Date: 2009-03-24
To: Safety and Hazards
Miles today: 0.0

After taking yesterday off, it felt good to go out and do about 12 miles today using roads and snowmobile trails around Durham and Pownal today. My new boots are feeling great, but I think the socks are making the pounding much more bearable. Good times, it beats just road walking for sure.When I tell people that I will be thru-hiking the Trail, a lot of first responses I get are about safety and some of the threats along the way. "You're going alone?", "What about bears?", "EWww, what about all the bugs?", or "Watch out for the banjo pickers in the woods". It's all the same when I first bring it up, most people are just worried that I'm going to get hurt.I guess I'll start with a passage from Bill Bryson's well known trail book, "A Walk in the Woods". Feeling very apprehensive, Bryson rants for about 4 pages about the dangers of bears, and then he says, "Then there were all the problems and particular dangers of solitude. I still have my appendix, and any number of other organs that might burst or sputter in the empty wilds. What would I do then? What if I fell from a ledge and broke my back? What if I lost the trail in blizzard or fog, or was nipped by a venomous snake, or lost my footing on moss-slickened rocks crossing a stream and cracked my head a concussive blow? You could drown in three inches of water on your own. You could die from a twisted ankle. No, I didn't like the feel of this at all."I sometimes go back to that passage and feel exactly the way he does. It is easy to get caught up in all the possibilities. What the heck am I getting myself into? There are a thousand different things that could harm me and take me off the trail. The environment is treacherous. Cold rain could give me hypothermia, thunderstorms could strike me dead, I have to push through hail, sleet, snow, rain, sunburns and heat exhaustion. It could be anywhere from 20 to 100 degrees on the trail while I'm on it. I could go tens of miles without a source of water. I could drink contaminated water, I could run out of food. I could trip and fall on one of my 5,000,000 steps that I plan to take. Anything from a sprained ankle to a broken leg or a concussion or an infected cut. I could poke an eye out from a tree branch, or get poison ivy or poison oak or something worse.Never mind that stuff, I could get eaten by a bear, or just partially digested, maybe just a giant swipe of its claws across a major artery. I could get bitten by a rattlesnake, or get Lyme disease from a tick. I have had my fair share of bad times with mosquitos, I know what it's like to by covered in bites, but I could also get diseases from them. There are things called chiggers, they don't suck blood like mosquitos, they live off of eating your skin and their bites itch like mad. Can we go back to the bears for a second? 400lb beasts that are actually pretty common along the trail. Normally you wouldn't be that appetizing except for the fact that you're carrying 6lbs of Snicker bars on your back and the berries are all gone. Speaking of massive, have you ever stood near a moose? It's taller than an average man, and I've seen pictures of a car hitting them and the moose ending up in the trunk as the car crumples around it. I couldn't imagine one hauling ass towards me, I wouldn't stand a chance.But I digress. I'm starting to sound like Bryson. Amidst all of these threats and hazards, the key will be preparation and awareness of my surroundings. The fact that I have a tent, and won't simply be lying on the ground or in an exposed shelter like some others, will help. The ability to stay alert and not walk up to a Mama Bear before it's too late, will help. The ability to know up to date weather conditions via my Peek, will definitely help. I will take my tools, both physical and mental, and head out to the wilderness as prepared as I can be. I know deep down that I cannot be ready for everything, and some stuff I just won't see coming.The best I can do is be prepared, be aware, and be ready for anything. Oh yeah, and have a blast while I'm out there.Happy Trails,Matt