5 Common Backpacking Mistakes That Can Cost You Your Life

[rainrunner]

5 Common Backpacking Mistakes That Can Cost You Your Life


Look at the guy in the white hat!!!
HaHaHa!

Hey wait....... that's me..... grrrr....

We were using a bear canister, and using a "bear-muda" triangle.
The bear sniffed out our backpacks, then headed to our cooking rock.
I was banging on the pots and yelling but the bear kept a-comin'.
Finally I stepped from behind the large rock and the bear turned around and moseyed off.

[Koda]

that was the first survival article I've ever read that didn't include the 10 essentials...


On the positive side, checking your pockets for food wrappers and crumbs in Grizz country is sound advice.

[-Q-]

Very happy that you posted this, as I need a refresher on what to do if you are caught in the alpine/sub-alpine zone and lightning starts up.

What is the recommended plan of action??

[Grannyhiker]

If I may refer to another ongoing thread, another backpacking mistake that can cost you your life is to heed the advice of Backpacker Magazine to leave your map at home!

[Bosterson]

Not having a "solid water purification plan" can cost you your life? Honestly, water purification is one of the least "essential" essentials... Hypothetical gastrointestinal illness is the least of anyone's worries if you're about to die of thirst! I will trade iodine tablets for a map any day of the week.

[Roy]

Some member a couple of years back posted that picture of the rock and the Bear (white hat guy) and said they were cooking.

I am to lazy to find it but I think they said they were in the North Cascades. Maybe two or three years ago possible they just yanked it off the net and posted it as their trip.

Taken by Ann Cowly it says A PH member?

A great shot though

Quick update i put my best team on the mystery "The truth is out there"

[rainrunner]

Roy, the bear/rock photo was us three years ago in Yosemite. Sierra Trading Post has used it several times.
Ann (Mrs. Rainrunner)

[adamschneider]

Very happy that you posted this, as I need a refresher on what to do if you are caught in the alpine/sub-alpine zone and lightning starts up. What is the recommended plan of action??

Find an open, isolated ridge or peak with a single tall tree on it. Climb to the top of the tree and hold both of your metal trekking poles over your head.


Seriously, though: get off any ridges/peaks and find a patch of small trees that has much taller trees nearby. The idea is not to be the highest local point, and not to be directly underneath the highest local point. (Tree roots can carry a lightning strike.) I just had to do this last Saturday on the PCT in the Central Cascades; photo below.

If you're so far up the mountain that there are no trees, just get down in a gully; and make sure it's one you can get out of again!

[kepPNW]

Very happy that you posted this, as I need a refresher on what to do if you are caught in the alpine/sub-alpine zone and lightning starts up.

What is the recommended plan of action??

Just ran across this the other day - http://www.wta.org/hiking-info/basics/h ... ning-storm

Hard to believe bunching up, versus laying down, decreases the target size enough to be notable. But I suppose it makes sense. I also hadn't thought about keeping 15'+ away from buddies, so that if one is struck other(s) will still be able to do CPR.

[R11]

When your hair stands on end and your ice axe starts humming, you know it's time to get low!

When we reached camp we knew the lightning's arrival was imminent because Shelley's hair was standing up. It reached us a few minutes later (great timing!). Again we waited out the rain and lightning around us, then it cleared for another beautiful evening. Two skiiers we had been encountering throughout the weekend stopped by later that evening on their way out and said that up at Glacier Gap their ice axes were humming when the storm arrived (yikes!).

http://www.nwhikers.net/forums/viewtopi ... 429633f9fa


ron