Worst backcountry experience?

“My worst experience was my first
experience..

I went with my girlfriends family they said they had an extra pack and sleeping bag and all I had to do was bring some extra clothes and help carry some of the food and gear. It was an old pack frame with no waist belt and a canvas car camping sleeping bag that weighed a ton. But hey I didn't know any better ...looked good to me... let's go!
We were hiking into
Sequoia National Park.
We left the trailhead
at lodgepole and hiked in to Emerald Lake. We found a beautiful little secluded place to camp ...set up camp
started cooking dinner
and next thing I knew
there was a loud discussion going on with a Backcountry Ranger as to why we couldn't camp where we wanted to? Only to find out the lake was closed to camping except for a little dirt area with roped off squares like a trailer park or something. Next the Ranger wanted to see our Wilderness Permit
A what......???? We don't have one. Can I see your drivers license? Why we're not driving...was our leaders response....
things were getting ugly quick. After some discussion We were offered a temporary permit and a dirt square or hike out tonight like it was a day hike. Our leader opted for the later.
So we packed up and hiked back out .Of course it got dark before we were out and of the two flashlights we brought one didn't work and the other died within a half an hour.
We had a couple of emergency candles and walked out holding each others belt loops by candle light. Hot wax dripping on our leaders bare legs. We got out in one piece
Drove down a little ways.Our leader wanted to take a nap before driving home... everyone had just dozed off in the van
when along came a rap, rap, rap on the window
I'm sorry you can't park here and you can't camp here.

I decided that day if I ever went again I would take it upon myself to find out what the rules were
and follow them and never be the victim of someone else's poor planning again.
That was my worst trip
and with just a little research could have been a great first trip. Believe it or not I did go on many, many trips with her Dad and Uncle and the trips just got better and better.....but I don't think my old girlfriend ever went again.”

“null”

“I have a doozy of a story. It was actually my last Philmont trek. This story is long enough (3 pages on Word) that I will write in installments.

The trek was doomed from the start. This was back in the day before I was an Adult leader within my troop, so I was the Crew Chief for the trip. The only two adult leaders we could get to go had absolutly no extended hiking experience. In fact there were only two people, including me, who had done extended backpacking. The adult leader started with good intentions. He schedualed a shake down hike which was supposed to be one of 5 hikes to get the members in the feeling of backpacking. I was the only one who went. That was the last hike we did. I attempted to organize other hikes, but everbody was always "busy." I went ahead and trained like I alwasy did so I knew I'd be able to carry more then my own gear. Finally the day came that we all left for the train station. We all loaded up our gear and boarded the train. Of course, the train broke down and we were late getting in. Because of this we had to hurry through registration. We had to finish up the next morning, so we didn't hit the trail until the late afternoon. This was a very short trail, but it took way longer then it should have. This was the first time I realized how the rest of the trip was going to go.”

“My first bad experience was at a boys camp back in my youth. The parents had shipped me across town to summer camp for boys and girls. Not only was I late getting there, but I also got stuck with the top bunk that was way up in the cobwebs by the rafters and away from the window.

That was just the start of what turn out to be memoirable summer. On our first outing underneath the stars, where we drank fine spider cider and listen to scary stories, was to be the first of many future bad experience. Picture if you will 10+ youthful bodies wrap in their Coleman slumber party style sleeping bags gathered around a central fire like spokes in a wheel.
We all were tired from the afternoon pantie raid on the girls camp and the stories had work there magic. One by one we all started to turn in for what was meant to be a peaceful evening under the stars.

As I laid there curled up in my Spider-Man Action Sleeping bag, looking up at the heavens above(trophy panties in hand) I drifted off into a tranquil slumber thinking of the days pillage and what morning may bring.

Well, morning came sooner than expected. I forget what time I was awaken, but what had awoken me was the smell and the heat that was coming from the bottom of my Spider-Man Action sleeping bag. Thank God I was short at the time, but as I piered over the top and down the bag towards my feet did I see the most beautiful colors ever. There were brillant shades of purple and orange with flashes of green erupting towards the heavenly skies. It was at that moment that it hit me. I saw this glowing dark matter laying on top of my Spider-Man Action sleeping at the foot of bag. That matter was a LOG that had rolled(?) from the fire on to my bag. I was out of that bag like a kid on X-mas morning. Only this time I was screaming.

