Thoughts on taking breaks while hiking

Decades ago with a monster pack and boots, I could hardly wait for my next hourly rest stop. And it was painful to get up and move again. Not a happy camper. I totally sympathized with Cheryl Strayed in “Wild.”

Fast forward about 20 years, and with a somewhat lighter pack and boots, I hiked as fast as I could until I got tired, then took a break, sometimes waiting as long as three hours between. I also couldn’t hike more than 12 miles per day – too much pain and exhaustion.

After lots of shuffling of boots to shoes, better and lighter backpack, lower total pack weight, breaks, slowing down, etc., I settled on 10-minute breaks every hour. Important to that habit was: butt on the ground, not standing, not on a log; shoes off and debris dumped; swap out to drier socks; and deal with frequent hot spots that inevitably turned into blisters. Longer break at lunch only. That worked much better for many years.

Then I started wearing Dirty Girl gaiters. Huge difference. Keeps crap out of my shoes, so almost no blisters, no need to take shoes off at every break, etc. Now I take 5 minute butt-on-ground breaks at the hour, or skip one if I feel like it. For really tough hikes, raising feet above butt at breaks helps a lot. Dump shoes and change socks at lunch only. Works pretty well on days up to my max of 20 miles. Usually end the day with feet and legs tired but not in pain.

Lots of other factors to consider. A backpack that fits you well, with low enough total pack weight, is extremely important. Shoes and socks that work well for you are vital. Prepping and caring for your feet also critical.

Everyone is different, and what works might change over time. Not happy? Experiment until you find something that works.

— Rex

Depending on mileage and terrain I break whenever my body tells me. No set time or distance personally.  Remember this,  your mind will give up BEFORE your body does ( minus injuries ).  I usually take breaks near or around water sources, when refills are required. If I am climbing up, my breaks usually just happen during this time since it is up up up and slower moving.  If I am with others, I can usually adapt and take breaks when they need too,  again… Depends on the situation.

Yeah, I just stop whenever it is required or beneficial…or if I’m on a known trail and already know that I’ve reached an ideal break location.

Remember this,  your mind will give up BEFORE your body does ( minus injuries ).

When I started running, someone that runs ultras gave me some good advice: “However far you think you can run: you can run twice that distance.”  This is why (all other things being equal) I tend to take fewer breaks when I’m with other people or engrossed in thought: my mind isn’t telling me to quit, because it’s focused on something else.

On a typical backpacking day I’m on the trail between 7-8 am and the only break in the morning is when I stop to get water.  There I’ll take my pack off for a bit and eat a snack – probably 5-10 minutes.  Lunch is usually a 30-45 sit down affair, hopefully next to water, but always on a log or something (I’m just not comfortable for any period of time on the ground).

I’ll usually take one 5-minute break an hour or two after lunch, but after that I seem to be in “I just want to get to camp” mode and push on without any breaks, even though it’s when I probably need them the most.  It’s something I’m working on because that’s when the “stumbles and bumbles” seem to hit me.  The rocky trails in Pennsylvania always seem worse in the late afternoon!

I hate breaks, but need them more than I used to…

An important thing when hiking with others is to communicate clearly what your hiking style for the trip will be..max distance per day, breaks (how long?, sit down/pack off?, stand up only?), etc.

1. I got invited on a trip where the organizer said the trip mileage was less than 10 miles per day. Our first day was 16 miles. Day 2 would have been 17+ had I not brought it up and it ended up more around 15.

2. I signed up with a meetup group where the organizer mentioned nothing about his hiking style. Turns out he does not sit down at all …all day. The breaks were short and stand up only. Eat you food standing up.

Take breaks and eat your food standing up?  What kind of adult actually makes that sort of policy and attempts to enforce it?

Lmao. Sorry sir but you can not sit down while we stop for a break. Please remain standing at all times!!

Lmao. Sorry sir but you can not sit down while we stop for a break. Please remain standing at all times!!

Exactly!  Who wants to go hiking with Inspector General Martinet?  I can see it now:

John S: < sits down and starts to boil water >

Martinet: “You will do that standing up.”

