Backpacking

The Curvy Chicks Guide To Hiking- Part 1

 This article is a re-post from one I wrote for the More Of Me To Love Website.  or more details, visit www.moreofmetolove.com

The Curvy Chicks Guide to HikingTD fun


Have you ever wanted to stroll along a trail or climb up a mountain?  Hiking is the perfect pastime.  Of course, we all know that it is great exercise.  It is not only good for cardio and strength conditioning, but also for balance and coordination. 

However, hiking is also great for the mind and spirit.  It can clear your head of worries, stress and anxiety as well as give you a huge boost in confidence.  I guarantee you that nothing feels better than reaching the top of a climb and looking back to enjoy what you have accomplished.  Hiking will get you in touch with strength and pride that you never knew you had.

Hiking is an activity that can be enjoyed by everyone.  However, many curvy people shy away from hiking due to concerns, both physical and emotional.  Here are some basic guidelines that will help you overcome those worries and get out on the trail.

First, remember the basic tenants to responsible hiking.

  • Always tell someone where you are going
  • Research the trail
  • Take a friend
  • Never leave your car without the 10 Essentials.

Simply put- food, water, rain gear, warm clothes, fire starter,

compass and map, first aid kit, head lamp, knife, and emergency contact info.

A simple Google search will list the 10 Essentials in more details for you. Just remember that being prepared on the trail is the best way to assure a pleasant trip.

Emotional Challenges

    When asked why they don’t hike, many round women will say that they are embarrassed or ashamed. Between the gasping for breath and sweating, they see hiking as an activity that points out their weaknesses, rather than their strengths.  However, one can combat these feeling of inadequacy by putting a plan in place. 

   

    Select a Good Partner

   The first thing to think about is your hiking partner.  Does he/she make you feel good, strong and capable?  Or slow and anxious?  Just because you love and cherish someone, does not mean that they are the perfect person to hike a trail with.  In general, male hikers tend to be more goal oriented than female hikers.  For that reason, they tend to be faster, i.e. harder to keep up with.  In female hiking clubs you often find women that joined so they didn’t have to worry about ‘keeping up with the guys’. 

    In any case, whether you want to hike with women or men, think about your partners hiking style.  Are they fast?  Are they patient?  There is a world of difference between a partner that will barely conceal her impatience with your pace and one that laughs, smiles and matches your walk up the hill. 

    Hiking can be a vulnerable experience if you are new at it, so chose someone that you can be yourself with. 

    While we are at it, don’t limit yourself to just one person.  Call a group of friends and hit the trail together.  Not only is it a ton of fun, but you all get to brag around the water cooler on Monday morning about the mountains you climbed that weekend.

   

    Change Your Paradigm

    Remember that book from a few years ago, The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People?  One of its most profound chapters talked about changing your paradigm.  Simply put, change the way you see the situation.   

    Hiking gives us a lot of opportunities to practice the habit of changing our thoughts.  The biggest of these is the idea that people are laughing at us.  In my twenty years of hiking and backpacking, I have often been the curvytest woman on the trail.  In fact, I have often been the ONLY curvy woman on the trail. 

    When I first began to hike, I was determined to not let the ridicule of other hikers get to me.  I was going to hike anyway, by golly! Throughout the years, though, I slowly noticed something. No one ever made fun of me.  No one laughed at me and no one ridiculed me.  All those snide comments I prepared myself for?  Not a single one came my way.

    You can chalk this up to two different things.  One, hikers are actually really cool people.  They don’t look at you and see someone that looks different from them.  They look at you and see someone that shares a common interest with them.  In the hiking world, if you love the outdoors, you are pretty much automatically accepted. 

    The second thing is that people aren’t paying nearly as much attention to us as we would like to think.  When that Boy Scout troop goes flying by you on the trail, they are thinking about hotdogs, s’mores and campfires.  Trust me; you and I are the last people on their minds. 

  Claim Your Place

    Finally, this is your world and this is the perfect time to claim your place in it.  The outdoors are there for everyone to value, experience and love.  When you step out on the trail, claim your place on it.  You belong there as sure as anyone and everyone else. 

    When the little voices in your head tell you that you are not fit enough, fast enough, trail-wise enough or good enough, remember… what does that voice know?  That voice is not your friend and the things that it tells you are not rooted in reality at all.  Reality is that with some preparation, common sense and just a touch of courage, you can be climbing mountains in no time. 

To Be Continued…………

Georgia with the Dames- part 3

Sweetpeas final thoughts on the weekend’s adventure!!

