First Solo Jitters

Awwww...you can't be scaring the locals @LarryBoy... haha going to mess it up for everyone else! Haha jk jk

I think my most favorite hiking sing songs are probably Disney or catchy tunes from the 60s - 80s. Oh and "Tiny Bubbles" (that is literally the only 2 words I know from that song, but I sing it over and over...so Bobbi gets rightfully, very annoyed.
 
wsp_scott said:
I'll add my two cents to the conversation. I am a mostly solo backpacker at this point, it will probably change as my kids get older. I love going solo, but I also am an introvert and find people to be very tiring to be around. My wife would sometimes ask who I talked to at work that day and I would say no one, I was just in my office alone. She found that very weird :) If you are someone who thrives on other people, then you might decide that solo backpacking is not for you. This is not a failure or a character flaw, it is part of who you are, just roll with it :)
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Even though most people don't believe me, I am extremely introverted. I have a lot of social anxieties.
So, even though I have been worried about it, I feel like solo backpacking is something I will love. I just have to acknowledge my fears and not let them own my trip.
 
Rockskipper said:
I carry a little pocket recorder and like to record trip report things each day, as later I can use it to remember where I went and all that. It's fun a year or two later to listen to yourself talking all panicky in a low voice because you think there's a bear in the bushes and it turned out to be a squirrel.
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LMAO! I LOVE this. I would totally do this and laigh so hard later on. I tend to over dramatize a moment, or most people do probably, but I love to relive how silly I was being.
 
regehr said:
One thing I don't like at night is being closed up in a tent, this makes noises outside a lot more scary. Just a sleeping bag or even a bivy bag is a big improvement. I'm also a fan of very light doses of melatonin, especially on windy nights. When I've had to get up during the night after taking melatonin, this has worked just fine, it doesn't make me noticeably groggy or dull like benadryl does. Alcohol is better consumed with dinner rather than later to avoid getting up to pee and waking up dehydrated. I like being by myself. Haven't yet done a long trip on my own, but I'd like to.
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So interesting to hear! I definitely feel safer in my very thin tent that an animal could easily crash into or scratch open. Haha idk why, just feels like...my little home or bed, you know keep your entire body on the bed and the boogie man won't get you. Haha.

I take melatonin at home when my insomnia kicks in, but I have to take 30-35 mgs and as soon as it wears off, usually around 3-4am, I am wide awake. I do better with a shot or half shot of vodka, not that I think it is good for me, just what seems to help me. :sleepy2:
 
Brendan S said:
Safetywise, I feel like the risks of solo backcountry travel are fairly overblown (or at least oversimplified). There are obviously some different things to consider but I’m a pretty strong believer that people make more careless/risky choices when they are with other people vs solo. Having another person with you doesn’t replace skills or experience, but often people behave as if it does.
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I am guilty of this. When I go with friends, I feel safer, feel more invincible, and am way less cautious then when I solo 'hike'.

I might be a scaredy cat on my first solo, but I will take the time to make safe decisions at least, since I will only be able to rely on myself.
 
many of my backpacking trips were solo trips.
I actually enjoyed it a lot. My very first backpacking trip was also a solo backpacking trip and I enjoyed it a lot.
I'm highly sensitive and an introvert, so for me it was always perfect. to be on my own. I know going solo is not for everyone, but you are your own boss and can decide when and where to stop and when to get up and what to do. Love my "Me time" out somewhere
 
I am not sure I would chunk out 40 miles solo on your first trip out.

When was the last time you spent any quality time with yourself? That is the prize of solo backpacking.

This is the list that I plan by for going solo:

Make a plan and stick to it. If you wander off your destination or route, and you become overdue because you are injured or lost, it would be harder for S&R to find you. Be prepared for self rescue. You are alone out there. Don't take chances and make good choices.

Make a list to do at camp and keep yourself busy. A lot of the psychological fear we have from being alone in the wild is all in our heads. Stay busy you will feel like you are doing something, and keeps the mind from wandering in those dark places.

Make sure you have a phone, watch, or some time keeping device.

Bring some music if you pack your cell phone. Its nice at night if you have a fire to listen to a little music to pass the time before bed.

