Ask Darwin Q&A #54 (Answers)

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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,Pinhoti Trail,Long Distance Hiking

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 let's go ahead and get into this week's first question what's your favorite snack or treat that doesn't usually make it into your bag something that isn't too easy to find worth it to carry or doesn't keep too long what is your go-to that doesn't disappoint so lately I have been really in two of akkad OHS for some reason whenever I started the Pinho D trail last month I was just hardcore wanting guacamole all the time for some reason so I decided to start carrying an avocado with me in my pack and then Fritos now I can't always find them when I'm resupplying because a lot of times I'll just resupply it like a convenience store or a Dollar General but anytime that I find some sort of a grocery store on the trail I always make sure I carry avocados they are a bit heavier you know definitely 100 percent but I think that it's totally worth it because they taste awesome having fresh guacamole out on the trail nothing really beats that it's good fat it's good protein so avocados have definitely become my favorite go-to snack on the trail I'm John and I'm out here at Sky meadow State Park in Virginia and it's about thirty four degrees and pretty windy

not as many as it was on Friday when we were seeing winds of 50 to 60 and more miles per hour and I'm wondering what's the worst conditions that you've had to fight you had any conditions that made you say yeah not today so I've definitely hiked in some rough conditions it's actually kind of windy out here today I don't know if you guys can hear that wind noise not as windy as there but I mean there's not really ever been a time where I was just like I'm not hiking in it typically as I always say it is cliches it's starting to become I always embrace the suck and I always just hike if it's thunderstorm if it's snowing if it's hardcore raining if it's windy I get out on the trail and I hike especially if I'm out there and I'm doing something like a long distance hike I really don't want to be held up in a shelter or a tent all day long waiting out the weather so I usually just go for it now obviously that's not always the best advice if there's like hardcore lightning storms are something that can get you into a dangerous situation but I typically just go for it I always just get out there and I hike as much as I possibly can and just deal with it as far as the worst weather that I think that I've hiked in I don't really know I mean there was a handful of times out on the Appalachian Trail in 2015 where we experienced some hardcore temperature drops and pouring rain and hardcore winds but nothing too crazy nothing that I can really recall being a really big deal I can tell you that in December when Nemo and I did our rim to rim to rim of the Grand Canyon over on the north rim of the canyon that night it got down to about 12 degrees 1012 degrees and the wind was like up to 60 miles an hour so that was pretty hardcore I didn't really have to hike in it but we did camping it that night and it was pretty gnarly weather over on the North from that Canyon aside from that I can't really think of any time in particular but I always just get out on the trail I embrace the suck and I keep hiking what advice would you give for dealing with family / friends who don't want you to leave for four to six months I want to hike the PCT in 2019 and that's one of the main hurdles I'm experiencing that's a great question I know a lot of people that have dealt with the same thing and snuggles and I kind of dealt with a similar situation whenever we were going out to hike the 80 in 2015 now my family didn't really care they probably didn't even really think that we were gonna do it but her family was insanely insanely concerned about her going out on a trail into the middle of nowhere for four to six months so the best way that we figured out how to get them to cope with it is we invited her family over for a night we ordered some pizza and we watched some Appalachian Trail documentaries so we kind of introduced it to him that way so they could see firsthand exactly what we were doing after that they got more involved and they were actually kind of excited that we were going out and doing this thing because we showed them you know what other people had done and it kind of reassured them of what we were doing and that we weren't getting ourselves into a terrible crazy situation and they got more invested and then they were kind of interested in what we were doing they were asking more questions they wanted to see our gear we even had some people that wanted to come out and hike with us so I would suggest kind of introducing it to your friends in your family that way maybe inviting them over or showing them a documentary maybe suggesting for them to read a certain book on someone else's hike that would be the best way to transition them into that and then just connect it and I think that you'll probably be pretty surprised and they'll be really interested in the thing that you're about to do good luck in planning for the PCT in 2019 I'm about to head out there myself hopefully it'll be a great hike for me and for you I saw your new van the Clydesdale here and on Instagram can you tell us more about that are you still telling the little camper so yeah if some of you might have noticed right at the beginning of the year snuggles and I bought a new van the reason was is our old van the Black Stallion was really starting to give us problems it had over 200,000 miles on it and all the seals were kind of stripped out in the engine and it just wasn't as dependable as it used to be so we ended up deciding to get another van and instead of buying a minivan this time we decided to buy a full-size van for a couple of different reasons we've really wanted to build out the inside of a cargo van and eventually sell our camper that we've been living out of four five six months so to just kind of make things more simple so we don't have to tow the trailer anymore currently we are here in Joshua Tree California we are staying at a friend's house and I am currently building out the Clydesdale once we get done building it out building a bed and a kitchenette and everything in it a Clydesdale will be our new adventure mobile is it possible to hike if you haven't got a big fluffy beard it's probably possible but why would you bother I watched an older video and saw that you used up to seven ziplock bags one for each day do you still use that system I was really thinking about doing this for the PCT do you recommend this I love the idea of being organized with my food yes so I absolutely still separate my food in two days and gallon ziplock bags and the reason I had to start doing that is because I have a really high metabolism and if I just put a bunch of food in my food bag when I get out on the trail I'll just keep eating it home so the reason I had to start separating things into gallon ziplock bags is to make sure at the beginning of that day I can pull out day one and I know that that's all the food that I have to ration for that day and that I don't dig into day two or day three so it really helped me not only stay organized but also limit me from eating all of my food on like the first day because some days out on the trail you're not really as hungry other days hiker hunger hardcore sets in and it's just it's really hard not to just want to eat everything in your food bag so I did it on the Appalachian Trail I did it on the Penn hodie Trail and yes I will be doing it on the PCT I highly recommend it