Georgia with the Dames (Sun)

This morning I walked over to the campfire ring and saw that someone has started a nice morning fire AND had gone and gotten our food from the bear bags. (It’s looking like it’s going to be a great day!) I went back to my hammock and packed up everything so that I could leave with one of the first groups. 15 minutes later I enjoyed the morning fire again, boiled some water for my oatmeal, and listened to all the chatter going on. SHOE, in another one of her food experiments, made some breakfast oatmeal that didn’t quite work out. It looked like some congealed orange glop. HA! That girl makes me laugh! I caught Maggie eating a breakfast S’more and had to call her out. You see, last night she had her first, and what she claimed was her last S’more. Not b/c she didn’t like it, but that it was just too rich tasting. Well, it seems it wasn’t too rich this morning. HA! We both had a laugh and I’m glad she got to indulge in a camping tradition. 🙂

After the traildame morning meeting about today’s hike and car pooling etc… Kelly and I were the first ones on the trail. We only had 5.4 miles to do but had a big climb that morning, a 954 foot ascent in a mile. We started around 8:45am and took out time. We climbed and climbed, and climbed. I thought it would never end! Then all of the sudden Kelly turned around and said, “you see what I see.” I looked up, past her and saw the blue sky peeking over the ridge. I said, “if that’s what I think it is, we are high fiving when we get up there.” And that’s just what we did! We were FINALLY at the top of Kelly’s knob. I dropped my pack and as usual, as soon as I saw the view, I forgot about the climb. It was spectacular. Kelly was pointing out a lake and told me that you could see NC and SC from our GA mountain top. I thought it was the coolest thing. We took lots of photos and a quick water break b/c it was just the first mile of the day, we knew we still had a while to go. We climbed down into Deep gap and decided to by pass the shelter and take a nice break at the bottom before the next big climb. Well, we’re chillin’, when all of the sudden this old dude in JEANS comes running down the trail. I mean running like he’s trying to get away from the cops running. He doesn’t say anything to us. OK… strange. And why would someone be out in the middle of nowhere, running in jeans? Everyone knows you don’t wear cotton on the trail right? ha! I just found it weird.

Well, we spent the next 2 miles climbing up and down 4 mountains. I counted each climb up. DAMN! I can honestly understand why lots of thru-hikers complain about all the PUDS (pointless ups and downs) in Georgia. My goodness, I felt like I was on a roller coaster ride, just up, down, up, down, no view, up, down, up, down. By then, we were getting pretty fatigued from all the ups and downs, that we decided to take a lunch break. I knew from looking at Kelly’s map that after the fourth climb, the rest of the trail should of been all down hill.

Well guess what? The map was wrong. Every time Kelly and I would make it to a gap, we would start climbing again, it got to be a cruel joke that we both laughed at and sort of cried at. THANK GOODNESS I had another person to share the insanity with. Haha! By the way, Kelly was a great hiker, she doesn’t give herself enough credit. She set the pace and led the entire way. All the while telling me she’s a slow hiker. Don’t believe it! She’s a strong hiker and I’d hiker with her again any time. So to get our minds off the climbs, we started thinking about cold icy diet cokes and that helped a little. This was a tough day for me. I hadn’t expected all those extra climbs and coupled with the fact that I hadn’t hiked since early October just made it tough.

We finally push up the last little hill and see the Dicks Creek Gap road up ahead. YEAH! we made it. and it was only 1pm! We hop in Kelly’s car and head into Hiawassee for a diet coke! I was so excited to roll into Haiwassee, only because I’ve read about this little town so many times on trailjournals. I tell Kelly how excited I am to finally check out Haiwassee and then she points out the famous Blueberry Patch Hostel! It looked just like I would imagine it to look like. A blue little hostel. We finally found a little store and head right over to the soda fridges. I pull out a diet coke then spot one of those huge 1 liter diet coke bottles. So I do the right thing and put back my little coke bottle and exchange it for the 1 liter jug. haha! Yea, I got greedy, but that cold coke was sooooooo good. We got up to pay and notice slices of pizza for sale, so my greedy self grabbed one of those too 🙂 I paid the clerk and tell her this place is like a little oasis. She smiles and I wonder if she gets that alot. I mean, it is a trail town. We decided to wait to eat our slice back at the trail head picnic tables, but we took big swigs from our liters of diet coke all the way back. hahha! As we get back to Dicks Creek Gap to wait for Joan and Maggie, we spot Sunny sitting in her car. We invite her to join us at the picnic table.