John S: “You want me to stand up and boil wa-”

Martinet: ” YOU WILL DO THAT STANDING UP!!” < disciplinary whip appears >

All jokes aside, I know that people like this exist – lookin’ at you, Karen – but I can’t seem to wrap my head around the hills they choose to assault and die on.  I can understand that if you’re doing a timed/paced event and neither need nor want to take a protracted break – speedrunning big hills, for instance – it would be unwise and unwelcome to sit down for ten minutes every hour or so…but that’s an unlikely situation in which to accidentally find oneself.  I can also understand communicating pacing and goal information because it is essential to finding people with whom you hike well…but even in that situation, who cares what you do when you need to take a break?  If someone needs a rest the responsible thing to do is to take a rest: that’s all there is to it.  Sit, stand, eat, drink, drop pack, juggle pack, practice karate, play air tuba, chase totoros, stage a mime performance of Antigone, procreate, pray to the multi-eyed and tentacled horrors imprisoned at The Edge of the Universe…doesn’t matter much to me.

The stand up guy trip…It was lunch time and we were gonna do a side hike into a Utah canyon, so we ate lunch standing up because we only had a few minutes break. After finishing the side hike, I was gonna sit and eat a snack before we left, not knowing his rules for the trip. After a few minutes of me eating my snack, I hear a loud yell from the trail. He was yelling at me to come on. When I did catch up to them (about 4 in group; not many people want to go on his hikes, so I learned the hard way), he was a little frustrated but did finally explain his hiking style on the afternoon of the first day (four day trip that turned into a three day trip).

Please everyone, hike your own hike. That said, hiking is not an athletic endeavor for me. I’m becoming more comfortable with a leisurely pace and part of that is taking breaks at places I find beautiful or when I feel tired.

Additionally, I struggle with a lack of hunger when hiking. I find that get more calories in me if I eat lots of small snacks rather than a couple large meals.

I’m not rigid or or premeditated about it but I’m guessing I stop hourly. 50% of the time I don’t bother to take my pack off. These breaks can be anywhere between 5 and 10 minutes. Lunch is usually not any different than the other breaks.

Late afternoon naps laying on a granite slab that is just the right angle are the best. Gimme 20 or 30 minutes for that break please.

If I recall correctly, Colin Fletcher said he took 10 min breaks every hour, in the full horizontal position.

For you young’uns, he wrote the book on equipment and long-distance hiking 50 years ago.  I believe he was the first to hike the length of the Grand Canyon, amongst other feats/firsts.

Colin Fletcher was carrying a 65 pound pack… so I guess he deserved a 10 minute break!

I have a suite of loops that I’ve hiked a number of times. I’m usually hiking solo. I remember good spots for getting water, or a good log with a view for snacking, good campsites, etc. I’ll take lunch sitting down at the top of a pass usually. These trips are almost ritualized in a way, now  that I think about it. I almost always stop at the same places, unless I want to push on past a prior campsite.

I don’t take a lot of breaks, but when I do, it’s always at a spot on the route where I stopped before. hmmm…what’s that about?

I’ll still take a break on an hour chime but, with an ever lighter pack, if only to remind myself to drink water.  Used to be a minimum of 10 minutes but now it just may be a few minutes to enjoy some water, probably with drink mix added (“shaken, not stirred”).

There’s also the impromptu break to check out a neat view.  Less inertia to overcome when getting back on trail with said lighter pack.

<p style=”text-align: left;”>Usually give minutes every hour…but adapted terrain, junctions, and others in the party.</p>
And something I learned from leading cycling tours…in a larger group, a stop after ten minutes just to make sure that there are no obvious problems…and then again after half an hour for the same reason.

Hiking solo I only break if I am not into beating a certain pre-determined time. The only break would be at the halfway point/peak to make coffee. Hiking with my wife we break when she needs to.

I take a brief “pause” every 30m.  Every 30m my “pause” is to drink water.  Sometimes with requires me to stop hiking for a minute or two, sometimes I just slow a bit to take the drink.  Generally about 1/2 liter.

