[pct-l] Watch

[brick@fastpack.com (Brick Robbins)]

At 04:24 PM 2/22/01 , Slyatpct@aol.com wrote:
>While I agree to actually know the time really doesn't matter, on the trail a
>watch can come in handy.

Actually I used my watch quite a bit to figure out where I was going to camp.

When I started out each day, I didn't have any fixed plan on where to stop. 
As the day waned, I'd figure out how far I had come, how long it took and 
how similar the terrain was to what I'd been hiking on, look a the 
guidebook and decide how much further I'd be before dark.

I also found that on cloudy days, or in heavy tree cover, my guestimate of 
how long till dark was usually way off.  At half hour before dark I would 
stop, good place or not.

In the desert, where I wanted to start hiking before sunrise (and rest at 
mid day) I even used (god forbid) the alarm.

-Brick