before realizing you skipped lunch too. Don’t sleep more than four or five hours in your eagerness for an “alpine” start.
1) Get stuck behind every single garbage truck, moving van and other vehicular obstruction possible.
2) Forget something kinda important (hiking shoes) and return to your friend’s house to get it.
3) Forget some other trivial possession that might be necessary in the land of the Black Fly (tent) and go by your storage unit to pick that up. But don’t forget to take the wrong turn on the way.
4) It should take no less than 2.5 hours to accomplish the above steps. You’ve got to be careful though: 4 hours and you might just stay home.
5) In the course of conversation realize that incidental details were forgotten to be mentioned: climbing shoes, harnesses, sleeping bags…that kind of thing.
6) Take a completely out of the way detour to attempt to purchase some of the above items. Run into friends, visit with them, amuse the owner of the store with your wayward attempts to get out of town. Amuse the store owner even further with your outlandish plans. It should be about 11 am now, and you’ve been on the move since 6am. And you’re still hungover.
7) In a moment of pique, buy a quart of jack daniels. Maybe he’ll be your friend. You need a friend. After all, your long detour did not result in a harness, nor a helmet, nor a sleeping bag. You call a friend who’s stuff lives up here, but there’s no answer.
8 ) Drive towards your friend’s house, more or less determined to break into his home. Encounter a downed powerline closing the road. Drive back and around. Scream in rage, perhaps it will prove cathartic.
9) Break into the wrong house.
10 ) Break into the right house. As you’re crawling through the window, your friend should call you to tell you that the key is under the mat by the front door or something.
11) Try to assemble a single functional camp stove from the parts of three. Try to discover the least ********************ty boat anchor size cam that you’re going to borrow, as you wonder how a twenty something year old guide has U stem camalots, cams of unknown origin apparently made from duct tape and only broken helmets.
12) As you’re putting the booty into the car, discover a pair of climbing shoes that fit your friend!
13) Drive extremely slowly. This is number 13, you’ve just wandered through two houses, and the last thing you need is a speeding ticket.
14) Forget that you still don’t have anything to eat and drive past several easily accessible grocery stores.
15) After another detour to buy food, eat at McDonalds.
16) Don’t buy gas.
17) Drive 60 extra miles to get that camping stove. Almost get into a work conversation, saved only by the grace of the esteemed gentleman who said “yeah, it’s your day off. get out of here! have a good trip!”
18) Realizing that not buying gas was a tactical error, coast downhill towards a gas station. Get off at the wrong exit in order to make the process more painful.
19) Pack your pack in the parking lot. Notice that the hipbelts didn’t seem to make it.
20) Make the 3.8 mile approach a 4.5 mile approach with several wrong turns.
21) McDonald’s normal intestinal results in such a strong need for toilet paper that is strangely lacking from the mass of crap that you’ve lugged up the trail that in your effort for maximum points you grab poison ivy in your haste.
22) Get rained on.
And after all of this, you know what? While I did have that strange kind of fun that is a good epic, I have to say I just missed my wife. I came home, and looked in all the good hiding places, and she still won’t be back till Sunday.
Only slightly embellished…