7 Habits for Happy Hiking.

[Neil]

#7 can be a hard pill to swallow. You get preached at constantly to not go alone but if you haven't connected with someone at your level/pace then what do you do? I for one am certainly not going to stay home. I have gone with lots of people in the past but am always the slow one and I usually get pulled out of my comfort zone quickly.

Are there any other shorter than average fair weather weekend warrior bushwhackers out there? Not that I have seen yet. So I'll just keep chugging along at my comfort level.

Tortoise Jim

"Thou shalt not hike alone".



I do it all the time, off trail, summer, winter.....I'm my favorite partner!

I chose myself very wisely and then I taught and coached and trained myself obsessively.

 

[Kevin Rooney]

Good post, Neil. Would just add -

Make sure everyone's vehicle starts before leaving the trailhead.

 

[Neil]

Imagine coming out at the Allen TH after a very long day, it's dark, around zero degrees and your a wee bit tired and chilly. Yours is the only car at the TH and your battery is dead. The nearest public phone from there is about 20 miles away.

Better hope your trip planning extended to cover the period of time between arrival at the car to the time the heater belches out kilojoules of warmth. Otherwise you're in for another loooooooong walk.

(Edit: but there are private dwellings along the road.)

 

[WinterWarlock]

Yowch...

Speaking of cars and keys - I just saw this on the newsreader...absolutely tragic.

… Sandra Ordner, 47, of Daphne, whose body was found last week outside her locked SUV at a North Carolina mountain parking lot, died of hypothermia hours after she told her husband she was going hiking, the local sheriff said Thursday.

Macon County, N.C., Sheriff Robert Holland said that it had been extremely cold and raining in the hours before Ordner’s body was discovered in the parking lot of the Whiteside Mountain Trail.

Ordner’s keys and cellular telephone were locked inside her 2002 Land Rover sport utility vehicle, Holland said

 

[DougPaul]

Speaking of cars and keys

News report: http://www.citizen-times.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=200880208158

Don't know if it would have helped in this case, but don't forget that you may be able to climb under the vehicle to get some protection from the rain.

FWIW, I carry 2 sets of car keys in different places to minimize the chance of lockout or loss. (I did manage to lock myself out of my rental car at Grandview Point in Canyonlands on a rather warm day. The risk here was death by dehydration in the hot dry climate. (The rental car company wouldn't give me a second set of keys. ))

Doug

 

[WinterWarlock]

News report: http://www.citizen-times.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=200880208158

Don't know if it would have helped in this case, but don't forget that you may be able to climb under the vehicle to get some protection from the rain.

FWIW, I carry 2 sets of car keys in different places to minimize the chance of lockout or loss. (I did manage to lock myself out of my rental car at Grandview Point in Canyonlands on a rather warm day. The risk here was death by dehydration in the hot dry climate. (The rental car company wouldn't give me a second set of keys. ))

Doug

You'd think she could have broken a window or something, but when hypothermia sets in, you just don't think straight any longer...it's very unfortunate in this case.

edit - looks like she tried, but I should have added above - 'nor do you have the strength you normally do'

 

[Gamehiker]

"Thou shalt not hike alone".



I do it all the time, off trail, summer, winter.....I'm my favorite partner!

I chose myself very wisely and then I taught and coached and trained myself obsessively.

Thanks for the humor Neil. I needed that. My post was intended more so to poke fun at myself and certainly not intended to flame anyone who I have hiked with in the past. All of whom are great guys who have taught me a lot. We are just not hiking on the same mountain ranges at this point.

I'll be teaching and coaching and training myself for a long long time to come.

 

[Jay H]

Wouldn't you just use a rock and break a window?? Sounds odd to me, tragic story either way...

Jay

 

[DougPaul]

Wouldn't you just use a rock and break a window?? Sounds odd to me, tragic story either way...

The story says that there are marks on the window suggesting that she tried.

It is also possible that she was already hypothermic when she reached the car and was unable to do so or unable to think of breaking in.

Doug

 

[timmus]

It is just me or Neil's thread drifted ????

It's titled : 7 habits for HAPPY hiking, not SAFE hiking.

Big difference, IMO.

And, happy hiking requires happy beverages at the end of the day

 

[WinterWarlock]

It is just me or Neil's thread drifted ????

It's titled : 7 habits for HAPPY hiking, not SAFE hiking.

