It sometimes strikes me how much #camping, particularly #backpacking, has evolved.

Older books often reference how light someone can travel. They then go on to describe taking two or three hours to make camp, cutting down trees for fuel and tent poles, carrying full-size axes, etc.

Now, you can easily go 20 miles a day, carry all of 10 pounds base weight (#ultralight), and make camp in literally 5 minutes. Then leave the next morning with no trace but a bit of temporarily disturbed vegetation.

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May 10, 1983, 43 years ago today: By 4:30, when I reached Betty’s Creek Gap, I had already surpassed my previous longest day, having hiked almost seventeen miles. At that point I caught an intense second wind and made the ensuing two-and-a-half-mile ascent of Albert Mountain without a stop.

#backpacking #hiking #outdoors #landscapephotography #NorthCarolina #nature #forest #mountains #AppalachianTrail

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May 10, 1983, 43 years ago today: We had already covered almost ten miles when we stopped for lunch in a clearing at Beech Gap, three miles past the summit.

The next portion of the hike was every bit as scenic as the morning’s had been. It was mostly sidehill trail, well down from the ridge crest.

#backpacking #hiking #landscapephotography #NorthCarolina #nature #mountains #forest #AppalachianTrailUpdate

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May 9, 1983, 43 years ago today: Dave and I had lunch in Bly Gap, just across the state line into North Carolina. One state down and eleven to go.

#backpacking #hiking #nature #NorthCarolina #hikingadventures #landscapephotography #mountains #forest #AppalachianTrail

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May 9, 1983, 43 years ago today: Dicks Creek Cap in Georgia is the point where the Appalachian Trail crosses a lonely stretch of US 76 less than nine AT miles from the North Carolina border. My tent was pitched in the woods just past the gap. A few feet away was a roadside picnic area beside US 76 where I could make and eat dinner and breakfast in style.

#backpacking #hiking #outdoors #landscapephotography #Georgia #nature #forest #mountains #AppalachianTrail

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May 8, 1983, 43 years ago today: There is nothing like trying to pack up everything you own in a downpour. My sleeping bag was soaked, my tent was hopeless; everything was drenched. Adding insult to injury, the rain came to a dead stop about five minutes after I had finished packing.

#backpacking #hiking #outdoors #landscapephotography #Georgia #nature #forest #mountains #AppalachianTrail

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May 8, 1983, 43 years ago today: Awakening in my tent just after midnight, I instantly felt a vague sense of uneasiness rippling through the dark forest. Outside, the air seemed leaden and dead. The evening breeze had died, and the gorgeous starry canopy beneath which I had gone to bed had faded to dark grays and black.

#backpacking #hiking #outdoors #landscapephotography #Georgia #nature #forest #mountains #AppalachianTrail