Make the Sentence Make Sense.

 

One of my goals in 2020 was to fastpack the Trans-Catalina Trail.

That sentence doesn’t make any sense. Let’s unpack it.

One of my goals - Goals were things people used to have in the Before Times. A goal is like a future desired outcome. It is the kind of thing a person can envision and plan for if and when they are confident that there is a future in which that outcome can be achieved. In times of adversity, it is normal for a person’s sense of the scope of the future to narrow to only a time when the adversity is over. There is a subset of people who have been able to plan and make progress toward non-adversity-related goals during the pandemic and those people are called sociopaths.

in 2020 - Math and science will tell you that there was once a calendar year that took place between 2019 and 2021, but sociologists will more accurately explain that in a bizarre and unheard of twist of fate, the year 2020 was actually replaced by the year-long month of March 2020 and that somehow simultaneously absolutely nothing happened and everything happened in that month. No one yet knows how this was possible, but physicists suspect dark matter or mass delusion. See: The New Chronology.

was to fastpack - Fastpacking is like backpacking, but very fast. It can even involve running. It requires packing as little food and gear as possible, allowing a person to cover as much distance as possible. It necessitates almost obsessive planning and reflection on one’s needs and abilities. It is one of those activities that forces people to be honest with themselves, because if they lie to themselves about their needs and abilities, they could freeze to death at night trying to sleep on a mountainside with the wrong gear and not enough food or fire.

the Trans-Catalina Trail - Catalina Island is a little bean shaped island about 26 miles off the coast of Long Beach. It is surrounded by clear waters and deep kelp forests. The island itself is rocky and hilly and there is a trail that runs up and down along the spine of the island. The trail is about 40 miles long and only has a few specific way points for sleeping and refilling water. The interior of the island is populated by wild boar and bison. An elevation map of the island looks like a worrisome cardiogram.

So that sentence has obviously been rendered meaningless by the black hole suck of the supposed year 2020. Let’s replace that sentence with this one:

One of my goals in 2021 is to fastpack the Trans-Catalina Trail.

 See? That’s better. The sentence makes sense now.

.

.

.

50 Miles of Fun.

I have ended up in something of a sour mood today.

So I’m reading online about “fastpacking” which is just hiking really fast with a very light pack. Some people even do it running. Reading about this stuff always makes me feel better because I want to do it and reading about it tickles the parts of my brain that look forward to doing things out in the world. Right now I’m reading about the Trans-Catalina Trail which runs the length of the island of Catalina from end to end. The trail is 37.2 miles long but if you’re hiking it you’re going to do more than fifty miles on foot. In four days. I’m in a place today where that sounds awesome. Am I in good enough shape to do that? No way. Do I have the right gear for it? Nope. Is there 49% of me that would like to wake up tomorrow and drive down to the ferry and head out? You betcha.

This is a picture from Parson’s Landing when I went to Catalina in 2011.

.

.

.

Fascinating New Words & Phrases!

Since I have been becoming interested in this whole outdoors-y, backpacking/camping/hiking thing, I have been doing what any descent English major would do, I have been reading about it obsessively. I figure that this is just exactly like that movie “The Edge” with Anthony Hopkins, skinny Alec Baldwin and the always delightful Elle Macpherson, where Anthony Hopkins has like never been outside before but knows how to survive in the forest after a plane crash because he has read every book in the known universe. Man, Anthony Hopkins is a badass.

Anyway, I have been trying to learn as much as I can about this stuff and in the process of doing that I have come across a lot of new words and phrases that are a lot of fun. Below are a few of my favorites, along with the best definitions I have been able to cobble together. Something that is very interesting about these words and phrases is that since there is no Oxford English Dictionary of Being Outside (though somebody should get to work on that STAT!), the definitions themselves tend to vary a lot depending on who you talk to or what website you read. I have even seen message boards where people get a little nasty while splitting hairs about what exactly constitutes “fastpacking”. Seriously, there are people who are not messing around about this stuff.

I even read an unintentionally hilariously and totally not-ironic blog post some dude wrote about how the difference between Super Ultra Light backpacking and regular backpacking had nothing to do with the weight you carry but rather about your mental strength and determination and how most people don’t “have a strong enough will” to be Super Ultra Light backpackers and so the reason more people don’t do it is because they are “mentally weak.” Man, that guy was a douche bag!

Anywhoo, here are the words and phrases:

Ultra Light: This is basically just regular backpacking, but with at a much lighter overall load on your back. They say the average hiker has about 30 lbs of stuff with them for a two or three day trip. Ultra Light hikers carry significantly less. The general consensus seems to be that an Ultra Light backpacker carries 10 lbs or less.

Super Ultra Light: This is the same as Ultra Light backpacking only the person is carrying 5 lbs or less (again, there are no rules, but 5lbs seems to be the general consensus).

Base Pack Weight: This one is fun. This is how much all of your stuff weighs but NOT including “consumables” which is stuff like food and water and any fuel for your stove or whatever. The reason that they use this measurement is because the weight of your “consumables” will vary depending on the length or your trip, but the weight of your stuff doesn’t change, so this is a good way to figure out how heavy or light you are. However be forewarned! Some people will tell you this is their weight but not tell you they are talking about Base Pack Weight, which means they are trying to trick you! For instance, when somebody like the douche bag mentioned above says, “Yeah, I did the Continental Divide Trail with a 4 pound pack because I have a strong will and vote Republican.” Well he is talking about his Base Pack Weight. If the dude took 60 pounds of Oreo cookies with him, he gets to leave that out when he tells you how Super Ultra Light he is.

The Ray Way: Okay, so there is a guy named Ray Jardine who wrote a book about how to backpack really light (ironically the book is 500 pages long and weighs a pound). A lot of people credit him with creating - or at least raising the profile of – “Ultra Light backpacking” and he has a cultish following, though he seems to be just a pretty cool guy. But a lot of people talk about “Ray” or “The Ray Way” when talking about backpacking and I personally find it a little bit creepy. Like most things though, it is the proselytizing, die-hard adherents who are creepy, not the man or the ideas themselves. This is his website (Just a warning, dude loves him some garish colors! Yeah he does!)

Trailrunning: This is exactly what it sounds like, which is “running on hiking trails”. Instead of taking a nice hike up the side of a hill and saying, “Look at all the beautiful plants and butterflies, hooray!” you RUN up the side of that hill saying, “Screw you hill! I laugh at your thousand foot elevation gain!” I am ashamed to admit it, but I think that trailrunning sounds pretty badass (though not as badass as Sir Anthony Hopkins) and I am trying to get into good enough shape to try it. My fitness regiment currently involves carrying 60 pounds of Oreo cookies around with me at all times.

Fastpacking: Okay, so if you take Ultra Light backpacking and smash that into Trailrunning, you will end up with Fastpacking. Like I said before, people seem to love to fight about this for some reason. There seems to be a The-Jets-vs.-The-Sharks kind of arguments between Ultra Light backpackers and hard-core joggers about exactly who came up with Fastpacking, but after awhile you just scream at your computer, “Who the fuck cares!” Anyway, as near as I can tell this is when you take only the most basic camping stuff with you and you jog trails all day, make camp for the night, wake up and jog all day again and then make camp someplace else. Do this for a few days and – I think – you are Fastpacking! Congratulations?


.
.
.