January 2007 – As The Crow Flies

Reentry.

Tom Robbins wrote a story about a creature that worked hard to appear to be a human and to be pleasing to other humans, but he overlooked some things, like he had big patches of hair behind his knees and he smelled really funky. The creature thought those things were insignificant and that no one would notice.

My neighbor invited me to go to lunch with her and two other people. As I was getting ready, I felt like that creature only my thoughts were more, “I’ll never pass�?. To my surprise, I wasn’t that far off the mark from the other women. In a town of rugged individualists, everyone looks a little off or even if they don‘t, they don‘t mind if you do. In a store, a woman came up to me, touched my Sunday Afternoon Adventure hat, and said, “ My, that is some hat. You look good.�?

Note: The skirt is a Macabi Travel/hiking Skirt ,for both men and women. It has a clip so that you can make it into trousers or shorts too.

Snow Levels on the CDT and the PCT for 2007

Before hiking the PCT, I watched the snow levels, as too much snow in the Sierras would make for a more difficult hike. So far, things look good for both a northbound PCT(Pacific Crest Trail) hike or a CDT (Continental Divide Trail) hike. (Although NM looks really dry) Snow levels for the PCT and CDT 2007. To see the snowpack for other months and years go to: http://www.wcc.nrcs.usda.gov/cgibin/westsnow.pl

I also found this site that has a a really good graph of the snow levels for PCT or the CDT

I sort of had other plans for this summer like building a cob cottage or selling my BC property but as the winter wears on and I tire of domestic life, I’m more attracted to a hike. The cabin I’m living in is fine for now and I don’t need to sell my BC property and it’s not every year the snow levels are this low…….

Bukit Lawang

Bukit Lawang is a magical little village built next to the orangutan preserve in Sumatra. The cars remain on the outside. A river runs through it with a swinging bridge over it and has little children diving off of it. There is a night club in a cave. There are some native rock climbers that live in a tree house and climb all day on the cliffs by their place. People come down to the river to wash their clothes and beat them on the rocks. I stayed for three weeks and would have stayed longer if I could have changed my ticket.

A lot of the orangutans were pets and were being rehabilitated. Western women flocked there, and lined up for a chance to work with them. Twice daily ungainly orangutans who were in the middle stage of their rehabilitation would come to the feeding center to be fed bananas.

I had the honeymoon suite at a place on the river. I got it because it was the only place in Bukit Lawang that had a hammock. There was lots of artful tile work. Water worn branches were bent into a canopy bed. The bathroom only had a roof over part of it, as is common in Indonesia. A tree grew up in the middle of the bathroom and from a tilted terra-cotta pot in its branches cold water flowed for a shower. There were tropical flowers growing in the bathroom. But the biggest attraction for me was the covered tile porch with a hammock.

I was lying on the hammock sleeping when I heard screaming. I opened my eyes to see across the river an orangutan with a t-shirt on and a bunch of natives from the city yelling and running away. Then this orangutan took off the shirt and started washing it in the river and banging it on the rocks like the people do. Then it tried to put the wet t-shirt on again, but because it was wet it couldn’t get it back on right and had it all stretched out.

Costs: When I was there in 1999, the first place I stayed at was .62 cents USD(United States Dollar) a night and had a private bath. When I moved up to the beautiful place on the river it ran me 7.50 USD a night. A plate of fried rice and a plate of passion fruit was less than one USD total. Whitewater rafting, overnight treks, rock climbing, orangutan watching and inter-tubing down the river were all affordable once the bargaining was done.

Note: According to this article, Bukit Lawang was washed away in 2003 and a lot of people were killed. According to the Wikipedia article they are rebuilding higher up and are back in business.

Tooth Brushing

this is all the toothpaste you need to use For a toothbrush, I carry the lightest child’s size toothbrush I can find. I keep it in a plastic flip top sandwich bag. This ensures that it doesn’t get dirty, while in my ditty bag, and that it gets a little air so it doesn’t get moldy. I really miss toothpaste, when I don’t have it, so I carry a trial size tube.

I only use a little bit of toothpaste. A little bit of toothpaste does as good a job as a lot of toothpaste and I don’t have anything to spit out when I’m done — it’s considered bad form to leave toothpaste residue on the ground or on the leaves.

I have used the toothbrush/toothpaste/carrycase toothbrush. They work well and you can refill them but they are a little heavier.

I have tried the two piece ones that you connect together and wouldn’t recommend them. The brush section sometimes flings out of the handle section.

Note: The small tubes of toothpaste are often kept in the “travel size” section and not with the big tubes of toothpaste.

Pictures.

