[at-l] Re: Young, Female SOBO etc

[rickboudrie at hotmail.com (rick boudrie)]

First off, what's with the Olympic Dreams 'O4 handle?  You talking about the 
mountains in the Pacific Northwest, right?  Or something even more 
interesting?

My only thouhts on safety issues (specific to your gender and age) would be 
to carry the kind of gear that would allow you to comfortably stealth camp 
whenever you wanted to.  Whether it was raining or not.  Whether it would be 
a dry campsite or not.

If you are like most people, you will stay at or near shelters most of the 
time and you will feel very comfortable doing so.  Its just good to have 
real, exersizable options to move on if things don't ever feel right.  If I 
were a young solo woman rather than a 6-3 male, I might hold off immediately 
spreading out everything in a shelter right away in some less-traveled 
sections of the Trail during the later part of your SOBO hike, just to make 
it easier to push on should anyone arrive and make you uncomfortable.

While I am no doubt in a very small minority on this, I like having a grey 
(which is to say not bright yellow) tent, so that I blend into the woods 
like a rock.  And often walk a to dry campsites with a filled up Platypus.  
Not that you would ever do so, but blending iin also gives one a few more 
options to camp where there is no camping allowed.

Since hitch-hiking is a reality for thru hikers, thats something you 
probably want to think about.  I have never heard of hikers being assaulted 
while hitching, but if carrying pepper spray or the like makes you feel more 
comfortable, it might be worth taking-- as much for the psychological 
benefit as anything else.

Rick B

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