Why do you go backpacking

I enjoy backpacking all over the place, but really it's about the mountains.
Everything about being in the mountains feels like home to me, and backpacking takes me there.

…and to be with family

This does not belong in Gear.

You are correct. And I bet you can guess what will happen now.

Did you get my PM a while back?

Not a barefoot hippy peace and love sort of freedom, but more of an angry adolescent anarcho-crust-punk sort of thing.

I had a pretty bad home life growing up, especially the early teenage years. Lots of alcohol and fighting and craziness in the house, no-good men coming and going. I was too young to work and move out, but too old to just sit back and take it. I had a band of friends that were similar misfits. Punk music, skateboarding, and hanging out in the mountains were our refuge. Growing up in Alhambra/El Sereno/East Los Angeles in Southern CA, the mountains above Pasadena were only a bus ride and a hike up a hill away. Skateboards sufficed for the downhill return.

The mountains were freedom from craziness and from family. From police for making too much noise or loitering or drinking 40s or other teenage nonsense. Freedom from all the noise, outside and within. From high school teachers that demanded homework while I remained silent and took it, unable to explain that I didn't do it because my stepfather fought me last night and I had to get away. It was freedom from people yelling at me but was also a place where I was free to yell. It was a place where I could cry.

Since I was pretty young I could appreciate the fact that the mountains were perhaps the last place left where, to the greatest extent I had ever experienced, I could be free from pretty much all expectations, obligations, rules, and responsibilities. The mountains became my great escape. I spent a good deal of time out alone with a Coleman flannel-lined sleeping bag and a surplus rucksack with my skateboard strapped to it. I cooked food in the can, typically Stagg Chicken Chili or Chef Boyardee Ravioli. A canister stove and a Wenzel pup tent were my first real gear purchases. And an army can opener and one of those nesting fork/knife/spoon combos.

The mountains later became a sort of first apartment. I spent weeks at a time living at Millard Campground and in surrounding canyons while in community college in Pasadena. I was friends with the old punk that lived in the campground trailer and was the "ranger" caretaker so I was never really hassled about how long I stayed.

The beauty and solitude only grew on me.

I do have to credit my mom and dad (before our family fell apart) for sparking it. When I was young, camping in Joshua Tree had a profound impact on me. I later married my wife in the park. Fishing with my dad was also an introduction.

I read a lot, discovering Gary Snyder and Jack Kerouac when I was about 13. My father gone by that time, they sort of became my mentors, especially Snyder. They were perfect teachers for a lost feeling kid that had a naive fascination with homelessness and an interest in art and writing. Kerouac's "Dharma Bums" was the impetus for my first bigger backpacking trip with friends: heading into the Sierra out of Bridgeport and climbing the Matterhorn when I was 16. In appropriate style, we begged our gas money the entire way there and back.

I've written plenty of poetry about beauty and silence and solitude in the wilderness over the years, but if I really get back to the source, it was those early days hiding in the local hills with a cheap sleeping bag and a worn out pair of Vans that set the tone.

It always felt like it was the right place to be.

I believe that God intentionally put the most beautiful things in out of the way places that, in the material sense, man has no practical reason to visit. Places that hold little promise for industry, agriculture, or development, that even in our modern day usually have no direct access by road. Places separated from the paths of least resistance by mountains, gorges, and deserts. Places where the relative few who are willing to put forth the effort are rewarded by seeing and experiencing beauty on a scale that most never will, and probably cannot even relate to.
I want to see those places.

Geez, Craig. I don't mean to get all mushy, but your post, especially the first few paragraphs, make my eyes get a weird wet feeling. I too didn't have the greatest pre-teen/early teen years, which is when I caught the backpacking bug (the high Sierra has been known to do that). Lucky for me I was able to enjoy time away from "all that" quite a bit and traveled to the mountains regularly. Sounds like you did too.

Escape

You know when you take pictures and everyone sees them when your done.
They look at them like, no big deal.

What you saw when you took that picture was unbelievable, huge amazing.
You start to realize that every other picture of scenery has that same feeling.
Especially after you've been there.

You can be looking at massive cliffs 3000' above you or huge domes and seeing it in the picture is just a dome or a cliff.

You really need to be there to understand just how magnificent the backcountry can be.
The ones who don't and think the pictures are just as good are really missing out.

So I get out to see just how beautiful the world is.

[…]

John Muir once said something to the effect that, and here I paraphrase, "by going away(to the Sierra), I found I was actually coming home". I couldn't express my feelings any better than that.

"I found I was actually coming home"

Now Tom, I've said it once and I've said it a hundred times… you NEED to get out of the house once in a while!! :)

It's where I feel right. It's where I'm supposed to be. It's where I feel the most calm, peaceful, compassionate, confident, and just plain good. I've never felt lonely or gotten down on myself on a trail. Never.

.

"Whispers Of The North"

Whispers of the north
Soon I will go forth
To that wild and barren land
Where nature takes its course
Whispers of the wind
Soon I will be there again
Bound with a wild and restless drive
That pulls me from within
And we can ride away
We can glide all day
And we can fly away

Whispers of the north
Soon I will return again
To those endless afternoons
In sunshine and in rain
Whispers of my love
Days and weeks on end
I will share my thoughts of her
In prayers that I will send

And we can ride away
We can glide all day
And we can fly away

Whispers of the north
The river and the shore
In the land that tested Eskimos
Ten thousand years before
Whispers of my heart
In the tracks of animals
I will leave my footprints there
To lie beneath the snow

And we can ride away
We can glide all day
And we can fly away

Whispers of the wind
I will feel it sting
I will see it rise and fall
I will hear it sing
The sound is like a song to me
It takes away the pain
The river is the melody
And sky is the refrain

And we can ride away
We can glide all day
And we can fly away

And we can ride away
We can glide all day
And we can fly away

Whispers of the north
Soon I will go forth
Whispers of the north
Soon I will go forth

I feel better afterwards. It renews and recharges me.

Must be uncrowded for it to work. If I pass 50 people on the trail I'd rather hike in the city.

I swear I think I have some exploring/ adventure gene.

My average backpacking trip is exponentially cheaper that a cruise of the same time duration.

I tried writing something eloquent but it was pompous. Instead, I think this guy says it nicely, especially the bit about “developing a relationship to the walk you’re on”.

The wonder of winter walking – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AoIDAr89ohM

"I would rather wake up in the middle of nowhere than in any city on earth."

"Hello community! I was just wondering why you decide to go backpacking, I.E is it the scenery, the challenge or whatever?"

What's your reason, CJ?

I need to. To relax. I'm a workaholic and have ADHD. I work at a desk all day and as soon as that's over, I don't generally don't stop moving until I go to bed. I always have multiple projects going and my mind is always racing and rapidly jumping from one thing to another. And I live quite happily like this. But when I step in the backcountry all that stops. And my mind and body get very calm. I find it very soothing and refreshing. I need that.