I was not injured other than my pride and spent the remaining time in camp with a charred Spider-Man Action sleeping bag. The hole was huge.”

“while blazing solo off trail,
i forded a stream using rocks
as stepping stones.

yeah you got it.icaught a mossy rock and fell backwards,hitting the back of my head on a rock.

i woke up to find the stream
running the color red.
i was about 5 miles back and had not seen anyone all day.
needless to say this was the end
of this trip.
a concussion,stitches, and a
week of confusion followed.
this is the only time igot hurt in years of hiking and i try
to be more careful since that scare.”

“Well, I hate spiders. I did this little 5 mile trail along a lake near home. on the hike in, it wasn't too bad cause all the day hikers had cleared all the webs outta the way over the course of the day. The morning I woke up and packed and started heading back out. It took me over six hours to walk out on a flat trail because there we're webs every 5 to 10 feet apart. Most of them still had the 8-legged-son-of-a-b!tches still perched in the middle of the web too. Oh yeah, That night I was fishing and never got a bite until I went to sleep and my pole got pulled into the lake.
I'll never go back there again!”

“I was probably about 12 at the time, but hate to admit I was this old looking back...Two friends & I decided at the last minute we would spend the night at "catfish pond". Everyone was to grab their own gear & we'd hike out (about 3 or 4 miles as I recall). Well, we hiked out O.K., but upon arrival realized that no-one had brought any "group" gear, hence, no tent, no cooking gear, and guess what..no food. No problem for us, ha ha ha, expert fishermen we. Well, we did catch a few, but by then it was raining like $#&@#$ and we had a lot of trouble keeping the fire going. Also, since we had no cooking gear, the best we could come up with was to make some skewers with sticks & roast the catfish over the (sputtering) fire. I still remember gutting them with an old, dull pocketknife. Yep, we all ate half-raw catfish for dinner, slept in a downpour in soaking sleeping bags, & woke up feeling cold & sick. I always re-tell this story to my scouts to try to get them to understand what can happen when you don't plan properly...I'll never forget that trip!”

“Now that you all have scared the s--- out of me. Had one like wanderer. Seventeen years old, we had the world by the knarlys. Five young men enter the woods to live off the land for three days. we had fish poles, knives, firearms and all the camp gear, no food we planned this. First day, no fish, no wild game, friend had a pocket full of jelly beans, three beans left when we caught him hoarding. split three jelly beans four ways, jelly bean hoarder beat to a bloody pulp good friends that we are, we stop short of a hanging. day two, no fish, one robin split five ways, day two evening hike back to truck and head for town, I now consider myself a real mountain man. we could have eaten venison but we tried to be law abiding and didn't want to shoot a doe. Never, ever hoard, it could be harmful to your health.”

“I'm lucky in that I've had trips with bad parts but I've never had the entire trip go bad.

That said, I would have to say the 'coldest' night I ever spent was a night in July when I forgot to pack matches and my wife had to go without a cooked dinner.
To this day she asks me if I'm sure I have the matches. :)”

“This reminds me of backfoot's story, so can I please tell it? (Even though I was mt. biking and was not exactly in the backcountry???)

Ok, I had just gotten a new Specialized Rockhopper in November for my birthday (maybe in '96 or so). It was late on a Friday afternoon and I managed to get off work early to take a ride in a local park. You climb up through the park on blacktop and scream down a tight-cornered hill on the backside. Well it was all icy. So I came back down the way I'd gone up.

Was kinda gawking around at scenery and admiring my new front shocks. And then I noticed two, long potholes fast approaching. I now know what I should have done, but not then. I clamped down on the handbrakes (a big no,no) and then I went over the bars in what seemed to be slow motion. (Yes,I think I shut my eyes and figured I was a goner.)

I was on blacktop, remember...harder than normal blacktop, cuz it's frozen. I hit in kind of a three point landing: one of my knees (can it really be I can't remember which?), my right shoulder (the jacket still has a torn hole there and, I'm not sure how, but I did not get a broken collarbone).