Ziploc bags don't weigh much label each one of them for every day that you think you're going to be resupplying on put all your food in there that way stay organized and you don't eat of your food in one go I've been doing training hikes now for about the last five or six weeks and how much they're doing about fifteen mile hikes a day and I can do them back-to-back over the weekend for three days and my question for you is how do you toughen up your feet because my legs are working fine but my dogs are hurting every day so how do you fix it so that your feet somehow catch up with the rest of your body so it's probably not the greatest advice but really how I toughen up my feet is I just go out and hike so you're already working on that I would just suggest keep hiking eventually your feet are gonna harden up toughen up you're gonna get calluses and yeah that's really the only way I know how to do it I guess if you wanted to you could go out and hike barefoot I probably wouldn't but just keep hiking eventually your feet are gonna build up good calluses turn into big gnarly hiker feet and then you should be good would you rather stay in a shelter on the 80 or set up camp and a tint or hammock it seems everyone tries to get in a shelter but you may have to be around others you would rather not be around is the company and ease of a shelter worth not setting up camp so Chris the only time that I ever stay in a shelter is if there's some really hardcore weather and there's not a lot of people staying in a shelter I personally don't like staying in shelters like on the Appalachian Trail just because they're usually totally overcrowded people are noisy at night you have some people that snore all night long so you don't typically get the best sleep in a shelter I always rather be in my tent however if there is some really hardcore weather I know it's pouring rain and it's still pouring rain before I get to camp the shelter doesn't look too packed I'll usually slide in there just so I don't have to set up a tent in the rain and don't have to break a wet tent down in the morning you know the great thing about the pen holy trail where there were a handful of shelters and there was nobody out there so every night that I stayed in the shelter on the pen hodie there's no one else there except for the guy that I was hiking with so it was like totally luxury and I definitely took advantage of every shelter just so I didn't have to set my tent up I definitely took advantage of them but typically I try to shelters I really don't usually ever camp near shelters I try to find somewhat of a small stealth spot and set my camp up just so I can get better sleep and I'm not disturbing other people and other people aren't disturbing me all right guys last question of the week so this question may sound silly to some but my wife got me into backpacking I absolutely love it until it comes to the sleeping part for whatever reason I spooked myself out every time I've been infantry in the army for seven years I sleep out in the field constantly but when it comes to the tent

I freaked myself out have you ever encountered this or met people that have been able to overcome this does it just get better the more you do it I have never really had that problem actually I am more comfortable and less spooked out when I'm in a tent in the middle of the woods I would think that over time you're probably just gonna get used to it I would assume that you're probably freaked out because you're in a shelter versus just laying out kind of in the middle of nowhere and being able to see everything around you like cowboy camping maybe whenever you're sleeping in your tent you should start keeping both vestibules open so your sides are still open and you can still see around you and that might help you better adjust into sleeping in a tent and then over time maybe just close one vestibule and have one open and then eventually maybe you can close both and you'll feel comfortable like I said I have always been more comfortable in my tent in the middle of nowhere than I am like sleeping in the van or sleeping in a hotel room it's just kind of my comfort spot so I've personally never experienced it but I would assume that you will eventually overcome it all right 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 in about a week I'm gonna be doing a meet-up here in Joshua Tree California so if you guys want to stay tuned and find out where we're gonna meet up what time what day go over and check out the community tab on my main page of my youtube channel and that's where I'll be posting all the information for the meetup here and Josh if you have on how to change it go over and check me out on Instagram of them posting a lot of new photos lately of some of the things that's and I have going on throughout the week plus some pictures from some past types 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 [Applause]

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