An adventure you've wanted to have and are still planning on having

Is there an adventure, a trip, an outdoor accomplishment you have been dreaming of and still hope to do someday, maybe soon?

I am thinking about mine, adjusting for age…and will post a little later today while I digest the question myself.

Or..did you just get to do that recently and what was it?

Hike/swim the full length of the Big Sur river (crossing over the ridge separating the north and south forks). No idea what kind of obstacles are up the north and south forks and how long it would take me.

A long packrafting trip in Alaska.

Walk the south island section of the Te Araroa trail – planning on starting next January.

I keep meaning to do a Sierras trip.  I’ve done a little but it was a long time ago.  The Sierras has to be about the best place on the planet for a backpack trip.  Unfortunately, when the season is conducive, it’s easier and almost as good to do something closer.

Not much backpacking but for years my wife and I have been talking of this one:

Ferry from Belingham to Skagway. Hike the Chilkoot pass trail. Take the train and bus to Whitehorse. Rent an RV for a week and drive the loop through Dawson, a bit of Alaska and back to Whitehorse. Fly home from there.

Next summer is already booked with family but we are committing to the summer after. We are already 60 and need to get to it while we can still do the backpacking. Time has a way of slipping by and we don’t want to miss this one.

Ren and I want to travel back to the U.K.  I was last there in ’76, while Ren was there in ’79. So it’s been a while.

Still need to finish the PCT.  More traveling around the West.

In order of likelihood in the next few years would be:

• Big SEKI loop + Whitney (this August).
• A Wind River high route of some sort (maybe 2018).
• Summit Mount Baker (last WA volcano).
• Summit some classic peaks in the North Cascades (Eldorado, Bonanza, Shuksan, Snowfield and Daniel).
• Washington PCT and/or Sierra PCT (Kennedy Meadows to Tahoe) section hikes.

Go back to Alaska and visit inland, at least Denali.  Also do the ferry up the inland passage (cruised from Victoria to Seward in ’98 and hiked every Alaska day on that trip, and we’ve always intended to return).

Patagonia, Torres del Paine

But first I need to get my knee working again.  I’ve been sidelined again since the GGG early this year…All conservative measures seem to have failed, and things are pointing to meniscus issues.  But hey, if Oscar Pistorius can run, they should at least be able to get me hiking again one way or another!

The Languvahoweveryouspellit trail in Iceland. Saving my airlines points.

Daughter wants to come with me to look for fairies. We’ll see.

Finish the Appalachian Trail ( 600 ish miles to go). hike the JMT, hike anywhere in the Sierras, Hike some more in the Kane Gulch area, Grand Canyon Rim to Rim, GC Hermits Rest to Bright Angel or Grand View.

Finish the CDT from the North end of Rocky Mountain Nat’l Park to Mexico.  I would still need to do the AT for the triple Crown but at this point I have no desire to hike the AT.  I’d rather hike the PCT again or just my favorite parts of the PCT and CDT.  Time has been fairly kind to me but I don’t know if I will be able to hike 20-30 miles a day for weeks and months at 65+.  I may be relegated to more of a section hiker style.

Month long raft trip on the Yukon River.

PCT, possibly as a section hiker.

Great volcanos of Mexico (Orizaba,  Popocateptl, Iztaccihuati).

My wife & I are spending this summer/fall in Wyoming — mostly in Yellowstone & the Tetons — to celebrate the 50th anniversary of when we first met while working at Canyon Village in summer of ’67.

Back then, we were poor college students with summer jobs — she at the general store’s soda fountain while I pumped gas at the Conoco station.

Planning to spend awhile trailer-camping — first in Idaho’s Island Park area during June before heading into Yellowstone, staying at Madison Junction campground near the Madison, Firehole & Gibbons rivers, then to lakes at Beartooth Pass before returning to YNP and camping at Canyon Village — where we started 50 years ago.

After Canyon Village, we’ll backpack awhile in the Wind River range, followed by car-camping at Jenny Lake in the Tetons before giving some friends a “Grand Tour” of Tetons & Yellowstone, finishing up at Yellowstone’s Madison Junction campground again for a week or so into early October.

Things have sure changed a lot in YNP & the Tetons from 50 years ago.

But we’ll pretend like it’s old times & have lots of fun like we did back then.

Return to Alaska (did a month-long trip in the Brooks Range with my sons  three years ago) and this time backpack/packraft the complete Brooks Range (around a 1,000 miles) from the Canadian border to the Arctic Ocean. Should take 2-3 months. Now that my kids are slowly going their own ways (and won’t be able to take 3 months off), I need to see whether I can find a partner who wants to go along on such  trip or decide to go solo.

I’ll keep hiking with you, Manfred, but maybe not for 3 months at a time.  See you next month on Adak!

David, looking forward to Alaska next month. I’d hike the PCT with you in a blink as well – and rafting the Yukon also sounds like a great adventure. So let’s discuss next month when we see each other again in person.

First retire, then (in no particular order):

• Do the PCT in Washington State
• Revisit Denali backcountry, many multi-day backpacking trips
• Spend a lot of time in the Canadian Rockies
• Spend even more time in New Zealand (expensive to get there, alas)
• Through-hike the AT

and while I’m at it:

• Single- and multi-day kayaking trips in the US and in the Caribbean
• Bike touring

I would like to do parts of the CDT, a month long trip in the Swiss alps but this time with lots of trail running; a combination of backpacking and some runs from hut to hut. I also still want to do more with kids outdoors, including teenagers. I really enjoy the company of our “younger people”  and they also seem to be drawn to me as well. What form this latter adventure with kids would take besides what I am already doing I don’t know yet, but I would like the chance of having a small group out for at least a few days.

There are not really  any epic trips that I have been dreaming of, just to be in the wild for several days at a time more often.

Oh….another trip with my daughter some day, that would be very nice.