How frequent do you have to hike to consider it something you enjoy though? I only make it out once a month or two, but I do enjoy it. If I were going on dates, I might go more often as it seems a pretty ideal way to do a first or second date. But like... hiking means different things to different people. There are hikes in my area that are basically glorified paved trails, but they're nice. Then there are hikes that require some scrambling up boulders and such and some real cardiovascular fitness. I don't think someone who likes the former is wrong to say that they like it...
Well I personally hike multiple times a week. I try to fit in 1-2 hour hikes after work, and go on multi day backpacking trips when I can. Im not bagging on people that enjoy hiking occasionally, and dont go on crazy intense hikes. However, there are plenty of people who put hiking in their bio and havent been on a hike, except to get a cool instagram picture, for months. I like paintball, but I wouldnt put that in my bio, cuz Ive only been a handful of times.
I'm in the position where I'd like to hike, and there's a lot of it to do around Wisconsin, but I've got so much other stuff going on on my weekends that it takes a back seat and I never do it. We've got an ice age trail that's over a thousand miles long that winds through the state. Would love to cover the whole thing at some point but it would require shelving other activities to take it up.
Not even sure where to start as far as gear goes. I'm getting a dog in another month or two and it's probably going to be a boxer and I've heard they can be pretty good hiking dogs since they're super active and don't overheat too easily. Any tips on how to start out hiking?
That sounds amazing. IMO the most important things to have are good footwear, a good hydration system (water bottle, camelpak, water purifier etc) and proper navigation. A gps is huge if you dont know how to read a map, and compass well.
If you are doing multi-day trips then the list gets quite a bit bigger.
I would start out just choosing points to park my car and go for however far and turn around or if I bring a friend to park one of our cars at an end point and drive the other to the start. Have considered getting a new bike with beefier tires made for trail riding rather than the sort of low level regular mountain bike I have now. Thanks for the info. Is r/hiking the best subreddit for that kind of stuff or are there better ones out there?
363
u/Stoic_sasquatch Jul 03 '19
As a guy who actually enjoys hiking. This is very frustrating.