Packin the last bits in. Long Trail Attempt Nº1 and Hurricane Irene

My Gregory Massif, fully loaded.

 Loading a backpack is a complicated process. Oh how I forgot..The bulk of the volume seems to be the rather light food cache and cooking stuff. The worst is going to be the camera equipment and the water bladder, but that is going to ride on the top where they will do the least harm to my spinal column. These long distance packs are incredibly well designed. The folks at Gregory informed me the Massif was designed for Appalachian Trail (AT) and (PCT) Pacific Coast Trail thru hikers. Organizing, packing and taking my time is easing the anxiety.
I bought my Gregory Massif 2nd hand, the padding decomposing I thought was just sand. Gregory Packs, you just have to hand it to those folks, they repaired the padding free of charge... 

Enjoying my recollection of reading Colin Fletcher's The Complete Walker. Fletcher made the Gregory pack famous. He used the Gregory Cassin and was out on the trail weeks at a time.

Colin Fletcher came to grief in Monterey CA hit by a car sustaining fatal head injuries. What on earth was he doing in lala Land crossing a bloody street?! Ironically, he was much safer in the back country with the coyotes, bears, rattle snakes, and cougars.. Remind me to stay away from car congestion! Life just has to be easier trying to befriend a bear. Your chances getting hit by a car are by far far greater than coming to grief in the back country. (bear photograph not mine)NY Times Colin Fletcher, 85, a Trailblazer of Modern Backpacking, Dies.

Butterflies on my pack

Timber Wolf and Deer In The Sighting Mirror

Much done with my packing this Gregory Massif backpack. Much collected and sorting done and not to over pack!!
I started reading agian, Aldo Leopold's A Sand County Almanac to calm my nervousness.
Keep on reassuring myself of the reasons I am doing this which also calms the nerves. Concentrating on all this planning assuage the vulnerability I will most certainly feel once I leave the road and and enter trail head as my boots dig in deep under my weight, to steady their load. 'There will be a shelter to head to', 'it all doesn't have to be done in one day'. 'I'm well organized'. 'If I can run 2 Montreal 1/2 Marathons, then I can do this'. There will be plenty of other Long Trailer thru hikers I'll run into. There is lots of photography to do.' Along with some great experiences   in my pack, this will the realization of long dreamed of adventure.

My first goal is to stop in at Waterbury and pick up the End to Ender's guide.
But, my first objective is Tilloston Camp, from Hazen's  Notch Rd./ Camp. A modest distance, but enough to gain my first legs. If the going is good, maybe even Devil's Gulch Shelter. Remembering that I haven't been in my 3/4 shank backpacking boots in a decade.

Trail Blogger

Me in Yoho Nat'l Park, B.C. Twin Falls Trail

There is nothing more refreshing than that sweet almost pungent fragrance of alpine tundra from my sleeping bag on a 5 day trip on the Skyline Trail in Jasper Alberta. The sound of my SVEA stove erupts to welcome us to the first coffee steam breaking the crisp morning air.

or... where oh where are you Tom McMillan?

I've been pouring over topographic maps, other through-hikers journals for this backpacking trip I'm planning for this fall. This might as well be the introduction and in part my MO for considering this project. The contest just re awakened why I studied biology at University of Calgary and Concordia in the first place. Those two summers I spent in Jasper in the early seventies became so rich in imagery to me, I remember the pained feeling I had when I could smell the heavy presence of boreal forest as our train left the prairie on my return  to Montreal the first summer. The east is so different. It didn't take long for my pining for Jasper to leave though in spite of the wicked crush I had on Charlotte.As spectacular to the west as those alpine meadows are, the mountain vistas, the pungent fragrances of alpine tundra, our eastern forests have an incredible richness in bio-diversity that the west just doesn't have. The myriad of flowering plants, hardwood trees, conifers, each to season each to habitat. Romantic sounding non-vascular plants including mosses and liverworts such as marchantia, lower vascular plants the selaginella's and the ferns as their names roll off your mind's tongue. They all belong to this wonderful zone we live in called the Great Lake St. Lawerence Forest Region.So, these thoughts and notes become the prelude to my trip. 

La Mauricie National Park: Great Blue Heron

It's been a long time since I read up on happenings inside Parks Canada. First they cut out the Warden service living in and patrolling the back country, now they've actually reduced the actual number of wardens all out, to a trickle. Therefore there is little to no protection against poaching around the borders of the parks. Keeping in mind, confiscation of poacher's possessions is the only power they have, and poachers are so wealthy, they just consider it the 'cost of admissionAs well... yearly pass to any Parks Canada territory is over 100.00 per person, including any use for educational purpose. This puts access to any NPS park way out of reach of the average Canadian. Including single parent families. This defeats the purpose of Parks Canada's third mandate, educational purposes of the Canadian public.finally.....The high cost of 'admission' has put the squeeze on back country use. Fewer and fewer wilderness educational experiences are enjoyed by those wanting boots-on-the ground learning. This defeats the purpose of Parks Canada's third mandate, education to the Canadian public at large. Education is the corollary to the other 2 mandates, to preserve ecological integrity, and to preserve ecological integrity for future generations.