Ask Darwin Q&A #43 (Answers)

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Live Q&A on Patreon - https://www.patreon.com/darwinonthetrail

R2R2R Grand Canyon Hike with Neemor - https://youtu.be/y1HUOWZZUPU

SMD Skyscape Trekker - https://www.sixmoondesigns.com/collections/tents/products/skyscape-trekker

Gossamer Gear One - https://www.gossamergear.com/collections/shelters/products/the-one

AZT Section Gear List - https://darwinonthetrail.com/2017/09/22/darwins-2017-azt-section-hike/

AT Gear List - https://darwinonthetrail.com/2016/05/03/darwins-2016-at-gear-list/

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------- Music By: Mike Boren --------

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Tags: Appalachian Trail,AT,AT Thru Hike,Thru Hike,PCT,Pacific Crest Trail,PCT Thru Hike,Backpacking,UL Hiking,UL Backpacking,UL Gear,Hiking,Hiker Trash,Camping,Adventure,Arizona Trail,AZT,CDT,Long Distance Trail

Video Transcription

hey guys it's Darwin here with my weekly Q&A to answer more of your questions if you want to ask a question for next week's Q&A you can either leave it in the comment box below or send me a video question over to Darwin on the trail at yahoo.com

and then next week I'll answer as many as I possibly can all right so let's go ahead and get into this week's first question aside from setting foot on trail and finishing your thru-hike what's one thing you're really looking forward to on the PCT so not only am I looking forward to just getting out on the trail starting my hike and obviously finishing but I think the biggest thing that I'm looking forward to is getting back into that through hiker community and not just like community as far as being around other hikers but community as far as just the way you feel when you're out on the trail kind of that hiker trash lifestyle you're getting up every day and you're hiking you're waking up with the Sun you're going to sleep as the Sun Goes Down coming into a town hitching eating terrible high-calorie food I really really love that through hiker lifestyle and it's why I love doing what I do that's why I love being on the trail so for me it's not just about the hiking it's more of that whole world that revolves around hiking do you ever go off trail to explore something you can see from a long distance such as a rock formation or cave or are the hikes planned with time limits slash expectations um so I think it all depends on what trail and what I'm currently doing if it's like a really big mild day and say I need to get into town to resupply and I know that I got 25 miles to like put in for that day I'm probably not gonna take the extra time to get off the trail to go check something out but you know if I get up early and I only have like a 15 mile day planned and I've already put down 10 miles for the day and it's noon yeah absolutely if I see something really cool

off in the distance that I want to go check out I will definitely get off trail to explore that a lot of times I'll see like a waterfall or maybe a pond and yeah those are always worth checking out but again if it's just one of those days where it's kind of like a work day on the trail and I just got to put the miles in no I'll definitely pass it up just because I'm a little bit more focused on where I need to get to by the end of the day hey Darwin

Mike here so I'm doing a long section hike of the Ice Age Trail today and prepping myself for a big CDT next year not through hike but just a big section I like five-day anyway I love your stuff but it's 15 degrees out here wind chill blowing and it sucks and I know what you talk about embracing the suck and a great great video but you don't really tell me or tell us how you do it how do you like mentally prepare yourself is it a certain beverage in the morning is that a certain cereal a certain cartoon certain alcoholic beverage what is it anything to help because I gotta tell you this sucks I love it I love your stuff keep it up Mike oh no um embracing the suck is just something I think every hiker has to do and there's no like magic to it everyone treats and embraces the suck in a completely different way I guess how I embrace the suck is usually how it works is at the end of the day I'm having a really hard day of hiking and it's it's just hard getting into camp I'm wore out I'm hungry I'm tired maybe I've been hiking in the rain all day I'm cold I'm wet and you know at that night whenever I'm getting into camp everything is going through my head and it's telling me to get off the trail this sucks I could be at home in a warm bed I could be in a restaurant eating hot food instead of eating some gross nasty cold soaked mashed potatoes for me it's all about getting up in the morning and waking up with the Sun packing up camp and those first couple miles on the trail when every year you're out there and you're watching the trail come alive you're hearing birds chirping the sun's coming through the trees it just totally changes my mood and that's how I embrace the suck because I know that even though you have those sucky days and that day v4 was hard and it was crappy that there's nothing better than that that feeling of being on the trail and it's the reason you're out there you know the reason you're out there is to escape the nine-to-five everyday the hustle and bustle of the city and that stressful lifestyle so a hard day on the trail as much better than a good day in the office so I think that that is how I embrace the suck it's no type of food it's no type of cartoon as you said or anything that I watch it's just it's knowing that I rather be doing that than anything else in the world because that's my passion and that's my love and that's how I embrace the suck have you ever considered doing a live Q&A on Twitch so I don't know what twitch is but I do a live Q&A once a month over on my patreon page now you do have to be a patron to get into that live QA but if you don't know what patreon is it's pretty much a way for my audience or anybody to support what I do and making these videos going for a hike but I do a live Q&A once a month over there so if you want to check it out I'll put a link in the description box below maybe I'll do something like a live Q&A for all my subscribers that aren't patrons in the future but for now that's the only way to see me do a live Q&A why don't you ever bring the real food like brats or whatever

it tastes way better better for you and higher calories a lot of this stuff has smoked so no refrigerator required so I don't always bring just like dehydrated trail food one of the things that I love to do when I'm on the trail is takeout town food so what I mean by that is most of the time on the trail yeah I will carry ramen instant mashed potatoes simply because of the weight because you can get higher calorie foods like that the