Ten years ago my camera was stolen and until this winter, I didn’t replace it. A camera is nice to have for blogging but for traveling and on the trail I find it too heavy and I think it encourages a person to objectify their experiences. Without a camera, when great sunsets are happening, you don’t think, “this will make a good picture,” you just sit back and enjoy it thoroughly.

On a trek in a jungle in Sumatra, a mother orangutan came down a tree with her baby wrapped around her, the guide gave me a banana as I was the only one without a camera in my hands, I handed the orangutan the banana, looked into her eyes and touched her hand. Over and over, I see people missing experiences by trying to capture them.

Five years ago, when I sold my house, I needed to get rid of all of my stuff. I looked through all the pictures I had, took out the ones of my son, sent them to him, and threw away the rest. Life is about now and you can never be in the now if you have to cart the past around with you.

My travels and hikes are not diminished by not having pictures; I think they are enhanced because not having a camera frees me up for experiencing the moment instead of trying to preserve it. In addition, my life is enhanced by not having to store bunches of pictures of the past.

Sun coming through a frosted bush, on my walk today.

Traveling spoon

For eating on the trail all a person needs is a spoon. My favorite spoon was a metal Chinese spoon I got in Thailand. It held big bite fulls of food, had a good edge for digging into hard frozen pints of Ben and Jerry’s, and it fit into my small pot for storage. Update: zebra spoon for sale

I carried that spoon for 4 years, but one day, in my cabin, it just disappeared. I found them on the internet at http://www.culinox.co.uk/acatalog/usparts.html, but they don’t ship to the US.

Since the disappearance of my Chinese spoon I have reverted back to the standard ugly polycarbonate spoon. It works fine but I would much rather have my Chinese spoon.

It is generally agreed among hikers that a spork makes neither a good spoon nor a good fork, but I decided to try out this Light My Fire Spork because it has a spoon on one end and a fork on the other. The spoon is okay, but the fork doesn’t really have enough curvature to be useful and it sometimes pokes me in the hand when I’m using the spoon. If they had just built a colorful Chinese spoon they probably would have been better off. Still, the spoon part is okay and it is colorful.

Update on the Light My Fire Spork. I carried this spork for awhile on the PCT(Pacific Crest Trail) in my food bag. It broke. It’s not very sturdy. Would probably be okay if kept in your pot.

When I was taking an Outward Bound course it was a common event to lose a spoon. People improvised a spoon with a shell, a rock, a stick, or a drivers license. One woman used two sticks like chop sticks when she lost her spoon.

Moving guide.

Packing a propane tank.

Since my last trip with my propane tank in my backpack was so painful, this time I thought I would try to improve things. I ripped the plastic lid off of a bin and put that in the inside of the pack against my back. It worked great and I was able to walk the seven and a half mile loop down to the little store, up the road to my mailbox, and then back up to my cabin without any problem. The plastic lid made my backpack more supportive and kept the propane tank from poking me in the spine.

Once the tank was full and my snow shoes were strapped to the pack it was almost 45 lbs (20.4 kilos), which is a lot for a pack that weighs a little over 2 lbs. (1 kilo). My pack is the Mountain Smith Ghost. I bought it after trying on every sub 3lb(1.36 k) pack in Portland. It can lift all the weight off of my shoulders if I want it to. Sadly, it’s no longer made.

This is a great opportunity to get trail ready and accomplish something.

Hiking in Chaco Sandals

On the PCT (Pacific Crest Trail) I hiked in running shoes. Almost immediately, my feet started to hurt. Excruciating pain, every hour sometimes I would have to stop and rub them back to life. The pain was from the ball of my foot. Even though I bought 12 different pairs of shoes on my hike, I could never find anything that relieved the pain. If I hadn’t had 20 years of dreaming behind me on hiking that trail, I don’t think I could have stayed on. After I got back, it was probably a month before I could even get up and walk to the bathroom without shoes on. When I would go out for walks, after an hour my feet would start to hurt and go numb again. I thought my hiking days might already be over.

The day before heading out to Thailand a bought a pair of Chaco Z/1 sandals; they are hiking sandals with an orthopedic foot bed. When I got off the plane I walked for hours through Bangkok; it’s not a pleasant place to walk but I was so happy that my feet didn’t hurt that I just kept walking.

Since then I have hiked only in Chaco sandals. On the AT (Appalachian Trail), we referred to them as strap on boots, so sturdy is the foot bed. Here are some things I know about hiking in Chaco sandals.