And I figured out the third point later as I rubbed my right temple and realized it hurt. I then checked my helmet to see that, indeed, it took a brunt of impact there. Oh and my cheapo sunglasses broke out of their frame on my right eye (luckily didn't shatter) and left me with a black eye! And the right side of my chin and cheek was scraped some. (Still have scars today.)

When I woke up, I didn't know if I'd been unconscious or not. But I don't think so. It was almost time for sunset and the sun hadn't moved much. I got up and limped/rode back home. Got X-rays much later (couldn't at time cuz of swelling) and I do have one disk toward the top of my spine that's a little messed up. Sometimes it hurts if I sit with bad posture.

So I was by myself, lived and learned and lucked out!!!”

“There's a similar thread with a sh!tload of horror stories, titled "Close calls." Plug close calls into the search engine at the bottom of the thread list and check 90 days and it'll come up. Some of the best are Big Foot's tales and Mel's story about a bear that kept her up at night in Yosemite.”

“The story continues:

The next day we had an easy 6 miles, but had to hike an extra 2 miles for a food pick up. At this food pickup, one of the adult leaders decided to pull his tent out to dry it off. This leader shall be named Dan. When we told him that we weren't going to be here that long, he just got mad and refused to put it away. He finally gave in once all the food was divided up. This brought up another situation. It appears that Dan's backpack was too small, but since he never did any hiking and didn't come to the gear check, he didn't "know" it was too small. The funny thing is that one adult leader who couldn't come on the trip offered to lend him his pack, but he refused and said that he would just sew on some extra pockets. I never saw those pockets. The only way that we could get all the food accounted for was for me and the other adult leader to take the extra. In the end, we both had about 60+ pounds on our backs. Now I'd like to mention that the Philmont maps many times neglect to show small connecting trails. We found the trail that looked like the one we were supposed to take, but it was actually a jeep trail with a really bad grade. It was s bad day. So bad we had to take more and more of this adult leaders gear and also some of his sons. Soon enough they were both at 25 pounds and still a helluva lot slower then me. We eventually made it to the camp just in time. No sooner had we set down our packs then the pack mule adult leader helping me with the gear started throwing up. He had altitude sickness brought on by overexertion. We spent most of the time getting him medical help and didn't have time to make camp before the rain started. Anybody who has ever been in a high elevatin rain storm knows what I mean by a heavy rain. We had all the tents up and the food in the bear bags ready to hang, right next to the bear rope that I had told somebody to go throw many hours earlier. At this time, Dan decided that he wanted to make soup. So he dug the soup out of the bag and proceeded to boil water and make his soup. The time was now 11:00. After he was done we had to go throw the bear rope in the pouring rain and hang the bags. It took half an hour to get the rope over the cable and when we finally got the bag up, being the smart one of the group, Dan tied the rope to the tree the cable was attached to. I couldn't see it where he tied it because it was dark and wet. We all got back to our tents and slept the night.”

“My first x-c ski trip with the Scouts when I was 10. We were spending a night at the scout master's cabin deep in the Oregon woods with two days of skiing. Possibly the snow would be too high for the 4X4s to get through and we would have to ski into the cabin with our packs. I was bound and determined to have a light pack and instead of opting for the normal beefy synthetic, I brought along a rectangular, cotton, Bobby Hull hockey sleeping bag that if it had been rated, was probaby to about 55 degrees. We ended up not having to ski in. No biggie, I thought. The cabin was cozy with the dozen or so scouts and plenty warm. I imagine now that when I unrolled my sleeping bag that night, I probably got some pretty strange looks. Everything was great ntil the wood stove died out around 12 a.m. that night and temps dipped down to freezing. I woke up, teeth chattering and put on all the clothes I had brought. I was still painfully cold all night long and did not sleep a wink. Of course, I was too ashamed to admit to anyone what I had done but the Scout motto was driven home: be prepared!”

“I have not had any "worst" backpacking
experiences...

A few were more "memorable" than others...

But ALL my bp trips BEAT THE HELL otta
of the "best" day at the orifice!!!!!!!!

Highcountry”

“In the morning the medics informed us that they were going to medivac our one usefull adult leader off the mountain. The ranger then came and said that our bearbags were low enough for her to raech up and touch because somebody had tied the rope to the same tree as the cable. Dan then made a joke about the bears needing a boat to get through camp. The ranger wasn't pleased.

