New member here. My name’s Ken. Live in southern NH. I’ve been out of the woods for TOO long. But now I’m heading back.
A little history, if it’s boring skip the rest. I did lots of day hiking when I was younger and fun camping at campgrounds (tents) but in the mid 80’s I started doing my first overnight and multi-night hiking trips. My former brother-in-law introduced me to these longer trips. I was trying to get equipment together for my first time out and he told me about hammock camping. He started hammock camping in the 70’s. Well, I picked up a cheap nylon net hammock that was probably not correct but it packed small (VERY small) and was very light and I used a basic sleeping pad under my cheap department store sleeping bag and I was off. Also, I used a small blue tarp. Yes, those crappy blue department store tarps. I even used a blow up pool float as a sleeping pad in the hammock a few times. It was cheap and it worked. We did a lot of hikes together like that. We did quite a few of the 4K footers in the White Mountains. I’ve NEVER slept in a tent on a hike. Not once. I’ve only ever hammock camped on overnight in the woods hikes.
Life moved on and I got divorced and remarried and too busy and had a family and etc. Some things had to get dropped. I stopped the long hikes and even dropped out of bands. You might ask, why not keep hiking and camping with the family? My wife’s idea of roughing it is having to pack only 1 large suitcase and having to use the hotel’s hair dryer. Mine is to go with what I can carry and walk in the rain.
But now time is coming back around. Family’s getting older and I’m getting back into hiking again (already back in bands for a few years now). It amazing how much more equipment there is now for hammock camping and how light everything is. I’ve picked up a couple off brand gathered end hammocks. One is a basic silnylon and the other has an attached bug net. I’ve got a pack and still looking for the right rain fly. Still have some old stoves and I’ve played with soda can alcohol stoves so I have a few of those from hunting trips to boil water. My son’s getting into it with me now too. It’s going to be a lot of fun having him as a hiking partner.
Anyway, I just thought I’d put out an introduction to say hi and thank you for all the information. What a great resource this site is.
Also, it’d be nice to see who’s around the southern NH area that might be able to tolerate an out-of-date hack like me.
See ya all in the woods. Keep on hangin’.
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Originally Posted by kwfonz
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