High Sierra Topix

Yeh, I am not much of a thru-hiker either. I probably would have become disillusioned well before the Oregon border if I were to try the PCT! I think some people just have an aptitude for it. 20 trail-miles a day really is not extreme. On a trail, even I, as an old fart, can average 2.5 mph and then add about half an hour for each 1000 feet elevation gain - that's 8 hours a day plus another hour for elevation gains (assuming 2000 feet a day average). I enjoy walking and look around all the time. I do not have my eyes glued to the trail! I am enjoying the mountains when I am walking. And I do prefer walking every day. At my age, not sure my body would hold up for 200 days of it though. But, let's face it, not ALL the Sierra trails are that wonderful or scenic. In fact probably 50% are just so-so. I think that when I was younger I could have done the miles, but I just do not have the patience to slog through the less interesting stuff. I pretty much "cherry pick" the good stuff and avoid the less scenic stuff.

My "project" is my guidebook to the Wind Rivers. Once one starts on this path, one gets sucked into some real "work" verifying the less interesting miles that simply are sometimes required to get to the good stuff. It is a trade-off for sure. But I keep my goal in mind, and I am sure Sara will too. That is not to say she will not have some darned boring miles to walk!

zacjust32 wrote:...(no offense to all the old farts ).

Zacjust32, I recommend you review Eric's advise:

ERIC wrote:..do your part to keep things civil... Best advice I can give is to state your case without personal attack...

In the future I would prefer you address me as a "Mature Intestinal Gaseous Expultion".



Thanks,

-Russ

Good comments from everyone. I hope this HUGE project is a labor of love for you Sarah.

To Sara and Wandering Daisy:

Wandering Daisy, I agree with everything you say. My concern is that Sara is reinventing the wheel where she might realize her big picture goals more efficiently by showing how to access and use info already out there. Sara should be the Napster of Sierra hiking data, if you are familiar with the Napster story.

Sara, Wandering Daisy wrote the quintessential book on hiking Wyoming’s Wind River Range: Beyond Trails in the Wind River Mountains. While nominally a “book”, most of the publication was on an included CD, allowing computer access to the content. Wandering Daisy’s book also included sections on how to access info necessary to predict water crossing difficulty, snow depth by date, and other parameters that vary year to year.

So, Wandering Daisy, your book answered the questions I posed to Sara in spades. Your book presents information in a compelling fashion superior to the older Wind River Range guides. The most information dense guide book ever, all the info is pertinent, and links to useful external info sources are provided.

Sara, in my opinion, Wandering Daisy’s book is a great guide book well worth a look. It creatively presents a tremendous volume of info, provides the tools to ‘adjust’ for year to year differences, and allows easy electronic content sharing. The caveat, it is not for the first timer, but otherwise is a model for a guide book.

To shift gears somewhat, there is a tremendous amount of GPS track info available. I participate on a board, Oregonhikers.org, where, unlike HST, many active hikers routinely include their GPS tracks in their trip reports. One popular gps track posting site they use is gpsfly.org.

If you’ve used Google Map’s ‘satellite view’ or Google Earth you’ve probably noticed that the trail locations are getting more accurate as time goes by. Google is ‘mining’ that gps track data—that darn ‘Google Bot’ you see listed as an active user of HST—and using the aggregated data to refine their maps.

For the Sierras, where so many have done so much, it makes sense to take advantage of the resources in place—to link and aggregate—than to go all new from the ground. Maybe even contact Google to interface with their map people and access their compilation of GPS tracks.

Good luck Sara. May you do for the Sierras what Wandering Daisy has done for the Wind River Range!

My best to you both.

So, can I crowd fund my Sierra trips as well? I swear I'll GPS mark every spot were I see a Pika or a MYLF, and share the tracks.

I didn't post it here but I was a finalist to win 5,000 dollars to do just that (sans needing to carry a GPS). I was so close to the dream!

Hmm lets see. If 25 of of us donate 17$ a month, in one year we could save up 5 gs to pay bills for one of us to go hike for a month. I think that one of us should be me!

Thanks guys, I cant wait!

this thread is getting weird with the funding part for the trip. We all mostly have that equipment, and the trails don't bug us that much.. hmmm.

Personally, I would fund Sparky first!

And back to what (Eiprahs) Dave hinted at.. Some of us do keep tracks. We just don't share them here because it really doesn't matter and all the data from a LOT of people is available online. Every year. Every trip. I have all my tracks but who cares unless you're a point to point hiker. It's pretty simple. I'm here and I need to go there. Map, align and go.

Cheers

I am all for helping people get into the outdoors - a handful at a time, with as much encouragement to learn and follow LNT as possible.

Here's hoping that, like all the guidebooks, there is at least a brief section somewhere attached to this project about Leave No Trace, proper food storage, and recommendations to follow basic safety guidelines for backpackers.

Handing out GPS tracks in one great big collection - isn't that what AllTrails is for?