Re: [pct-l] Yogi & Booboo

[Karl Brandt <brandt@snf.Stanford.EDU>]

On Mon, 12 Oct 1998, Tom Sweetnam wrote:

> ...and speaking of rangers
> 
> Did anyone else see the Yosemite ranger interviewed on The Outdoor Channel
> yesterday, who said that bears are doing $500,000,000 (that's right!! half a
> billion dollars !!)  in damage to cars in the park every year? Wow!

Uhhh...no way. Either that ranger was mixed up or you didn't hear them
correctly. If you figure that the bears are only active for 6 months
out of the year and it cost, let's say $2000/car to repair, that would
mean roughly 350 cars per day are getting thrashed. Even $500,000
strikes me as a bit high. I suspect that ranger may have been tempted
to exaggerate a bit in the hopes that the shock value would get people
to behave better. 

I was just in Yosemite this past weekend and can report that my
hatchback is still in tact and that I saw no cars that had the been
opened like a tin can by bears. Maybe I was too busy hiking... :)

> And in other news, I just spent a week hiking the Lost Coast Trail (blister
> beach) and the upper King's Range, and I'm here to tell you, that that West
> Point study hyped on CNN which said that people who put deodorant on their feet
> will get far fewer blisters...is all wet (it didn't do much for their smell
> either). Anyway, I'm convinced, after 25 years of backpacking, that there is NO
> 100% preventative measure for blisters. They're as inevitable as flying
> hatchback doors in Yosemite National Park.

I'm hoping to get back to the Lost Coast soon. Is the Punta Gorda
lighthouse still there? I've heard that the town of Shelter Cove is
going to move it soon. That'd be too bad IMO. There's something
magical about visiting an abandoned lighthouse all alone. 

As far as blisters go, keep trying different combinations of socks,
boots and whatever. I used to be convince that blisters were a fact of
life too. There may be no 100% cure but you can do a good job of
minimizing them. Now that I've found a combination of boots and socks
that work for me, I only get blisters while breaking in boots. After
that, I don't get any.

-Karl

*********************************************************************
Karl "Birdman" Brandt PCT97 LT98                       (650) 725-3686
http://www-leland.stanford.edu/~kbrandt/

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