Tag Archives: Literature

Backpacking, May '15

To be a human in the wild

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“Twenty years ago, fresh out of college, I was too poor to afford the most expensive name gear. I did have a great back pack (Lowe Alpine Contour), but a cheap tent, Walmart ground pad, and low end hiking clothes, etc. Several times on the trail, I would meet people and outfitters who would judge me on my apparel/gear. It was like the trail had become a country club and I was not welcome or good enough to be a member. I feel now, the same way I felt then. If you love the outdoors, hiking and camping, then you belong.”

–/u/mein_liebchen on Reddit

It’s not Martin Luther King. It’s not Ghandi. But my goodness did this dude put it perfectly. To provide some context, people have been incessantly bitching about the movie Wild and the resultant flood of backpackers. This guy was fed up with the elitism from a portion of the hiking community. Continue reading To be a human in the wild →

March '14

The weatherglow

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Frederic Fenger published these words in his book, “Alone in the Caribbean”, after his 1911 crossing of the Lesser Antilles in a sailing canoe.

“Crab pas mache, il pas gras ; il mache trop, et il tombe dans chodier.”
“If a crab don’t walk, he don’t get fat ;
If he walk too much, he gets in a pot.”

— From the Creole.

IS IT in the nature of all of us, or is it just my own peculiar make-up which brings, when the wind blows, that queer feeling, mingled longing and dread? A thousand invisible fingers seem to be pulling me, trying to draw me away from the four walls where I have every comfort, into the open where I shall have to use my wits and my strength to fool the sea in its treacherous moods, to take advantage of fair winds and to fight when I am fairly caught — for a man is a fool to think he can conquer nature. It had been a long time since I had felt the weatherglow on my face, a feeling akin to the numb forehead in the first touch of inebriety. The lure was coming back to me. It was the lure of islands and my thoughts had gone back to a certain room in school where as a boy I used to muse over a huge relief map of the bottom of the North Atlantic. No doubt my time had been better spent on the recitation that was going on. Continue reading The weatherglow →