[pct-l] HYOH

[Scott Williams]

Growing up car camping and backpacking in the early '60s we usually had a
fire.  It was sort of expected as part of the experience, and car camping
with friends now, it's still nice to sit around and sing or talk together,
when and where it's permitted.  But as part of my backpacking routine, I
let go of it long ago.  I'm most often stealth camping somewhere, and
wouldn't even want to scrape the ground clear to do it safely.  Finding a
soft spot in the pine duff for my bag is enough, and leaving it looking
like I hadn't been there is even better.

I don't think I've built a fire ring or dug a fire trench in years, and on
my thru hike in 2010, I remember some fires at trail angels homes, and they
were wonderful, but the first and only fire built by someone in my company
of folks was a day or two from Canada when we were wet and cold, north of
Rainy Pass.  It was nice to have the warmth, but we all could have gotten
into our bags and been just fine.  The person who started it, (safely and
in an existing ring I might add) wanted to spend some time together around
a camp fire before we all split up.  We were getting sad about the
impending end to our wonderful summers.   After the hundreds of miles we'd
all walked together it was a nice evening, but for the rest of the trip,
getting to that point near the end, a campfire was absolutely not needed.
Our camaraderie was great without it, and it was just too much work in the
evening anyway.  We just wanted dinner, hot or cold, and a warm dry
sleeping bag.

Shroomer