Bad Behavior

Beyond the numberless people cutting switchbacks and creating fire-pits above treeline, a few of the worst behaviors I've seen:

My first hike getting back into backpacking in May '08 to Tiltill Meadow via Rancheria Falls in Yosemite. It was Memorial Day weekend. In the parking lot with me getting ready to head out was a group of 4 guys and 4 girls. This was several months before I discovered BPL, and I was no lightweight, but even I could look at the glass bottles of hard alcohol they were packing and see they were if for a painful hike. It started to rain not too long into the day. I made it to Rancheria, where I was spending the first night, long enough before them, that I ran into them on the trail while I was poking around the falls. It was about an hour before nightfall and they were asking the time. The decided they could make Tiltill that night. I ran into them the next day about 1.5 miles from Tiltill. It had rained all night and they looked miserable. I chatted with them about the conditions in the meadow. When I got there myself, and started scouting for campsites, I found what had obviously been theirs. They left what seemed to be all their trash in the fire pit, 4-5 bottles of vodka, plastic bottles of mixer, plastic wrapping; they had attempted to burn it, but, well, their wet-weather fire-building skills were as good as mine, which is to say, non-existent. My night spent there, I encountered another large group who hiked in. When I left early next morning, I saw they ditched the required bear canisters in favor of bear-hanging their bags all of 5' above the ground. If they hadn't thoughtfully hung their bags 20 yards from where I'd set up (100 yards from their site), I would've been happy to have seen their bags ripped to shreds by Yosemite bears.

I befriended a guy who was trying to hike every trail in Yosemite during my own loop hike of Sunrise, Merced Lake and Vogelsang High Sierra Camps. While we were hanging out at Merced, a teenager in a guided group attempted to pull down a seeming dead but stil-standing tree for firewood. The guy, Bill, told him to stop and explained the rule was dead-and-DOWN. He stopped, but his group's camp was right next to ours. How they planned on burning a 6' long, 8" diameter log, I have no idea. But for the rest of the evening, they made a point of heading us off at the water pump whenever they saw us going to refill, perhaps because we made a point of strolling through past their camp with bundled firewood we procured by hiking a quarter mile back down the trail.

And, of course, anyone who hikes the trail up to Half Dome will encounter this sign:

This summer, someone had made a fire directly on the CDT and made no effort to clean it up.

I'm not so sure the "resource damage" is substantial enough to dissuade one from going at the bare minimum slightly off trail to do ones business, Sarah.

If I rounded a bend to see a bent over behind coppin' a mid-trail squat, there's a good chance they'd be wiping with my shoe. That's just uncalled for, "resource damage" be darned.

Just my take.

While vegetation damage is something to be concerned about, a person usually has fair warning for when they'll have to relieve themselves. Being mostly alone in the wilderness, this would imply that a person would have ample time to scout out a suitable place to do their business.

Unless I have a major medical condition, if I can't find a rock, tree stump, or bare ground while I'm several miles away from another human being, then I'm just being lazy.

"someone had made a fire directly on the CDT and made no effort to clean it up."

On the Dodson Trail in Big Bend about halfway between Fresno Creek and Homer Wilson there was a campsite where someone hand build a pretty good sized fire ring and had obviously had a roaring blaze going. Not only did they not clean it up but I'm sure someone else has found it and built a fire there now too.

This is a particularly dry year for that part of the country and the park is under a permanent fire ban anyway.

Similar sort of things happen in Australia, but without the gun play.

About 40 years ago the Melb Uni bushwalking club built a domed hut at the top of Mt Bogong. The hut had a wood-burning stove. About 20 years ago they removed it because people had been cutting down living trees to burn in it.

The other classic thing is that the "huts" here are emergency shelters which most people simply cook in to be out of the weather, but I know of a group who've run into people who've barricaded themselves in the huts on the basis of "we were here first". That guy also had a dog (banned in National Parks), had cut timber (living) with his chainsaw and had driven his 4WD in along the walking track (I have no idea how – he may also have done some track widening with his chainsaw). (Funnily enough I saw him in the city the other day – he has personalised number plates on his 4WD.)

Japan was generally pretty good, although I did tell off one old guy in a group I was walking with who was destroying mushrooms "for the safety of children". Never mind that there wasn't a child anywhere nearby, and if there was their parents would probably tell them to not touch.

"Unless I have a major medical condition, if I can't find a rock, tree stump, or bare ground while I'm several miles away from another human being, then I'm just being lazy."

That's being charitable, to put it mildly. ;-]

This topic recently came up on a community news site in my local area. Someone posted that they went on a hike on the Manzana trail and saw a large rattlesnake that looked like it was going to strike. "Sadly, the snake was killed." They said it just like this to purposefully leave it vague as to what happened. Well, what happened is they killed the snake and kept the 11 rattles as a souvenir! The community uproar, thankfully, was pretty intense. I hope they learned something.

Also in my area, also on the Manzana trail, someone cut down numerous bushes to build "survival" shelters. I wonder if it was the same person. Actually, I hope it was the same person because otherwise there were two idiots out there that weekend.

