[pct-l] Hiking the PCT wihout a shelter?

[Bob Bankhead]

Carry no shelter of any kind for the entire PCT? How good are your wilderness survival skills? Unless you have experience building and using adequate weather-resistant shelters made from only available materials, you'd be extremely ill-advised to try it.

There are VERY few shelters still standing on the PCT.  I can remember only two north of Yosemite NP:  South Brown Mountain shelter in Oregon section B and Camp Urich in WA section I. Both are maintained and reliable. Most of the others have long ago been torn down or have simply fallen down due to neglect and/or vandalism. 

Wandering Bob
  ----- Original Message ----- 
  From: Terry Norton 
  To: Scott Polewach 
  Cc: pct-l at backcountry.net 
  Sent: Tuesday, November 28, 2006 7:56 PM
  Subject: Re: [pct-l] Hiking the PCT wihout a shelter?


  Hiking without some form of emergency shelter is reckless.  Rain in
  Oregon and Washington can be unrelenting!

  BUT...Dare I say it?  You could have a very lightweight emergency
  shelter.  Consider something like a 1.5 mil thick plastic "painters
  tarp."

  I know several guys who hiked the AT without any form of shelter.
  They employed several strategies:

  - Stop early on rainy days at a shelter
  - Hike on to another shelter if full
  - Ask for a tent/tarp from people in the shelter if they won't make room.

  These are all based on the shelter system on the AT.

  cheers,
  terry
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