Boy scout rules say that you have to have 2 deep leadership inorder to hike, and we were one short. Fortunatly there was another crew on the same itinerary as us, and they had an extra leader, so he voulenteered to join us. He was way better then Dan. As we started the hike out, we only got about a quarter mile when Dan suddenly decided that he had altitude sickness too and had to drop out. Now we were down to one leader. After hiking him down, his son "twisted" his knee and we had to hike hem down too. Now we had a streamlined crew and we actually made really good time for once. This was the day we assulted Mt. Philips and it was one of those hikes you start early. We started at noon. Back to Philmonts maps. They had just cut a new trail to Comanche peak that was not on the map, but marked with blue flags steaked in the ground. Now at the time this trail appeared, there was another trail off to the right that was on the map. We decided that this trail was better because it was well marked and on the map. It was another jeep trail. We basically followed the other trail, but we gained some elevation. Fortunatly, this sidetrack offered a beautiful view and was well worth the effort. Even better, our foster leader turned out to be an awesome guy. We had a blast.”

“When I went to Philmont in '67, we only needed one adult leader with our group. He was the new 24-year-old district scout exec, an Ivy Leaguer (Brown grad) and a Playboy Club keyholder in good standing. On the train from Chicago to Denver, he spent his time cruising a group of 17- and 18-year-old Jewish girls from Lahng Ayyland who were touring America by train. He managed to split a set of twins with the cutest scout in our group. He was good in the backcountry, too.”

“Getting an painfully burning abrasion rash of the buttocks!”

“Boots that were a half size too small for an 8 day trip. Very Very bad blisters.”

“We finally hit Mt. Phillips and the assault was easier then I remember, so we got to the top in record time. It was almost worthy of being called a deathmarch. We got to the top, set up camp and then watched the thunderstorm blow in. This was actually the second one I had been caught in on this particular mountain. After a few hours and about half an inch of hail, it stopped. We all just went to bed. The next morning we awoke to a cloud deck about 10 feet over our head. This put the summit well within the clouds. We went up and ate breakfast on the summit and watched the sky in the distance clear to offer a spectacular view. There was a strong wind blowing and every now and then we would get hit by a large cloud droplet. There is nothing like that feeling. That is when I realized why I love to backpack and why I love high altitude. On the hike down we stopped for lunch and decided to have last nights dinner since we ate todays lunch for dinner last night. While we were up in Philips, we joined up with our sister crew, so we had lots of extra food. For lunch that day we ate spaghetti with dried jalapenos. That is a great addition to trail food. After that lunch we continued on.

We had the best time with our sister crew. They were a great bunch of people and enjoyed my hiking style. Unfortunately, the inevitable had to happen. After a few days at base camp, Dan returned.”

“Hey I have a story of hardship to tell. Several years ago, mid September, I was camping between two HUGE sycamore trees (both at least 90? tall, with about 35? between them), on a ridge, overlooking a small creek valley. This is kind of unusual, because the tall trees are usually found in the valley, not on the bluffs. Anyway, I had rigged up my hammock tent about 70? up, between the two trees. To do this, I had to have two climbing lines, one line in the uppermost branches of both trees. That way, with the lines secured to my harness, I could access the space between the trees, with me at the bottom of a ?V? formed by the climbing lines.

