ET's Info-Stew

After a few days back from the trip, it's time for some reflection.

I didn't write near as much in my log as usual. I'm usually writing about all the mundane things, like food, reading, swimming, etc. just to fill pages. I decided to leave these details out and the result is less writing that is more informational. One consequence of this is that I didn't write interesting log entries for the last two days. True, these days not much happened, but I should have written something.

On Sunday night I accidentally touched my hot stove with my right hand, which was holding my full pot of boiling water. The jerk reaction cause me to spill my hot water over my chest and directly onto my left hand. My chest was protected by my fleece, but my hand didn't fair so well. It was painful, swollen, and red, but fortunately it didn't bother me after I had laid down for sleep. Today, I noticed that my skin was peeling and I had small blisters. That's a second-degree burn, according to Jenny.

On Monday after reaching Cluster Lakes I spent most of the day reading and a bit of swimming in the shallow northmost lake, so there wasn't much to write about. Two equestrians came by saying that they had seen a bear up the trail about a mile. Later that day Bill wanted to check it out so he left, taking my camera in case he saw one. When he came back he said he hadn't seen any bears, but that he believes he heard one. Conveniently, you can't take a picture of a bear you can't see.

So based upon these supposed experiences, Bill and Carl made a big hubbub about bears over the last night. Though we had seen bear scat at the other camp, some quite fresh, they took extra measures to protect their food and themselves that night. I thought that was silly, as though these supposed encounters made it more likely that a bear was going to go through our camp that night.

Over the course of the trip Bill recounted many stories of his encounters with bears, and Carl soaked them all up. I tend not to believe half of them. Call me cynical, but my thoughts on his overly elaborate bear stories were later validated. On the hike out he told inbound backpackers that we had seen bears. I am happy he tells these tales though...they are well told and quite entertaining.

The hike out on Thursday started at about 11:00. I got my pack packed pretty quickly that morning...everything just seemed to come together easily. Carl and I spent a lot of time sharpening sticks while Bill got ready...it's not as easy as I thought so it was good that I tried it out in case I ever need to do it for survival. We got out by 1:10pm, which is a pretty quick pace. Of course, much of that was downhill.

As for my gear this trip, everything worked out pretty well. I had brought Top Ramen for lunches, and that was a pretty good idea. I didn't put my binoculars to use, but it's hard for me to leave them behind because there's no way to know if I'll want them. At the last minute, following Carl's lead, I decided to take only one trekking pole. It turned out to be a pretty good idea. Though you don't get as much bounce on uphills or resistance on downhills as you would with two poles, having one pole has the advantage of being able to relax one arm while the other is working. Not a bad trade, really.

And now for the whopper: I'm half convinced this was my last backpacking trip. Next year my family will be living a thousand miles away and it's hard to believe any of us will travel such a long distance to go backpacking. At some point, I may backpack with my children. However, if I never manage to get myself in good shape (a dismal thought), I may not even do that. So, I've been putting off buying expensive new gear. If I do continue backpacking, one of my first purchases will be a Big Agnes Seedhouse 2 SL tent, assuming there isn't anything better by then. Bill had one, and it looked great!