The hardest part to get over was crawling in my sleeping bag at night. Its easy to be afraid of every little bush moving, twig snapping, tree branch falling. It is not that silent where we reside, so the quiet can be deafening in the wilderness. Something we would not even notice at home sounds three times as loud out there. Every time I have gotten out of bed for some noise I was afraid might be a bear or the boogie man in my camp, it ended up being a squirrel, deer, or moose. It happens enough times that you just learn to get over it and say "fuck you squirrel!" If you have a safe camp, follow the guidelines for food storage for the area you are in, you really should not have much to worry about.

Never solo in Grizzly Country. #2cents
 
Brendan S said:
Good post and discussion with a different perspective: https://bedrockandparadox.com/2013/05/01/solo-is-safer/
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There are plenty of stories of people hiking alone who have been attacked by Grizzly Bears. The usual situation is running into a sow with cubs. Even if you keep your distance, which is recommended by the Interagency Grizzly Bear Committee of keeping a distance of 300 yds from any bear, a sow could pursue you for miles. There was a guy just two years ago who had guns and bear spray and nothing deterred the sow from nearly killing him. He almost did not make it out. The surgeons who patched him up said the amount of blood he lost put him with in a hour of death upon arriving at the ER. That guy would even tell you don't go alone in Grizzly country. The "X" factor is a Grizzly Bear that has become acclimated to viewing humans as a food source. No matter how much prep, safety, and deterrent you bring with you, that situation is a nightmare for backpackers. I tend to believe wildlife biologists who recommend not traveling alone in Grizzly country over an opinion piece online.

Side note: His section is dead wrong when it comes to traveling in avalanche terrain solo. I have my Avy 1, and some of my good friends work for the Utah Avalanche Center as forecasters. He does not even identify the most important factors in traveling in avalanche terrain. Without a partner you trust with your life, who is going to dig you out if you get buried in an avalanche? You have 15 min to get a victims airway cleared before the survival rate plummets once a burial has occurred. There was a guy backcountry skiing in the Murdock Peak area two years ago solo that was buried and killed in an avalanche. He had all the gear, but no partner, and was buried 15 ft deep and died of asphyxiation. They did not find him for two days when he was reported overdue. You have to understand terrain and slope steepness to travel solo in avalanche terrain. 99% of all avalanches occur on slopes which are 30-45 degrees in steepness. Does the author of that article even know how to tell the slope angle of the line you want to ski/ride? There is also the level of acceptable risk depending on your experience out there. I find articles like these to be more opinion based, and not full of facts or addressing the dangers from a realistic point of view. Ego is the #1 killer when it comes to the human factors in the backcountry whether you are hiking a 20 miler, or you are skinning a big line in winter.

Some confidence is a bonus. Overconfidence is a killer.

You can get it right a million times, you only have to get it wrong once to lose your life.
 
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The author of that piece (Dave Chenault) definitely "knows" the outdoors. I think his point is that the average person is more careful/safe if they are solo, i.e. they are less likely to make dumb group think decisions. So if you are alone, maybe you would not attempt that slope and would not get caught in an avalanche.

From his post "Show me 10, or 20, backcountry accidents and 9, or 19, times I’ll show you situations where bad or casual decisions got the whole mess started". There are lots of stories of people "going with the flow" thinking that someone else is on top of things and really no one is doing the thinking. Here is a great example http://www.nytimes.com/projects/2012/snow-fall/index.html it is long but very interesting even for someone who doesn't ski (me).

I don't know enough about grizzly country to address that.
 
wsp_scott said:
I don't know enough about grizzly country to address that.
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The only thing predictable about a Grizzly Bear is that they are unpredictable. I learned that from a 20 year vet ranger in Denali. It has always stuck with me because of how honest that saying is. Still applies to this day. I still live by it.
 
Dr Nebz said:
There are plenty of stories of people hiking alone who have been attacked by Grizzly Bears. The usual situation is running into a sow with cubs. Even if you keep your distance, which is recommended by the Interagency Grizzly Bear Committee of keeping a distance of 300 yds from any bear, a sow could pursue you for miles. There was a guy just two years ago who had guns and bear spray and nothing deterred the sow from nearly killing him. He almost did not make it out. The surgeons who patched him up said the amount of blood he lost put him with in a hour of death upon arriving at the ER. That guy would even tell you don't go alone in Grizzly country. The "X" factor is a Grizzly Bear that has become acclimated to viewing humans as a food source. No matter how much prep, safety, and deterrent you bring with you, that situation is a nightmare for backpackers. I tend to believe wildlife biologists who recommend not traveling alone in Grizzly country over an opinion piece online.