Okay, I was having a fine time, and went to sleep shortly after the sun set. I woke up around 10:00 (I?m guessing) and saw lightning in the distance. No big deal, it wasn?t forecasted, and I just went back to sleep. Well, awhile later I woke up again. You know how a powerful thunderstorm is preceded by a squall line of strong wind? I woke up right as the squall line hit. It was a STRONG wind. The trees felt like they bent over in half. I must have been swinging out 20? or more, and I could hear the wood cracking in one of the trees. Not a good feeling. Then the lightning started hitting. The kind that pops all around. Well, I was halfway up a ridge, and these two trees suddenly felt like giant lightning rods. I had to get out of them quick. More or less panicking, I unzipped the tent and swung my legs out. I realized I had only left one of the lines clipped to my harness, so I?d be less bulky and more comfortable sleeping. Damn dumb. The other line was clipped to the end of my hammock. Normally, it would be simple to scoot down and unclip the rope from the hammock, but with the wind buffeting the tent wildly back and forth, it was very difficult. I managed to unclip it, only to have the biner yanked out of my hand by the action of the trees. $*&%#!!! Now it was pouring down rain, and the wind I swear to god got worse. I had about a 15? swing to the tree I was tied into. I tried to hold onto the tent line and take up rope slack and inch back to the tree. The wind had a different idea, though, and I lost my grip on the tent line and swung the rest of the way into the trunk of the tree. Ouch. Banged and scraped the hell out of my shoulder & arm, and my knee hit squarely on a branch. In a lot of pain I descended on my friction hitch. Every branch I could hit on the way down, I hit...hard. I reached the ground ? thank God ? and spent what seemed like an eternity huddled miserably in the cold rain. (I didn?t have the brains to grab my coat.) After the lightning moved on, I clipped back onto the rope and climbed back up, which was very difficult to do injured, in the rain, with wet rope, without the aid of a foot loop. I managed, with great difficulty, to hand-over-hand along the tent line, and hoist myself back up into the tent. I spent the rest of night cold, wet, and miserable. Lesson: leave both lines clipped in, and always have rain/emergency gear at the ready!”

“Buddur!

One word - Vaseline!

Works wonders!

And that's no dirty crack!

Highcountry”

“DM, yah know that your not allowed to camp out on phillips any more.


I have to say that I have ALLWAYS had fun in the back country.”

“They closed the Philips camp? When did they do that? That was my favorite camping spot.”

“I've had some pretty miserable weather experiences, but my all-time worst experience was due to humans. I had two people on one trip who would best be described using anatomical metaphors, if you know what I mean (and I think you do). They pissed and moaned through the whole trip, bad-mouthing me behind my back and second-guessing everything I did. When we were camped in a spectacular canyon, they griped about what a horrible place it was--because they wanted to be at a lake instead. The worst thing I did on that trip was let those...guys get to me.”

“I went backpacking with my girlfirend in the Three Sisters wilderness in Oregon. About two miles in, she started whining about how we should stop and camp and we must have "gone at least ten miles." Then she started into personal attacks about how I didn't care about her and how I was a selfish a$$hole because I wouldn't stop and set up camp 2 hours into our backpack trip.

She was a camper and had backpacked with me previously. I had explained the trip to her beforehand and was baffled and disturbed by this behavior.

After another 45 minutes of being told how I didn't 'respect' her and how evil I was, I responded by hollering back (I don't normally yell, especially in the backcountry). She proceeded to sit on the side of the trail with her backpack on and cry. I relented and we hiked back to the trailhead and drove the three hours back to town and took her home.

It turns out she had decided I was the cause of all her problems in life and had become addicted to crank. The drug addiction led to the emotional instability I experienced on the trail. Needless to say, the relationship ended soon after my worst backcountry experience.”

“Deathmarch, I'm dying!! I'm scheduled to go w my troop to Philmont next year (it's actually pretty tough to get reservations these days - a lottery system is in place). The biggest problems we've had in the last few years haven't been the boys, it's (1) the parents, of course, and (2) the adult leaders. I can definitely picture some of our adult leaders in the situations you describe...what a trip!”

“Mutt, most experienced backpackers are satisfied with just hanging their food :)”

“It didn't happen to me, but I ran into some folks who ran out of toilet paper about two weeks into a three week trip.
That's pretty awful to contemplate.
Makes my fanny itch just to THINK about it.”

“wanderer,
I do have a solution to your problem. Get the group togehter for a shake down hike, to show everybody what the hikes are going to be like. Load everybody down and take them on a (you guessed it) death march. Pick a spot with lots of hills. It doesn't have to be long, between ten and fifteen should do the trick, twenty will do better though. Try and go as long as you can without an extended break. Take short water breaks, but don't let anybody take off their pack. after the first 5-7 miles, stop for a five min break, then get going again. Encourage the boys to power up the hills and not stop. You will find two distinct types of hiker from this. Some will love it start pushing for less breaks and a faster pace, others will hate it. All should be able to do it though. If anybody can't, be sure and tell them that Philmont is not as challenging, but at much higher altitude, so they better get in better shape. It's a real big eye opener to those who aren't in shape. If you're near southern Indiana, the Knobstone trail is excelent for this type of hike, especially in the summer with 90% humidity.”