Wear socks: Your feet will probably never be tough enough to wear Chacos for very long without socks; not wearing socks is nice every once in awhile but if I would keep them off for very long, I would get blisters and sores where the straps rubbed my feet, also with out socks my feet would get dried out and crack, the neoprene socks are particularly helpful to prevent cracks as they keep your feet moist. I tried the waterproof socks and found that they stunk so much that even among hikers I was a bit of a leper. Even after washing, they stunk. After a week, I threw them away.

Snow. In the snow, or when it was cold, I wore neoprene socks; still my feet were cold and uncomfortable and the snow would build up under my toes. More then anything I think it is psychologically uncomfortable for me to walk in the snow in sandals. The longest I have continuously walked in snow, was 12 miles in 6 inches of new wet snow. My feet were fine but I was worried.
Chacos can be resoled. I did get one pair resoled but then, after awhile, the straps broke. Therefore, if you are going to have them resoled I would recommend having the straps replaced too. When my strap broke, I taped my sandal to my foot with electrical tape and hiked for three days like that until I could get a new pair sent to me.

The Chacos with the toe strap. I hiked the AT and the Florida trail in the Chacos without the toe strap; since then I have switched to the ones with the toe strap: the Z/2. I like hiking with the toe strap, my feet stay warmer and the ice doesn’t build up under my toes in the snow as bad. I wear them with tabi socks. I think there now may be some neoprene socks available with the split toe but I don’t have a pair so when I want to hike in neoprene socks I have to step on the toe strap. Comfort wise it’s fine but the problem is that if you hike stepping on the toe strap too much it becomes impossible to pull the toe strap back out without the help of a pair of pliers. Update: After about 500-700 miles on my latest PCT hike, a callus developed between my toes and I had to switch back to the Z1 style.

Make your own toe socks. Brawny on her backpacking site, http://www.trailquest.net/, gives these instructions for making your own tabi toe socks: “Make a straight mark (with a felt tip pen or marker) on the socks between the big toe and second toe. Then sew a “V” shaped seam on either side of the pen mark, and then make a cut on the straight pen mark.”

Cracks. In addition to wearing socks, you might find that you need to file down the dry skin and put some grease into your feet and put them in plastic bags or neoprene socks to heal them. Bag balm works really well, but is hard to find on the trail. Carmex is available at most places. Also if you have petroleum based neosporin, that will work as well. Brush on super glue works wonders, but is only a temporary measure—eventually you have to take care of your feet.

Sizing. It’s important to have just the right size so that your feet fit the orthopedic foot bed right. You can get them in wide sizes for both men and women. I have heard of people who bought them extra long because they were afraid of stubbing their toe and they ended up not happy with them. I’ve never stubbed my toe in them, even though my toes go right up to the end. I have had sticks poke me from the side, but it just hurts for a moment and I got good at tuning out those assaults.

The NRS Neoprene Sandal Socks w/ HydroCuff is the best neoprene sock I have found. They come plenty big so you can wear a warm sock under them.

note: Joe over at Zpacks has worn sandals in blizzards in Colorado. He wears waterproof socks—maybe if I had worn regular socks under them I wouldn’t have had a problem or maybe he had better waterproof socks then me.

Related post: Stalking the elusive split toe tabi sock

Cracked feet

Brush on super glue

An entertaining fire starter.

While I was out hiking on the PCT this summer, I met a woman who was carrying some diversions with her. She carried knitting, a book, and some crosswords. A book always seems too heavy to carry and I don’t know how to knit, but a crossword puzzle ripped out of a newspaper seems like it would be a light diversion to have when a storm keeps you in your tent or you just feel like hanging out for a day. It would also make a good emergency fire starting material.

Where to pack your wet tent.

Lining my pack with a clear plastic bag not only keeps my stuff dry when it rains, it keeps my wet stuff separate from my dry stuff. When my tent is wet, I slide it down in my pack on the outside of my packliner thus keeping it from soaking my other stuff.

If the sun comes out while I’m hiking, I stop, spread everything out, and let it sit in the sun for 20-30 minutes and dry out.

No guests.

After preparing my cabin for guests, they called and canceled. I didn’t really mind, except that they were going to take me to the little store so I could fill up my propane tanks. In anticipation of this, I carted six tanks all the way down my big hill to the spot I had shoveled off for them to park. Now I have to haul all those tanks back up the hill.

A simple outhouse.

The rare event of having company is happening today. In case they object to using the five gallon bucket on the porch, I thought I should prepare the guest bathroom for them. I broke trail out to my outbox and brushed the snow off of it. It’s a gaily painted plywood box with a toilet seat bolted to it. It sits over a hole. Unlike a lot of outhouses this one is no trouble to move when the hole is full.