Big difference, IMO.

And, happy hiking requires happy beverages at the end of the day

Good point - and my bad...I guess with the NH and NC happening, they tended to overlap.

Although, I'm happy when I'm safe (and so is my wife)!

 

[DougPaul]

It's titled : 7 habits for HAPPY hiking, not SAFE hiking.

Maybe its just me, but I always figured that the two were correlated.

Doug

 

[Jay H]

The story says that there are marks on the window suggesting that she tried.

It is also possible that she was already hypothermic when she reached the car and was unable to do so or unable to think of breaking in.

Doug

Did she go for a hike, return to the car and then realized she didn't have her keys? If so, they her pack should of been with her, i.e. outside the car. So I can only assume that she was packless with her keys and her cell phone inside the car and she hasn't started hiking yet. Then why couldn't she use a rock and toss it through a window... it's not that hard. She couldn't of been thinking clearly if she tried to break the glass with her fingers! Use a rock...

My only hypothesis is that she must of decided to try to walk somewhere to get help (maybe she didn't know the area), somehow gave up and walked back to her car in some kind of hyperthermic state and then somehow didn't think clearly enough to break a window. The article posted did seem to say it was raining.

Jay

 

[timmus]

Maybe its just me, but I always figured that the two were correlated.

Doug

No they are not.

Safety doesn't make me happy, it just keeps me alive.

And I know a whole bunch of people that are very alive and safe, but remain unhappy.

 

[WinterWarlock]

No they are not.

Safety doesn't make me happy, it just keeps me alive.

And I know a whole bunch of people that are very alive and safe, but remain unhappy.

I'm happy to be alive - if it takes safety to achieve that, then I guess it does.

OTOH - I would have to assume that if I weren't alive, I wouldn't be so happy...

Oh well - it's all in how you look at it, I guess!

timmus, I enjoy your drawings immensely, so I have to say I'm happy you're safe enough to be alive too.


Scott

 

[timmus]

Oh well - it's all in how you look at it, I guess!

Exactly.

timmus, I enjoy your drawings immensely, so I have to say I'm happy you're safe enough to be alive too.

thanks !

 

[DougPaul]

No they are not.

I didn't say that happiness and safety were 100% correlated*. They might only be partially correlated. And, of course, one would also have to average over a large group of people.

It is perfectly possible for them to be positively correlated for some individuals, negatively correlated for some, and uncorrelated for others. But my guess is that on the average over a large group of people, happiness and safety are positively partially correlated.

FWIW, I tend to be happier when I am safe than when I am not. I probably tend to be safer when I am happy too.


* For the non-mathematically inclined, correlation is an average ranging from 100% to -100%. A loose definition: If A and B tend to happen together all the time, they are 100% correlated. If A and B tend to happen together more than half the time, they are partially correlated. If A and B tend not to occur together, then they are negatively correlated. If either occurs without regard to the other, then they are uncorrelated.

BTW, correlation says nothing about causation--it just measures co-occurence.

Doug

 

[Chip]

It is perfectly possible for them to be positively correlated for some individuals, negatively correlated for some, and uncorrelated for others. But my guess is that on the average over a large group of people, happiness and safety are positively partially correlated.

How about a Poll ???

FWIW, I tend to be happier when I am safe than when I am not. I probably tend to be safer when I am happy too.

Ditto. Triple Ditto for my wife, which, depending on how that's weighted, may add up to a quadruple ditto for me.

 

[Mike P.]

After reading all the Franconia comments & writing my own just to get the pop up that the thead was closed, I skipped most of the comments here. (What's the padlock mean again )

I would also add (if no one else did) to get a couple of good nights sleep. I've hiked after several days of just getting 3-4 hours of sleep & also after a few days of 6-7 hours sleep & being well rested helps. (I have spare nutrition I'm trying to burn off but you can't bank enough rest)

 

[una_dogger]

No they are not.



And I know a whole bunch of people that are very alive and safe, but remain unhappy.

Obviously, these people have not been drinking sufficient quantities of spirits after their hikes!

I didn't say that happiness and safety were 100% correlated*. They might only be partially correlated. And, of course, one would also have to average over a large group of people

To each his own, although I tend to agree with you a bit Doug Paul on the safety/happiness causation/correlation angle, as may others -- but not all.

Neil's list could go on to infinity if we tried to customize it to everyone