“deathmarch, there ain't no way I'm hiking anywhere in the summer with 90 percent humidity, especially with a pack on. I live in Louisiana where we have that hot & humid sh!t most of the year around, and it's hard enough just walking around in the summer, much less up and down hills with a pack.

Come summer, if I backpack at all it's gonna be out West where the humidity is LOW.”

“Yea, but the point of this trip is for it not to be extremely fun, but to show the miserable side of backpacking. Show them the extremes and they'll take measures to avoid them .”

“Mel.....one can never carry enough tp kind of like matches worth there weight in gold!”

“The point is not to be fun? Sounds like a good way to discourage people from backpacking. You seem to want wanderer to weed out all the boy scouts exept the 3% who are tough-as-nails military type.

You don't need to show the miserable side of backpacking...that comes along for the ride automatically.
Instead, show the fun and beauty of the outdoors, and let them know how much more fun it will be to be prepared and in shape.

Doesn't take a rocket scientist to go on a 12 mile overnighter, have a really really fun time, and start figuring out mistakes and getting juiced about the next trip.
My $.02”

“If you want heavy packs long miles and misery, join the Army. If not put on a moderate pack and STROLL through hill and dale.Take pictures and enjoy. Tommy, you said it best!”

“That's why my kid isn't in the Boy Scouts, unless I hear of a Philmont trip we can get in on short notice. Great thread, by the way, good lunchtime reading.

Day 3 solo in the Aldo Leopold Wilderness, I hiked down from the crest into Seco Creek Canyon to find just how abandoned the trails there had become. Nasty thorny things were growing waist-high in the trail and tree blazes were grown over. Didn?t ever see a couple of intersecting trails, but my plan was to follow an old trail up Long Canyon over the ridge and down to Las Animas Creek. Long Canyon was easy enough to spot after I finally got there around noon, slowed down by the rough trail. The trail up Long Canyon was supposed to be rough and little used (as opposed to the one I?d been on all morning) and in fact wasn?t even shown on the topo map I got from the Forest Service, but hey I?m an adventurer and tougher than your average middle class american wanna be mountain man. My topo map, by the way, had elevation lines every 200?. All I had to do was bushwhack up this canyon, cross the ridge at a low spot and follow the drainage to Las Animas Creek.

On top of the ridge I ran into thick brush about 6?-8? high with no hint of a trail. I psyched up and charged through about 100 yards until things opened up. I wasn?t bleeding from more than a few places and had only slightly bent one trekking pole and soon I was seeing ancient tree blazes again. I was following a good trail less than a mile from my destination when it turned up the side of the canyon. At the top had been some old mining activity (Victoria Park) and the trail disappeared. At this point rational thought must have ceased as I would find what may have been a trail, but wait it ends at the top of a 100? cliff, bushwhack some more, follow a creek, oops a waterfall...

I had bushwacked what I knew to have been about halfway when I thought of retracing my steps but realized that would be useless. So I forged on down hill through really thick brush until I almost fell into a slot canyon. Of course none of this stuff could be seen on my map. I dropped my poles and pack into the slot and scaled the cliff down, then scrambled down waterfalls for a few hundred yards until I got to the bottom. I was bleeding from dozens of places but the debilitating injury was to my heels, which had blistered the day before and had been neglected and abused all afternoon. It took 2 days to limp back to the car. I never saw anyone except at the trailhead.

It?s kind of a fond memory now, but the arrogance, pain and stupidity of it all was pretty scary at the time. I?m thinking about going back this year to that lonely place with bad trails. I?ll have USGS topos this time.”

“DM..
Great tips, thanks. We did a 5 day trek last year in the Sierra's that turned out to be one of the favorite trips of the year. But that was a group that WANTED to go BP'ing, and kinda knew what they were doing - our more experienced boys. Most of our BP treks are here in Northern CA. My concern about Philmont next year is that EVERYONE will think they want to go, adults included, but won't appreciate the importance of the prep beforehand. I'm thinking we make the 50 miler a mandatory prerequisite...”