[pct-l] Plea for Fire Safety 2014

[Paint Your Wagon]

I’m going to be responsible for my actions. If there is a fire restriction, and I’m sure there will be multiple areas where there will be restrictions, 
I will comply. 

If I am in a campground where fires are permitted, and where the ground is bare, and where a fire ring is present, and where dead fuel is available, 
and where water is available, then, and only then, if I want to have a fire, or join a group that has a fire, I will exercise the privilege to do so. 

I will also do away with illegal fire rings when I encounter them out on the trail. 

If a cat stove is considered to be of a design lacking a shut off valve, and they are, and they are restricted, and they are, 
then I will not use them. FWIW: I don’t use them anyway, but I know others that do, even when they are restricted. I wish they didn’t. 

I use an Optimus stove with isobutane/propane fuel mix. I’ll clear an area sufficient to prevent an inadvertent fire. 
I’ll have multiple quarts/liters of water at hand for dousing any fire that emulates from my hands while heating up a meal. 
I don’t use open fire to cook; just a gas stove with a shut off function.
I have went stove-less and in the end wished that I didn’t. 

In 2012, and 2013, the CA. Fire- fire edicts, for a fire permit, required a shovel be available if a fire is started. 
How many hikers followed that requirement? 
I carried a lightweight aluminum one and enjoyed near nonstop mockery. 
A cat hole trowel was offered as being a kind of shovel that is acceptable, 
but I doubt anyone cleared an area 5’ around a fire with a potting spade trowel.

What is called for is personal responsibility and stewardship. 

I can’t tell you, the reader, how many hikers that may have walked past a two burner stove and plate apparatus, 
that came from a kitchen stove and laid off the trail about 7 feet, just north of Scissors Crossing, in the San Felipe Hills, 
which I carried to Warner Springs (about 33 miles). I also found a Gatorade rubber liter bottle in those same hills, 
that someone had dropped onto the trail, and had been tossed into the brush just off the trail, 
likely thrown there by a passing hiker trailing along, instead of picking the thing up. North of Pinchot Pass, 
a hiker found a horseshoe and set it up on a rock for others to see as they passed by, 
or it was miraculously dropped on the perch by a passing animal and remained unnoticed by others travelling north. 
None of the JMT hikers that I met heading south, elected to collect the shoe. I grabbed it as I passed by and carried it to Muir Trail Ranch. 

I’ve picked up trash left in a fire ring that wasn’t burned, but was held down by a rock and the critters in the area scattered it about, 
tipping me off to the garbage dumped nearby. 

Not looking for a pat on the back, or a star by my name, but to say that it’s not all Skittles, rainbows, and butterflies out there. 
Some of the biggest offenders are, in my humble opinion, those that are trying to shed those pounds and the leave no trace ethos gets in the way, 
or just gets ignored. 

<>Paint<>