Topic

Itinerary vs. actual walked mileage?


Forum Posting

A Membership is required to post in the forums. Login or become a member to post in the member forums!

Home Forums Scouting Philmont Itinerary vs. actual walked mileage?

Viewing 9 posts - 1 through 9 (of 9 total)
  • Author
    Posts
  • #3603688
    Kevin Sweere
    BPL Member

    @sweerek

    Conjecture has most crews actually walk 10-20% more miles than their trek’s Itinerary when all things (pre, on, and post-trail) are considered during their entire Philmont tour.  Besides the quoted itinerary mileage, side trips on trail, visiting the Tooth from basecamp, errors in navigation, I’d also include in total miles a trip to town, gathering and returning gear, the campfires, and other such things.

    Might anyone have evidence to back up such claims — like pedometer, fit-bit, GPS, or rigorous map-work?

    #3603699
    Brad Rogers
    BPL Member

    @mocs123

    Locale: Southeast Tennessee

    I’ve never been to Philmont and don’t  usually take a GPS track backpacking, but I do use my Garmin Forerunner watch on long dayhikes and it generally reads ~ 7-10% more mileage than trail signs or map mile markers.  My thought has always been that they just look at flat miles and don’t take into acount the elevation changes, but don’t know that for sure.

    #3603710
    Brian H
    Spectator

    @bthaberberger

    Had my garmin Fenix with me and it had about 40-45% more mileage by steps(not always accurate to true gps miles). Need to factor in things like walking to activities, water sources, privacy for cat holes or red roofs, swap boxes etc,   Some camps are very large ie ponil.  Could walk .75 to a mile from your campsite to the cantina.  We were trek 23.   Mileage says 68. According to my watch I was closer to 100 miles and that doesn’t include base camp days.  They intentionally walk you from one end  to the other to get you acclimated to the altitude.  I have pics of my step charts for each day but couldn’t figure out how to load multiple pictures.  Hope that helps.

    #3603712
    robert G
    Spectator

    @bert68ku

    We were on Trek 12 (61 miles) and ended up about 100 miles which included base camps.

    #3603718
    James A
    Spectator

    @nps-hiker

    We had itinerary 18 with 63 claimed miles. We hiked over 90 miles not including base camp days. That doesn’t always mean a full pack, as you will be walking to fill water or go to cons or program or coffee at night. Some of the staff camps had us camping 1/2 mile from the cabin and we would walk back and forth up to five times in a day. Definitely smart to plan ahead so you don’t have so much back and forth. Fill water the night before if you won’t be going by the source on the way out of camp, for instance.

    #3603722
    David Y
    BPL Member

    @moonshine

    Locale: Mid Tenn

    I think the mileage of the various treks is only meant to give prospective bidders an idea of how long and how difficult each trek would be. The mileage is only measured by the most direct distance from point A to point K with no consideration getting lost or walking back and forth to latrines, Program Features or anything else.

    I have an app on my phone that tells me how far I walk each day as a health reminder, but I would not compare that to the mileage listed for various trek at Philmont. That would have no meaning to me.

    “Philmont should be enjoyed, not endured.” Moonshine

    #3603739
    TAG in AZ
    BPL Member

    @tagiam

    Locale: PHX

    My rule of thumb is that you’ll end up hiking ~25% more than your itinerary distance.  In 2017, I ran my Garmin InReach the entire time we were hiking.  Our 79 mile itinerary came out to 92 miles of hiking with packs on.  I didn’t track miles in basecamp, program activities, getting water or any other hiking where we didn’t have packs on.

    #3603811
    David Y
    BPL Member

    @moonshine

    Locale: Mid Tenn

    TAG in AZ

    25% more miles hiking with packs on than presented. That’s interesting and good to know. Thanks for verifying that with your Garmin.

    “Philmont should be enjoyed, not endured.” Moonshine

    #3603816
    J-L
    BPL Member

    @johnnyh88

    It’s hard to figure out how far you truly hike since GPS devices can easily overestimate the distance traveled:

    https://backpackinglight.com/forums/topic/why-every-gps-overestimates-distance-traveled/

    I’ve found even more error when hiking in very steep areas. My Garmin GPS device’s location error will say I traveled a little bit uphill and then a little bit downhill, even though I was contouring >> this leads to it calculating a greater distance than I actually traveled.

Viewing 9 posts - 1 through 9 (of 9 total)
  • You must be logged in to reply to this topic.
Forum Posting

A Membership is required to post in the forums. Login or become a member to post in the member forums!

Get the Newsletter

Get our free Handbook and Receive our weekly newsletter to see what's new at Backpacking Light!

Gear Research & Discovery Tools


Loading...