EATING WELL There are many options for eating well on trail so no need to chew on twigs and bark. Blueberry cobbler or pad thai? No problem. There’s a huge selection of dehydrated meals, and some of them taste pretty darn good. They come in handy packs: just add boiling water and eat out of the pack, so you don’t have to clean your camp plate. A cheaper route is do-it-yourself backpacking meals online. Coffee addicts rejoice: Instant coffee packs well and comes in single-serve packets. (Add half a pack of hot chocolate and you’ve got a mocha. My camping rule book says it’s totally OK to eat chocolate, because you burn so many calories each hiking day – woohoo!)
A PERSONAL TALE By Shannon Peddell
LET’S GO BACKPACKING, she said. It’ll be fun, she said. Backpacking is hiking and camping combined. You carry all of your gear, hike to a location, set up camp, sleep, get up, pack up, and repeat. When my friend asked, I thought carrying heavy camping gear for kilometres sounded downright miserable. I loved camping, and I loved hiking, but backpacking - a combo of the two - sounded like something only for the super-fit or unemployed. So my friend recommended Wild: From Lost to Found on the Pacific Crest Trail by Cheryl Strayed. And a strange thing happened. It made me want to learn more. I researched everything about backpacking I could find, watched hours of YouTube videos, learned about knots and woodcraft until I felt ready for our first multi-day hiking adventure. We wanted to start easy, so we planned about 100 kilometres of the Rideau Trail, nice and close to home. I bought a sleeping bag, a cheap lightweight tent and a few things to get by with before spending big bucks on the good stuff. We planned and planned and finally the day came when my husband dropped us off at our starting point in Sydenham. We stayed our first night in Frontenac Park, but the second day …
The trail was hard and took way longer than planned. So we left the trail hoping to make up lost time to the campground on a road. Bad idea. Blazing heat, cars roaring past. What we discovered was cheap tents leak, road hiking sucks, and if it’s your first trip, whatever distance you think you’ll hike each day, cut that by a third. But astonishingly after all of that, we didn’t quit. Instead we planned a nine-day trip to Newfoundland’s East Coast Trail. The cause of this apparent insanity was that after the Rideau Trail adventure was over, we missed it. There was something to be said for carrying everything that you need to survive in the woods. You forget about material possessions, work, commuting and the daily grind. You get to be what human beings are meant to be. We are built to move and we have the minds to survive. In short, backpacking had made me feel more alive than I have in years. After that, every morning I wake up planning to get back at it again. Backpacking may not be for everyone, just as running, or camping, or fishing isn’t for everyone, but if you are even slightly intrigued by the idea, try it. It can change your life. Φ
~ Shannon Peddell is the editor of trailaddicts.ca
PHOTO BY TIPLYASHINA - FOTOLIA
REWARDS There can be backpacking times when you’ll be tired, sore and fed up and want to quit, but there are rewards for persevering. The sense of accomplishment is a big one. You’ll also see aspects of the natural world that only a small group of people will ever see, and that’s pretty cool. Just educate yourself so your fears fade and you are as prepared as you can be. Then you’re headed for addiction to the trail. Φ
WHY BACKPACKING WORKS
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