On the hour my “pause” is to consume between 200 and 300 calories.  I carry a days worth of grazing food in my hipbelt pocket so again this may be short stop (if I need to unwrap something) or simply slow my pace for a bit.  Over the course of hiking 10-12 hours I’ll stop at 2 or 3 of these for a more extended time based on how I feel or where I am at.  Generally no longer than 30min, but in the case of my recent JMT hike I took an hour atop Mt. Whitney and an hour atop Clouds Rest.

Breaks are great! That’s the time to look – really look – at the scenery, the birds, the small wildlife, the flowers, and just sit and contemplate. No need to spend hours at it, but a short break now and then to drink some water, have a snack, take a jacket off, and take it all in, is mandatory. I know HYOH and all, but what’s the hurry? But I also have friends who run all their trails. We get together for a beer afterward, but don’t travel together.

A few years back a good friend and I (who have hiked many, many trails together) joined a club hike in our community. The leader was not a break-taker. He also didn’t believe in breakfast. So after everyone was awake in the morning, he insisted on getting everyone moving. My friend and I looked at each other and agreed – we’re having coffee! Boy oh boy was Mr group leader unhappy with us. Eventually the group left us to our own devices. We caught up fairly quickly anyway. Yes, good to know your group preferences and agree on solutions ahead of time. On day two, the leader already knew; we weren’t leaving before coffee.

I take breaks, when it depends, why it depends, where it depends, you get it, it is all situational.  My son and I were doing a 20 mile hike for BSA on a rail trail.  We actually took staggered breaks.  Late in the hike when we were wearing down  I would tell him to stop at a suitable place for five minutes sit down and then I would keep going until the next good stopping point.  I would sit down.  When he caught me I would go.  It would work out we each got a break and kind of kept moving.  Helped the last 5 miles when we were shot.  I find I am good for 12 plus miles, but when I start hitting 15 to 20 I get really spent.  I don:t really care though, I don:t feel a compelling need to hike more than about 12 miles at a shot.

Karen, thanks for the examples. The no breakfast is a new one on me. The point is to communicate and let others know the hiking style of the trip (if leader), or think to ask about it if attending (something I didn’t do at the time). Of course others can hike any way they wish. It just makes a trip more fun (and avoids conflict) if everyone knows what is expected.

I used to take a short break about every 2 hours but now….. maybe more often.  Still a short break.    One exception will be on a climb up a mountain.  Or to a pass…… A lot of times I want to take that break on top…..so that becomes the goal

@ Elliott. Colin Fletcher’s rule of thumb for his mostly solo hiking was hike 50 rest 10 minutes but he also allowed for what he called dawdling: journaling, napping, photography, wildlife watching

@ the original post. I personally would do what ever it takes to make it fun and enjoyable for my wife to keep backpacking. :-)) So communication to reach common goals…

I think I must be in the minority here, but I’m in the fewer but longer breaks category. With the exception of stopping to quickly scoop up some water or take some photos, I usually don’t break for less than an hour and up to several hours.

For me it comes down to rest vs recovery. I feel like if I stop for 10 minutes, once I start hiking again, I’m right where I was, physically, before I stopped. If I stop for an hour or more, the shoes are off, I’m lying down, maybe taking a nap, stretching, soaking my feet, eating a meal, etc. When I start hiking again, I feel pretty fresh.

I tend to get rolling in the morning and hike for a couple of hours. Then I’ll stop for an hour or so and have some breakfast and go through my routine. Then I’ll go for two or three hours and stop again. This time it’s usually for two or three hours, includes a nap, laundry, swim, etc to avoid hiking during the hot part of the day. Then a couple more hours on the trail before a dinner break. Maybe set up camp or maybe go a little further after dinner depending on what I’m trying to accomplish.

Of course weather and terrain can throw a wrench in these plans. My last trip I was constantly racing weather over passes. I think I only got one nap it that whole time!!!

When I’m with a group, this pretty much never happens. Every time someone needs some water or a snack, it turns into a break, so I’ve learned to roll with that schedule. I do feel a little more beat up at the end of the day though. Just much less time off my feet with my pack off my back.