Hiking alone

I hike alone 90-95%.

Two weeks ago I was King of the AMC Gentian Pond Shelter. (AT mile 1906.6, Mahoosuc Range, NH).......for an hour.

The prior evening 17 AT hikers in the shelter (Capacity 12) and at least 11 tents in proximity. Easily 30 hikers.

Enjoyed negative comments on my gear, a 4/20 safety meeting and a pre-dawn verbal altercation. Also a hiker walked off with my Garmin Mini. I retrieved it in time....phew! Hiker thought it belonged to his buddy. AT hikers in a hurry would pass me on the trail just to get prime spot in shelter.

AT Shelter Culture was culture shock.

Gentian Pond Shelter


Lesson learned. Avoid the bubble!

Just an FYI, GRMS radios (when you use channels 9 and up) are supposed to be FCC licensed. It is $70, requires no exam and lasts for 10 years. It actually covers the use by the licensee and their family group. There is an exemption to needing the license when using for emergency use.

I also wanted to to add that I have been trying to find out how many people go out hiking and come back safely but it is a hard estimate to come by. I would say it is millions come back safe to a handful that get into trouble.

I can only imagine. Last time I was on the AT was 1980. I'm guessing a lot has changed.

I did put a brief explanation in the Hiking Rescues thread but here it is again. I have saved news searches that turn up these type of articles. I do not think most of them would merit individual threads but others might find them interesting so I created the thread to throw them into.

Personally there are several reasons I am interested. First the amount of resources put to rescuing people astounds me sometimes. Next the stories of survival are remarkable at times. Forgive me but the stupidity of some people is equally remarkable as well.

But maybe the most important reason I follow stories like this is to study how things go wrong or sometimes how they get righted to improve my chances. I do have personal experiences that have taught me much but reading these many stories gives me more learning examples. In the last story I would say his decision to push on was what led to the cascade of events. The other thing is if he had a signal mirror and knew how to use it maybe it would have gone much better. This story makes feel better about paying for the subscription to my relatively new Mini InReach.

What I get overall as the most important thing from this info is do your best to not fall. So many of these incidents start there.

I have always wanted to do SAR particularly as a younger man but mostly living in the metro NYC area there really isn't that much call for volunteer SAR. It is mostly handled by profession police, fire and EMS of local, county and state agencies. Years ago my hiking partner and I helped rescue a inexperienced solo hiker who got into serious trouble doing a winter summit of Mt Marcy, likely saving his life. I have aided a number of people lost on the trail over the years in less threatening circumstances. I also have informally helped with some SAR searches when asked by formal SAR rescuers that ran into us on the trail.

I would say a case where hiking alone might have been safer.