[at-l] advice and attitude

[twilight98@earthlink.net (twilight98@earthlink.net)]

Shane said:

< To be honest, though, the idea of 'thruhiking' is rather alien to me.  I
don't care if I make it all the way through.  I don't care if I 'finish'.
Finishing is not important to me, and never has been.>

It's funny... Kamp and I have agreed that we will probably never hike a long
distance hike together, because of our difference in attitude.  While I don't
think I have a "reach the goal" attitude, it's part of my attitude.  I want to
DO IT and ENJOY doing it, and I did enjoy it... at least part of every day
except 2 days of my 6 months and 2 days of my Thruhike.  Pretty good odds in
my book.

But I digress.  The way we phrase it is Kamp "hikes to camp"... because he
loves camping, staying in a place for a while, finding a great pond or lake
and camping there, fishing, relaxing. He hikes only to get from one great
camping place to another.  He has hiked over half of the AT in 2 large
sections, but spent way more time on it than I have.

I, on the other hand, "camp to hike".  I love hiking.  I love being on the
trail, moving along, seeing different things as I go, watching the landscape
pass.  To me, camping is just what I do at night between hiking time.  Because
of this, I never wanted to camp in the same place two nights in a row on my
hike.

So our style and our ultimate goal is different - for him it's the camping and
enjoying time in one place for a while.  For me it's the hiking and enjoying
time as I move along, and time with other folks or alone at camp at night.

Twilight
GA>ME '98