The longer I read the thread the more this kind of thing makes me like people less and less. That's not a good thing , but sharing this kind of experience is a release as is one of the better poems on the subject.
NOVEMBER SURF

Some lucky day each November great waves awake and are drawn
Like smoking mountains bright from the west
And come and cover the cliff with white violent cleanness: then suddenly
The old granite forgets half a year’s filth:
The orange-peel, eggshells, papers, pieces of clothing, the clots
Of dung in corners of the rock, and used
Sheaths that make light love safe in the evenings: all the droppings of the summer
Idlers washed off in a winter ecstasy:
I think this cumbered continent envies its cliff then . . . . But all seasons
The earth, in her childlike prophetic sleep,
Keeps dreaming of the bath of a storm that prepares up the long coast
Of the future to scour more than her sea-lines:
The cities gone down, the people fewer and the hawks more numerous,
The rivers mouth to source pure; when the two-footed
Mammal, being someways one of the nobler animals, regains
The dignity of room, the value of rareness.

Hi Arapiles
> About 40 years ago the Melb Uni bushwalking club built a domed hut at the top of Mt Bogong.

Actually, on the end of a spur off Mt Feathertop. I know, because Sue and I helped build it.

That's my wife in front the first winter (1966).

Cheers

the absolute worst thing i was witness to and then helped to deal with – several scouts got bored while on a camping trip in February 1984 and wanted to go home. they felt the best way to get the leaders to cave was to set the forest around us on fire. around us. on fire.

about an acre burned and many burning logs were thrown into the river. it took about an hour to bring it under control – i never ran so fast with a bucket of water. the fire burned under the soil for at least a day. luckily most things were still damp from the melting snow for a week or so before. we all could have died.

Amazing. I think your story gets the prize, Steven!

That almost won a Darwin award.

so many stupid things surround scouts. that one just seemed the most asinine.

"so many stupid things surround scouts. that one just seemed the most asinine."

I've had way more good experiences with scouts, than bad

Whenever you deal with humans you sometimes encounter stupid things

"Actually, on the end of a spur off Mt Feathertop. I know, because Sue and I helped build it."

Sorry Rog, yes that's right: I had the right mountain in mind, just the wrong name.

"I've had way more good experiences with scouts, than bad"

Jerry – i had a great time in Boy Scouts – it fueled (no pun intended) my desire to camp and spend time in nature. our troop was very camping oriented and i learned a great deal about how to handle myself in the woods.

kids that did not want to go on the camping trips did some really stupid things to make sure they never had to go again. the summer before the fire incident while canoeing the Potomac River, a kid started dropping railroad spikes into the canoes. he put several large holes in each one. his mother was not pleased when she picked him up that evening.

I once came upon several good ole boys riding ATVs in the Blue Primitive area in Arizona. They were horn hunting, seaching for elk antlers, for profit. When I said something they told me they were to old and handicapped to walk anymore, and to mind my own business. I don't think a spare tire qualifies as a handicap. Found their tire tracks all over the forest for the rest of the day. Urrrr!

" once came upon several good ole boys riding ATVs in the Blue Primitive area in Arizona. They were horn hunting, seaching for elk antlers, for profit. When I said something they told me they were to old and handicapped to walk anymore, and to mind my own business."

ABOMINATION! Tempts me to start thinking of piano wire as multiple use gear. :(

It's a thought, but ppl like that could function without a head. I shouldn't of said that "forgive me".

Horse People

I feel those two words probably sum up, for most people here, what I'm talking about.

Most notably, horse people in GSMNP, on the Benton MacKaye in the Cataloochee area. I ran across a group of them who stopped me and asked me about my pack, kit, methods, etc. They were drinking beers, and one of these mouth breathers decided to crush his can (with his bare hands as a display of manliness) and then chuck the can off into the trees. Luckily his old lady called him out and picked up the can, not because she knew it was a boneheaded, ignorant, awful thing to do, but rather because "them rangers will fine you a thousand dollars for that s#!t, Cletus!" The area that the horse campers use is also littered with horse turds, people turds (never buried), toilet paper, trash, food scraps, and pretty much anything you can think of as far as negative human impact. Don't even get me started on the horses' physical impact on the trail, much of which is trenched 1-3 feet below the surrounding forest floor. Riders often lead their horses to drink at springs as well, and allow the animals to defecate and foul the springs. How these people are allowed in a National Park is beyond me.

Also smokers, not just in the wilderness, but everywhere. In my mind, discarding your cigarette butt outdoors should be a thousand dollar fine; by far the most common litter I see, both in the frontcountry and backcountry. If you must poison your body with such rubbish, at least hang onto the remains and dispose of it properly.

"Tempts me to start thinking of piano wire as multiple use gear."

That is _titanium_ piano wire.

–B.G.–

"That is _titanium_ piano wire."

Nothing better. ;)

"How these people are allowed in a National Park is beyond me."

That's an easy one. They are represented by the best Congressmen money can buy.

I have to say there are alot of stupid people out there that have no respect for anything but out of all the people that do enjoy the outdoors many more are respectful and curtious to both others and the enviorment, now that being said i live to be outdoors and have been that way since i was a little kid, i backpack,kayak,camp,shoot/hunt,atv,ride horses,ect.. the thing that botheres me the most is the small amount of people that do all these stupid/ irresponsable things and makes the rest of that said group look bad ie. shooting and not knowing your backstop or makeing trails with your 4×4 or atv when there are lots of designated orv parks to go ride at, leaving garbage laying around, letting there animals (horses,dogs,ect) poo next to or near water and not clean it up… i like most other people that enjoy the outdoors clean up after myself and alot of time others i cant stand going somewhere and seeing it trashed. like where i go shooting alot i usally end up taking out ten times the garbage i brought in ie empty shells and ammo boxes.