Looking over Jackie “Yogi” McDonnell’s CDT guide, I got a good laugh out of what she said about “Hiking as a Couple.”\u00a0 Yes, for sure, guys and gals hike differently!\u00a0 Fixit and I are no exception.<\/p>\n
Fixit’s idea of preparing for a hike is to toss some food in a pack and take off.\u00a0 He\u00a0likes to hike fast, from point A to point B.\u00a0 He just puts his head down and goes, and as a result\u00a0sometimes misses a turnoff.\u00a0\u00a0Rough trail does not slow him down–he is very surefooted. Occasionally he will stop and look at a very awesome view, but only sometimes.\u00a0 He is fine with hiking by headlamp at night\u00a0in order to get more miles.\u00a0 Food is irrelevant to him–he eats simply to get some calories then gets going again.\u00a0 When faced with an expanse of snow on a steep hillside or a steep climb up a snow face, his motto is “Momentum trumps gravity” and he races across (or up).\u00a0 He crosses rivers by walking across logs.\u00a0At a resupply town, he would like to just get our box from the PO, eat a big town meal, then hit the trail again.\u00a0 He likes to stay clean by literally jumping into a convenient lake, clothes and all and swimming around a bit.<\/p>\n
I (3rd Monty) have a whole different approach.\u00a0 My preparation is very detailed and involves lots of lists and measuring and making endless baggies of this and that to eat and organizing everything very carefully.\u00a0 I can hike fast on nice even trail, but the minute it gets rocky\/rooty, I have to slow down because I’m such a klutz that I’d be doing one faceplant after another, even with trek poles.\u00a0 I love to look at scenery and take pictures of flowers, and I’m\u00a0 the one who spots the turnoffs and yells, “BILL!\u00a0\u00a0 Come back!\u00a0\u00a0 We turn off here!”\u00a0\u00a0 I do not like hiking by headlamp unless it’s early morning and getting lighter.\u00a0 Food is important to me.\u00a0 I like it to be tasty, and I like to find a place with a view to stop and eat, even if it’s just a Snickers.\u00a0 Snow fields and faces are scary for me.\u00a0 I put on the Microspikes, get out my ice axe and proceed with great caution.\u00a0 If I can’t ford a river, I CRAWL across a log.\u00a0 When we get to town, I really like being able to get a room, wash clothes in a washing machine and wash myself in a shower.\u00a0 And sleep in a bed for one night.\u00a0 And eat a lot.<\/p>\n
So how can we possibly hike together?\u00a0 I will never forget an encounter we had while on the PCT in Washington state in 2010.\u00a0 We met a couple who were out dayhiking (they were headed back to their car) and they said, “You guys look like you’ve come a long way (yeah, we did look like hikertrash all right!)–where did you start from?”\u00a0\u00a0 We said, “Mexico.\u00a0 We’re doing the Pacific Crest Trail.”\u00a0 The dayhikers stared in open incredulity and finally the gal said, “And you’re still together?\u00a0 That’s amazing.”\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Back in southern California on the PCT\u00a0that same year,\u00a0we were happily hiking along the\u00a0trail when we met another northbound thruhiker named Transient, who’d stopped for a rest.\u00a0\u00a0Transient was known for his blunt but wise philosophical sayings.\u00a0 And this was no exception.\u00a0 He said to Fixit, “So, how did you get a woman to follow you and do this trail?”<\/p>\n
Fixit’s reply was, “God gave her to me.”\u00a0\u00a0 And then he said a bunch of nice things about me (which I totally don’t deserve) and about how God is really real and changed his life.\u00a0 Transient said, “Aaa, I tried that God stuff.\u00a0 Didn’t work for me.”\u00a0 He and Fixit talked some more and I think Transient may have moved over at least a bit in his thinking.<\/p>\n
But as Jackie McDonnell said in her guidebook, the bottom line is…..GUYS love their gals and are willing to make LOTS of changes so that we can hike together.\u00a0 When compromises are made, it’s pretty much always the guy conceding to the gal, because they love us.\u00a0 Fixit is very, very patient with me.\u00a0 When I’m slow on rough trail, he stops and waits.\u00a0 When I take forever crossing a snow field, he waits patiently on the other side.\u00a0 When it’s time to eat and I get picky about looking for a place with a view, he doesn’t complain.\u00a0 He doesn’t grump about having to pay for a motel in town.<\/p>\n
Once a year he does the whole John Muir Trail, HIS way–I go with him to the top of Mt. Whitney and say, “Bye, Bill, have fun!” and off he goes, totally hiking in his own way and having a blast, I am sure!<\/p>\n
So gals, we sure can be grateful for the guys who love us and want to be together.\u00a0 They put up with WAY more than we do!<\/p>\n
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Looking over Jackie “Yogi” McDonnell’s CDT guide, I got a good laugh out of what she said about “Hiking as a Couple.”\u00a0 Yes, for sure, guys and gals hike differently!\u00a0 Fixit and I are no exception. Fixit’s idea of preparing for a hike is to toss some food in a pack and take off.\u00a0 He\u00a0likes […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-25","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-preparation"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/montybillpct.net\/blog2016\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/montybillpct.net\/blog2016\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/montybillpct.net\/blog2016\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/montybillpct.net\/blog2016\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/montybillpct.net\/blog2016\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=25"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/montybillpct.net\/blog2016\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":26,"href":"https:\/\/montybillpct.net\/blog2016\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25\/revisions\/26"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/montybillpct.net\/blog2016\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=25"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/montybillpct.net\/blog2016\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=25"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/montybillpct.net\/blog2016\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=25"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}