Sunny used to be a serious hiker/climber/outdoors woman til she got into a really bad car wreck. She still hikes, but not as much distance as she used to do. She and a couple of hikers took the bail out, 1 mile trail back to the car this morning. Seems as if a couple of the girls decided not to finish the hike today. So Sunny went with them to help out carry gear and car pool. Then she came over to the trail head at the end of our section hike to pick up the rest us that finished. As we were talking, I find out that Sunny is really into ultralight backpacking and start to pick her brain for some gear recommendations. She asks if I want to SEE anyof her gear and I excitedly tell her “YEAH!”. She comes back with a huge duffel bag full of gear. I checked out her Patagucci (Patagonia) down jacket that weighs almost nothing. I check out her snow peak stove set that made me double think my Jetboil, and you know I love my Jetboil. But the snow peak was so small, compact, and light. I picked up her western mountaineering 20 degree down bag and almost ran off with it. That bag is soooo light Icouldn’t believe it. Then she showed me my next gear purchase! hahaa! Her Granite Gear Vapor Ki backpack. Man that pack was sweet. She let me try it on and I loved where all the straps fell. I’ve been wanting to get a lighter weight pack, but still wanted one with an internal frame. This one is perfect. I love the outside pockets that were made out of stretchy wetsuit material, I loved the cushioning on the hip and shoulder straps. It just looked and felt great on. I’m going to be saving up my pennies for this purchase!

After ohhing and ahhing over all of Sunny’s gear, Joan and Maggie finally show up. We load up into Kelly’s car and head back out to the cabins. I say my goodbyes to everyone and at 3:30pm, I’m pulling out of Helen GA and headed home. Another wonderful trip with the Trail dames. The weather was perfect, the views were great, the company was wonderful, and even though the trail kicked my butt, I got to be outdoors. I couldn’t of asked for a better weekend. Til next time… GET OUTDOORS!!!

Sweetwater Creek State Park- Trail Dames Hike

Posted in Around the House, Hiking with the Trail Dames, Travel Adventures on 01/15/2012 04:56 pm by Donna

Saturday was a super great day as I joined the Trail Dames on a hike through Statewater Creek Park. The 2,000 acre park is located outside of Atlanta and has hiking trails throughout that pass along spots including the George H. Sparks Reservoir and the ruins of a cotton factory destroyed during the Civil War. The hiking paths are easy in some spots and there are some areas where some rock climbing is involved. It was a bit challenging and a whole lot of fun! Cheryl our group leader was so helpful and guided the Dames along the trail, ensuring our safety throughout the hike especially through the boulder section! I met some amazing, strong, funny, women who all enjoy the beauty of nature. We all love laughing and making new friends and that is a good thing!

A quick group photo before we hit the trail.

Gathering together to start our hike. We count out so we know how many Dames are in the group so we can keep track and make sure no one is left behind on our way out.

We begin our hike on the Historic path which will  pass along the New Manchester Manufacturing Company.

This mill was built in 1849 on Sweetwater Creek. The mill produced yarn to form cotton and in 1861, the company had a contract with the Confederate Government to produce the materials for Confederate uniforms. In 1864 with so many men fighting in the Confederate Army, most of the employees of the mill were woman and their children. Sadly those women and children were arrested in July of 1864 when the Union Calvary captured the mill and village all around it. If they agreed to sign an “Oath of Allegiance” to the US Government they were released north of the Ohio River and Indiana. Those that did not sign the oath remained in prison until after the war ended. That my friends is a bit of Georgia history!

Sweetwater Creek

There are so many beautiful boulders all throughout!

One of the terrific things about the Trail Dames is that we have so many knowledgeable women who share the history of the area. Here we are taking a break and soaking up Georgia history.

Hello lovely! I had great love for this one and I gave it a big hug! Hug a tree, it’s good for your soul. Really now! There is even a lesson on how to hug a tree. Check it here!

Moving right along the trail you will find it can you give a bit of a workout as you will find the trail rocky as pictured above.

Here are the Dames, getting their heart rates up! There are several areas where climbing up and up is involved.

We take a few short breaks along the way and when we do, there is beauty all around. I love the color and textures we see all around us.

Trail Dames with Cheryl our guide right up front! Ladies, it was so nice meeting a lot of you for the first time. I so enjoyed our day and look forward to doing it all again soon!

For those interested in the Trail Dames, click here to check us out and click here to see another post from a past adventure I had with them.

