Hobbies

[noddy]

no, experiencing pain and suffering and then powering through and rising up out of it is the key ... perspectives are honed and short term pains/imaginary pains get put in their proper place.

just experiencing it, does no good at all.

[Simple Minded]

[Simple Minded]

[Demon of Undoing]

I guess what I am trying to get at is the difference between a three mile jog at a track and a best speed blaze through a swamp or up the side and over the crest of a mountain, duration unknown. One is more " extreme" than the other, but that's not really the point.

When on a really hard run, not even a spectacularly long one, it's one thing to know you won't stop over the course, or that you run it in such a time. You find a plateau of how much you can bear over the course of it and stick it out. But if you are constantly holding your own feet to the fire of exactly how fast you can move, no disassociating, no hitting a pace, but getting in the limit of what you can do right then, and sticking to it all the way in. Not to just run, but push, nowhere to run away from it.

I don't know. It's kind of ineffable. It's an altered state, a sick and incapacitated high that is tormented to take the next step but demanding that it be done. It's not punishment to see if you can take it. There's nothing to prove, but much to learn.

[Tinker]

[Demon of Undoing]

This weekend, The Great and Terrible Jeffrey will be up for the usual schedule of eating, intoxication, working out, sparring and shooting. He will be bringing his daughter, a great friend of my own. We will be hiking into the springs and out with a good break there to swim, eat and cool down. Temperatures are going to be mid-90s with an index of 100+ deg F. This will be my daughter's longest (~10 mi) hike and J's daughter's first real one, but she's in pretty good shape, a born horsewoman. Of course, there will be a long discussion on how foot troops can run down cavalry over a long haul, because that's just how me and Geronimo roll. But all in good fun.

The heat is the kicker. At that humidity, sweat only evaporates when in direct sunlight, and then the sun is kicking your ass, too. At the low points, there are often clouds of biting insects for stretches that will make you become willing to gargle DEET. Thick enough that you close your mouth so you don't breathe them in. It's not enough to bring misery to someone in training ( though you can see it from there), but for a ten and eight year old, it's the gas.

[amos]

[Demon of Undoing]

I think you have to keep in mind the realities of aging and inevitable physical shortcomings. Maybe the issue gets sorted another way. A day out on a boat? Sun and wave creates its own trial. Horseback? For all of being a ground creature by nature, horses are a great way to find something other than yourself. Not sure what is available near you or what your limits may be, but think sideways. They are young and will be impressed by a manifestation of wisdom, even if the wisdom was gained by scarring yourself at a young age.

Dad always has the upper hand on showing the ropes.

[Demon of Undoing]

Hot. Hot as hot. Hot hot hot.

Too hot for the daughter to make the trek back after swimming, she was flagging on the way in. The J did not show, so I went solo, back the ( as the pedometer on the iphone read) 4.2 miles to the car while she stayed at the springs. It was 1530, thermometer read 98 F, index at 112. Not a lot of shade, but thick brush nonetheless as the trail was often either overgrown or growing into the trail. Went through 5L of water in a 2.25 hr hike. Only a few ticks, which is nice( no indication of Lyme disease). I ran a turkey hen and chicks about a quarter mile on the trail where the brush on either side was thick enough that they didn't want to dive through. It was so hot they were almost incapable of normal turkey speeds, could maybe have got one with a pistol. That would have been a great story. And a Federal offense, as the area is a deer breeding ground in a national forest. Gun heap big non-no. Lots of hills I didn't appreciate ( karst topography) until I was legging up the bastards.

I need a sombrero or a coolie hat for that crap, except the brush will yank it right the hell off. The doo rag only goes so far. Forest hiking season is done until October. At Paris Island, it would have been a black flag day and they wouldn't have done the march ( in the fleet? Pfffft. Screw your heat exhaustion, buddy, there's a machine gun gotta get up the mountain, it ain't gonna hump itself). Even I got a little light headed and head achey. Learning the virtue of sweat is one thing, but I'm not going to be Torquemada.

I look like shit in velvet, and it chafes.

[Hans Bulvai]

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[jerryberry]

Demon,
Do you hike more during Autumn And Winter? We're coming up to the cross-quarter day of Summer Solstice & Autumn Equinox (August 7) and that's when I have my visions of hiking in Sept through April. Time to make preserves, do some canning. I watch day by day how the shadows grow, I read the sunrise sunset charts to be conscious of day light diminishing. I find trees or bushes to monitor through out the seasonal changes coming and observe. My summer hikes aren't always enjoyed at the moment but when I look back on them I'm very happy about the trek I took. I planted pumpkins this year for harvest around Halloween. We'll eat most of them. The coming of Autumn is the most mysterious time of year, the most comforting to my senses. I'm running 4 days a week from 5:00 to 5:45AM and noticing cooler air overall. I've got to work on the formula these next couple of weeks as well.

[Demon of Undoing]

In Florida, the winter lasts from January to February. The highs here won't be routinely below 90F until October. Then the real heat starts back in April. After Halloween, it's hunting season around here, and you have to be careful about where you hike/look like something that could be deer, as they will not allow me to shoot back at people that won't identify their targets properly ( I have asked).

I would love to be near mountains and hardwood forests, believe me. Scrub ad marsh wears thin.

[Apollonius]

Demon,

This sounds like a description of hell to me.

Our summer started on August 1st and will end on Labour Day. But I'm going to stop complaining about snow and cold.

[Tinker]

[jerryberry]

I complain about desert heat but I think tropical swelter must be the worst, especially the bugs. In the mountains around my area there are strict hunting zones so getting shot at is really up to me.

[noddy]

[Demon of Undoing]

[jerryberry]

In May I went out for a trek and my eyes, nose and lips were constantly attacked by gnats and other bugs. The insects coupled with hiking up a south facing sun baked mountain side was pretty bad. It's like having a temporary mental illness when one spends hours swatting at bugs. I'm guessing DEET swets off like anything else. I did some summer camping in the north east and was attacked by no see ums and chiggers. My legs were pocked for a couple weeks. Yeah, the tropical ecosystem is just too brutal for me.

[Demon of Undoing]

Last year( I think I wrote about it), I got >250 separate chigger bites from a three minute, un-doped walk , not 20 yards from a prepared trail in ostensibly light ( for around here, anyways) brush. Mostly around my knees. That's when I decided I'd been stuck in the office or our ad hoc classroom too much. Lightens and thins the skin, makes you easy prey for bugs. Can't afford that, so this summer has been loaded with a whole lot of exposure to both.

On the plus side, is what Alexander Springs ( our hiking destination lately) looks like.

The trail to it? It often looks like .

[jerryberry]

The little white dot in the top center is Palomar Observatory. I usually go up a little left of this pic. Starts through an Indian reservation. I wont even attempt this between May and September and sometimes October is off limits as well.

This is a shot further north off the Mountain, about 25 miles, and into high desert. In the winter the high desert is gorgeous and the bugs aren't so bad.


One more just cause it's so nice.

[Demon of Undoing]

[Demon of Undoing]

In retrospect, I'm going to back off the nasty fauna claim I made for Florida. As the night went on, I thought of a number of places much worse. Let's just say Florida is up there for places white people go.

[jerryberry]

[Demon of Undoing]

[Hans Bulvai]

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