[pct-l] Scott Williamson's Worksops

[Jon Danniken]

 "Steve Courtway" wrote:
> Jealous Jon:
>
> I'm sure Scott values his time, hopefully others do as well.

You can call me whatever names you want to if it makes you feel better about 
yourself, Steve. The reason I am vocal about this issue is that some people 
are hellbent upon insinuating their own social vision upon this trail, and I 
cannot stand idly by without expressing my strong distaste for such 
activities.

This trail, the Pacific Crest Trail, has meant something very special to me 
for many years; it is, in fact, the trail upon which I took some of my first 
solo trips back in the eighties, when I was first learning the difference 
between my ass and a hole in the ground.

When I see certain individuals who view the trail as nothing more than a big 
frat party, or who wish to sell it out to people who are not backpackers 
(but who are eager to spend $$$ on "experience" instead of learning things 
from a lifelong love of backpacking), I have no choice but to speak out.

Twenty years ago I would see maybe a half-dozen people during the "busy" 
time along the PCT. This last year, during a section hike, I saw well over 
several dozen people.

The inevitable increase in the number of people who hike the trail will 
happen on it's own, unfortunately, but those people who actively encourage 
it, either through their own egotistical vanity, or for their own profit (or 
both) are what I see as detrimental to the experience which, ironically, 
most of them were once able to experience on the trail back when they first 
hiked it.

Depriving people of the learning experience itself, the sense of 
accomplishment gained only through years of devotion to backpacking and 
outdoor pursuits, is a very selfish thing, and furthermore to fill the trail 
with such people is disengenuous to those of us who have devoted ourselves 
to the experiences of backpacking far off in the woods away from the crowded 
masses that inhabit our currently overcrowded world.

As I have suggested before, perhaps those people who seek the notoriety, 
fame, and profit of building up social structures should form a softball 
league or something similar, and leave the experience of hiking the PCT to 
those of us who seek our own backpacking experience, off in the woods, with 
other backpackers.

Jon