It’s all good. ~ Donna

Georgia With the Dames- Part 2

Continuation of SweetPeas’ s Adventures……

Georgia with the Dames (Sat.) – Part 2

At 9:45am we step foot on the trail and start our 1 mile climb up. I hadn’t hiked since the Shennies trip in early October so I was worried I’d fall behind. Luckily, my trail legs didn’t disappear! Joan and I hiked together for the rest of the day. She was kind enough to wait for me on top of the climbs and we would hike down the trail together. At the top of the first climb we caught up to Crystal and her dog Buddy and we all stopped to enjoy the view and take some photos. Crystal and Buddy were just out here for the day and it was Crystal’s first hike. She seemed to be doing really well. Buddy was loving it. She had her tail wagging the entire time and just raced up and down the trail. She would stop when she couldn’t see Crystal and wait for her, but as soon as she caught a glimpse of her mommy, she raced down the trail again. It was so cute. It made me miss my dogs. I learned that Joan was really into the plant life. It was actually pretty cool having someone point out things and teach me something. Like when we hiked by some bamboo plants, normally I would of just walked on by and not thought a second about it, but Joan schooled us on the fact that it was a bamboo native to only the GA mountains. See, I learned something! Joan’s from Oregon, but is a professor at University of GA, where she also does some genetic research. She would sometimes get off the trail to check out an interesting tree or flower. I kept wanting to give her the trail name “Dexter”, like that Hanna Barbera cartoon about the little red headed scientist in the white lab coat. I think the cartoon’s name is actually Dexter’s Labratory. Anyways, we continue on together and see the sign for the shelter. We were told there were some stellar views, so we dropped our packs and decide to hike the .3 miles up the nicely graded trail to check it out. We arrive and notice an open privy on the left and as I yell back to Joan and Crystal to check out the privy, it dawns on my that there’s a pair of boots peaking out from it. Oops! Seems as if we stumbled upon someone doing their business. We quickly look over the shelter, then head back to the view to give the fellow hiker some privacy.

It was a great view, I would highly recommend stopping at Tray Mountain shelter just to check out the view. As we get back to our packs, we see that most of the group has arrived as well as 2 Southbounders!! Buffalo and Eecreats (spelling?). I find out that Eecreats will be the first ITALIAN southbounder to finish the AT. You KNOW I had to ask him about my favorite country on the planet. hahah! He’s sort of a celebrity on the trail, at least that’s how we treated him. hahah! Picture 12 women just oohhing and ahhing over these two southbounders. They were loving it! Sunny offered to get their picture and we all clamored around them for the photo. OH, and I found out the dude in the privy was Rootbeer, another southbounder hiking with Eecreates and Buffalo. So after the photo op, Joan, Crystal, Buddy and I continue down the trail for a couple miles. We decide to have lunch at the top of one of the climbs, which looked to be about 1/2 up. Well, a mile later we were walking down into SWAG of the Blue Ridge Gap where we met some other hikers, one from England and one from Ireland. They were nice enough to take our picture at the SWAG sign 🙂 Well, you all know where there is a GAP, immediately after, is a climb. So we climb up some mountain and climb down into Sassafras Gap, where Joan and I decided to get water at a blue blazed spring. Little did I know I would need some repelling gear to climb steeply down .3 miles for some water. (The down really wasn’t that bad, it’s coming back up that I dread. And it’s especially bitter when the miles don’t count. hahaha!) So we left Crystal up with our packs and we rappelled down to the spring. It was actually a nice, clean, running water spring. Joan and I took turns pumping water thru the filter and finally climbed back up to our packs. When we got to the top, there was no sign of Crystal or Buddy. We think she just decided to finish up since she was just day hiking. So Joan and I continue into camp. We look at our watch and it was only 2:30pm when we arrived into Addison Gap.

