"Ken Fortenberry" wrote in
message om...
Scott Seidman wrote:
snip
Leave a tinfoil impression
of your boottrack with someone. I'd consider a Personal locator
beacon,
http://www.sarsat.noaa.gov/emerbcns.html, if I really wanted to
enjoy the
wilderness solo. Maybe a satellite phone or something.

And I thought *I* was anal about solo backcountry travel. ;-)

Really, if you think you need all the latest electronic doodads and
accoutrements to take a trip into the backcountry you probably don't
have the skills to be out there in the first place.

Everybody has his or her own comfort level. John Muir used to go on
thousand mile hikes carrying nothing but a bag of bread and tea (he
would roll the sack down a mountain ahead of him to bust up the bread
so that it could be chewed). On one occasion he hopped up and down
all night on a glacier to keep from freezing to death, rather than
risk trying to traverse it in the dark. On another (presumably in
Yellowstone), he and a companion spent a night rolling over and over
in some sort of hot spring or mud pot, alternately boiling on one side
and freezing on the other. I don't recall ever coming across a
reference to how he felt about other people's outfits, but one can
easily imagine him saying that anyone who needs all the latest doodads
and accouterments like sleeping bags and tents probably doesn't have
the skills to be out there in the first place.

Wolfgang