I also try to get off the trail and take the way less traveled. It's easy to camp about anywhere in a hammock.
I also try to get off the trail and take the way less traveled. It's easy to camp about anywhere in a hammock.
Predictions are risky, especially when it comes to the future.
Hey, Snake ... welcome to the Forum!
I love stealth!
Dan
W7DDM
So how many tries did it take you to push the camera's button then run and make it in you hammock before it clicked!
Really its nice to be in a hammock. I did a day hike today as well. I ran across a few campers and I thought to myself "Of all the beautiful places you could hang a hammock, they have to settle for the only piece of flat ground, what a shame".
I got myself a StickPic so I can place the camera at the end of the trekking pole and take my own picture. (Great little device!) I'm just hoping the camera doesn't break after taking too many pictures of my mug!
I was up in the Coconino's last weekend. No other backpackers. A couple of hikers came by right after setting up the hammock. They were certainly curious.
Dan
W7DDM
I'm embarrassed to say how many times! Actually, a self timer helps mucho, but I really must learn to post videos. Not that this would be worth a video. Just some guy hanging/sitting over some other wise basically unusable(IMO) ground.
I guess another thing I don't consider much here in MS is "Leave No Trace". I could have found a near by spot that wasn't over the log or such, and put down a floored an enclosed tent to escape roaming insects ( especially ants and ticks) and snakes. Though I still would have been on a slope most likely. But, when I left after my few hours of laying around and playing with the wood stove, no one except a professional tracker could have ever guessed that I had been there. That would not have been the case while laying in a floored tent, especially for more than one day.
Not that I am really concerned about that in the places I mostly "hang out", but that is for those who are. As an old NOLS grad, I was thoroughly indoctrinated in LNT, and am still mostly a practitioner of the same. But really, where I go locally, it wouldn't matter if I took a machete and chopped down brush or whatever was in my way. ( Yes, I know, blasphemy!) But really. First of all, it is highly unlikely that any one else will hike to this spot or most other places where I go. It is true bushwhacking. And if I slept in a tent for a day or a week, it would be about the same effect as a deer making their beds. And a week or a month later, all would be completely reclaimed by the jungle. Mainly because there is zero over use, and there will not be any over use in the foreseeable future.
But in the places where I do practice LNT( most places where other folks hike), and for folks who are concerned with that every where, the hammock seems to be a major plus.
Got to love the Coconino NF! I have yet to hang there, though I have done a ton of ground dwelling there in the past. In fact, my first or 2nd(?) ever actual test of my new NF West Wind tent and MSR stove many years ago was camped a few feet from the edge of a Mogollon Rim cliff some where up above Payson. I think I was off of Forest Road 300? Any way, great country. Hoping to hang there some day. Was it nice and cool up there?
I'm super familiar Payson and Strawberry, but that doesn't ring a bell. But that doesn't mean I have not been there. I can remember quite a few places I hiked in that area, I can picture them in my mind, but can't remember the names. All of it sure was fun though.
Except for the hike where I discovered Poison Oak and it's effect on me. There is a state hwy that runs from Flagstaff and comes into the state hwy more or less north, (maybe) of Strawberry. Somewhere before that hwy intersection, I turned south on primitive dirt roads until it ended at a deep canyon. I hiked down into that canyon, and waded/swam( no choice, had to get in the water or turn around) in the cold waters. Possibly it was called West Fork of Clear Creek? Something like that. It was very beautiful, and I had it all to myself. The hike itself was great, but by the next day I found out what it is like to suffer from poison oak.
the ability to set up camp pretty much anywhere is one of the many reasons I love my hammock. I now have a realistic solution for sleeping that will allow me to hunt the way I have invisioned for years.
I've always been crazy, but it's kept me from going insane. - Waylon Jennings
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