We split up to pick some nice camp spots. I choose a couple of nice trees, set up my tarp, hang my hammock, and sit in it a while to relax my feet. About an hour later, in walks Sundai and Diana! They looked pretty worn out so Joan and I help them set up their tents. I realize that their backpacks weigh a ton and that’s why they were so wiped out. Around 4pm, Laura and Lynn walk in, followed by Maggie. The Dames are starting to trickle in. While everone is setting up their tents, Diana decides to pick up some logs/sticks for a campfire and Joan and I go off to hang a couple of ropes for bear bagging. She’s never done it before and it’s one of my least favorite camp chores to do, so… yeah. I take advantage of the situation and tell Joan she should practice. hhahah! Seriously, after she weighted down one end of the rope with some twigs, she had 2 bear bag ropes up in less then 10 minutes. It was so cute to see how excited she was to get it over the tree limb. We high fived after each successful toss and she had the biggest ear to ear grin. When we got back to the campsite Diana had a nice little fire going. I helped her stack the logs around to keep the fire going and to create some really good coals. By 5:pm, I was getting a bit worried about SHOE and her group. SHOE, as the leader of the trip, held up the rear and made sure everyone made it safely to camp. It was almost completely dark when they finally pulled into camp. By this time, everyone else was pretty much set up and starting to make dinner. She went off to get water, while Joan and I put up another bear bag rope. This time I threw one up and it was pretty sloppy. Instead of redoing it like we should of, we let our stomachs take over. So off we went to make some dinner. I was starving! As everyone was making/eating dinner (SHOE and Kelly filtered water)guess who night hikes with her headlamp on into camp. Mud Butt! YAY! She is in such a cheery mood, it’s hard not to smile when you hear her. The best part, she brought in everything you need to make S’Mores!!! Whoo hoo! I walk over to hug and say hello. While she is busy setting up her camp, I go and bear bag my food.

As we are enjoying the S’mores 🙂 and chit chatting around the campfire, Jen and her family hike in. Jen works at Mountain Crossings Outfitters and attempted to thru hike last year. After they set up, they start making dinner. Talk about a yummy dinner. SHOE and I looked at one another and she says, “we are doing that next time we’re in the Smoky’s” and believe me, we are SO doing that. Jen had marinated some steak, skewered it, and cooked it on the campfire. After a while, the fire started to die out and most of us called it a night. I didn’t realize how warm the fire had kept me until I started walking back to my hammock. I checked my thermometer and it said it was around 35-40 degrees. Chilly night! I slipped on my down vest, jumped into my warm hammock, and drifted off to sleep. I slept sooo good that night. The next morning I woke up around 6:30am and just laid in my warm hammock til I heard some of the others moving around. Stay tuned for tomorrows adventure. Til then, GET OUTDOORS!

Stay tuned for part 3!!

Georgia With the Dames- Part 1

Post written by one of our favorite Dames, Sweetpea!!

Once again I zipped down to Georgia for the Trail Dames annual backpack trip! After work on Friday I hopped in my car, and headed to Kelly’s cabin to meet up with the dames. I whirled up the mountain roads up to Helen GA and this time the weather was clear, crisp, and all around perfect for a backpacking trip. (If you’ve never been to Helen,GA it’s the cutest little Alpine village type town. It reminded me of a little ski resort in the Alps.) I called SHOE to let her know I was close by and she gives me directions to the cabin. Well, Kelly has three cabins and wouldn’t you know it, I went into the only empty cabin to wait for everyone. So typical of me. hahaha! Everyone else happened to be in the first cabin. SHOE came over to rescue me and then introduced me to everyone. I met Crystal and her dog Buddy, who will only be day hiking the first section with us, Kathy and Sunny (who is really into ultralight backpacking and gave me so gear tips), Kelly, who owns all three cabins, Lynn and Laura, (mother and daughter), and Diana, whom I met last year at the Hike Inn in GA. We chit chat a bit, but since I rolled in late, everyone was ready to go to bed. SHOE and I stayed up a while just catching up. We finally decide to call it a night around 10:45pm b/c the rest of the Dames were coming up at 7:30 in the morning. I pulled out my sleeping bag and stretched out on the couch for a good nights sleep. SHOE said I must of slept well b/c she could hear me snoring away. Oops 🙂

I woke up the next morning around 7am and started packing up my stuff when a new group of Dames walk in. Sundai, Nancy, and Joan drove up this morning. In total there will be 16 of us backpacking. (Me, SHOE, Kelly, Joan, Sundai, Nancy, Kathy, Crystal, April, Mudd Butt, Sunny, Diana, Lynn, Laura, Maggie, ) Everyone finally arrived at the cabins, (except for Mudd Butt, she had to work and was hiking in to our campsite later that evening.) we loaded up all the packs and shuffled three cars up to Tray Mt. Gap. The ride up Tray mountain was on a narrow, steep, gravely, dirt road with tons of pot holes, which made for an interesting drive. 🙂 We made it to the trail head, parked the cars, got everyone situated, took the obligatory “before” picture, and started our trek to Addison Gap. Only 6.2 miles away. Tune in tomorrow to continue our adventure! Til Next time GET OUTDOORS!!!

Stay tuned for part 2!!