a lot lighter so you can carry more food so more calories but something that I always do is whenever I resupply in a town whatever food I take out of town for that first night I'll always take out some real food so I'll take out some lunch meat maybe some bread I've taken out burgers from like a restaurant like a fast food place I've gotten like three burgers and taken those out and maybe had one the next day so I do eat real food on the trail but typically I don't carry it like for my entire resupply just because it's heavier it takes up more room and sometimes it can just be more of a nuisance to carry so that's where something like instant mashed potatoes or ramen or one of those unreal foods comes into play a lot more than something like brats when filming how much longer does your hike take that's a really good question and funny enough anymore and I just got done doing a rim to rim to rim of the Grand Canyon and we both of us film that entire hike and that was a big joke during our hike because we took so much time to set up a shot and then we filmed each other setting up shots but I don't know I think in the long run it probably doesn't take up too much time and then there's definitely certain times of the day or parts of the hike where I will take that extra time to really set up a shot I'll do that kind of like long walk off onto the trail and then have to walk all the way back and get it I've talked about eventually doing like a blooper reel of all of those walk back shots or all of those outtakes of me setting up the camera but regardless of how much time it takes I definitely think it's worth it to make a really good video to be able to bring you guys out on the trail with me hey Darwin Daly from st. Paul Minnesota recently watched a video of team Z packs and Wilwood hiking the superior hiking trail here in Minnesota and I know in a previous video you'd mentioned that instead of doing longer through hikes you're going to be doing some shorter hikes in the future just wondering if you'd ever heard of the superior hiking trail if you've ever considered it yeah I love your channel keep up the videos have a good one man yes so the superior hiking trail is definitely on my list for some time in the future the ones that I kind of have in mind and what I'm planning on doing kind of next are the Arizona Trail obviously you guys have seen me do a bunch of sections of that but I really want to do a full thru-hike going northbound so that is definitely number one on my list number two would be the long trail and Vermont I've hiked half of it because half of it is utilized by the Appalachian Trail but I'd really love to do a full through hike of the long trail especially because it is like the grandfather of long distance trails and then some other really small ones that I would love to do are the Benton Makai Trail that is in Georgia and is pretty much a giant section of the 80 the pinho tea trail which goes through Alabama and Georgia and then I'd love to come back out here and do something like the Colorado Trail and maybe just some of the smaller trails out here in the West but the superior hiking trail is on that list it all depends on when I get to it was wondering what's the most important or best weight saving gear to replace from an average set up sleeping bag backpack or shelter since I'm on a budget and the big three are the heaviest what would be the smartest to replace first say if I have a three hundred dollar budget I would personally replace my shelter so look at replacing your tent there are a lot of really good lightweight budget option tents out on the market now even though I don't use it anymore I did have a tent called the six moons design skyscape trekker and I believe I paid like 270 to 300 dollars for that tent and it was great it was a good lightweight tent just over two pounds it uses trekking poles to set up so that's definitely one to check out gossamer gear is putting out some really great tents right now just last week I did that hike with me Moore and he was carrying the gossamer gear one that's a phenomenal tent that would definitely be in that budget that's super lightweight and then I'm sure there's a lot of other tents out on the market that will be under that $300 budget that you could definitely drop quite a bit of weight like up to 3 pounds out of your pack set up after that I would we worry about my sleep system and getting the weight down on that and then worry about your pack last all right guys last question of the week speaking of competition do you ever feel in the hiker community there is unhealthy competition to get weight down and have the most miles height reddit is my personal example of where I see flares of 20,000 total miles hiked or Georgia domain six pound base weight I've seen people complain that this isn't constructive to the community but I've never had much of an issue what about you so lately it seems like that has been a pretty controversial topic I think that people like to show off how low they can get their base weight but I think treating it like a competition and thinking that you're better than someone else because you have a lighter pack or because you've hiked more miles is in a sense ignorant in general no matter how many miles you've hiked no matter what type of gear you have at the end of the day we're all just putting a bag on our back and we're walking in the woods it's not that important it's not that amazing no one is an athlete at doing it it's just people getting out in nature and enjoying it it's people getting on a trail and living a little more simply than living in an apartment so I think that if you're taking it serious and you're treating it like a competition and in a sense you're being arrogant about how many miles you've hiked and how light your pack is it defeats the whole purpose of of hiking and the hiking community again I think that some competition is healthy and I think that it's fun you know to kind of show off your pack and show how light you can get but taking it too serious is ridiculous there's no one right pack there's no one right mileage for someone to have it shouldn't matter it's fun to talk about it's fun to throw around joke about and kind of make a competition with yourself but treating it serious and making it a competition among other hikers and belittling another hiker that's just silly

and it to me I think it it's not constructive to the community at all and it makes the community weaker we're all just people who put backpacks on our back and walk the woods so just be a hiker do what you want to do enjoy what you want to enjoy pack whatever you want to pack and hike whatever miles that you want to hike just get out on the trail and enjoy it alright guys so if you want to leave a question for next week's Q&A you can either leave it in the comment box below or send me a video question over to Darwin on the trail at yahoo.com and then next week I'll answer as many as I possibly can you haven't had a chance yet go over and check me out on Instagram I've been posting a lot of new photos lately of some of the things that snuggles and I have going on throughout the week plus some pictures from some past hikes if you found any value in this video go ahead and hit that like button subscribe to my channel if you haven't already and as always guys thanks for watching [Music]

[Applause]

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