Side note: His section is dead wrong when it comes to traveling in avalanche terrain solo. I have my Avy 1, and some of my good friends work for the Utah Avalanche Center as forecasters. He does not even identify the most important factors in traveling in avalanche terrain. Without a partner you trust with your life, who is going to dig you out if you get buried in an avalanche? You have 15 min to get a victims airway cleared before the survival rate plummets once a burial has occurred. There was a guy backcountry skiing in the Murdock Peak area two years ago solo that was buried and killed in an avalanche. He had all the gear, but no partner, and was buried 15 ft deep and died of asphyxiation. They did not find him for two days when he was reported overdue. You have to understand terrain and slope steepness to travel solo in avalanche terrain. 99% of all avalanches occur on slopes which are 30-45 degrees in steepness. Does the author of that article even know how to tell the slope angle of the line you want to ski/ride? There is also the level of acceptable risk depending on your experience out there. I find articles like these to be more opinion based, and not full of facts or addressing the dangers from a realistic point of view. Ego is the #1 killer in the backcountry whether you are hiking a 20 miler, or you are skinning a big line in winter.

Some confidence is a bonus. Overconfidence is a killer.

You can get it right a million times, you only have to get it wrong once to lose your life.
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As wsp_scott mentioned above, Dave is about as experienced as they come (and has spent tons of nights, mostly solo, in Griz country). I've done a big trip with him (8 day loop of tech canyons and packrafting in the Grand) and I'm not sure I've met anyone as thoughtful when it comes to backcountry travel. He mentions Yellowstone data (in the comments) that it's only once a group has more than three people is it statistically more safe, so not just opinion.

As for skiiing, he's had several posts over the years that go into more detail on backcountry skiing (here's one), but he's had a couple (extremely experienced) friends die in avalanches and basically takes the stance that beacons/gear/partners/etc give a false sense of safety and if it seems completely insane to go somewhere solo then it's just probably not worth the risk at all with something as unpredictable and deadly as avalanches. I'm too obsessed with canyon country to have much relevant skiing or griz country experience but I'm sure Dave would be happy to discuss if you throw him a comment on his blog.

In all these cases, once you're in trouble it's likely better to have someone with you; the point is to avoid them in the first place an to challenge the assumption that it's a given that traveling solo is somehow more dangerous. There's a ton of widely accepted "conventional wisdom" when it comes to backcountry travel that isn't really based on anything so I feel like it's always a good exercise try to reconsider some assumptions, do some new reading/research/thinking, etc.
 
Brendan S said:
As wsp_scott mentioned above, Dave is about as experienced as they come (and has spent tons of nights, mostly solo, in Griz country). I've done a big trip with him (8 day loop of tech canyons and packrafting in the Grand) and I'm not sure I've met anyone as thoughtful when it comes to backcountry travel. He mentions Yellowstone data (in the comments) that it's only once a group has more than three people is it statistically more safe, so not just opinion.

As for skiiing, he's had several posts over the years that go into more detail on backcountry skiing (here's one), but he's had a couple (extremely experienced) friends die in avalanches and basically takes the stance that beacons/gear/partners/etc give a false sense of safety and if it seems completely insane to go somewhere solo then it's just probably not worth the risk at all with something as unpredictable and deadly as avalanches. I'm too obsessed with canyon country to have much relevant skiing or griz country experience but I'm sure Dave would be happy to discuss if you throw him a comment on his blog.

In all these cases, once you're in trouble it's likely better to have someone with you; the point is to avoid them in the first place an to challenge the assumption that it's a given that traveling solo is somehow more dangerous. There's a ton of widely accepted "conventional wisdom" when it comes to backcountry travel that isn't really based on anything so I feel like it's always a good exercise try to reconsider some assumptions, do some new reading/research/thinking, etc.
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I am glad you know this blogger personally. I'm glad you trust his skill set. I would say no one knows everything.

Yellowstone is one place. I do not think you can apply that logic in a general sense because every place you visit is going to be different and have a different risk assessment and plan for said exposure to that risk. For example, I lived and worked in Denali National Park. So I have solo'ed in Grizzly country before I knew better. The bears don't care about your party size or what data you collected. They only see you as potential opportunity, or not depending on how your luck pans out. My experience could be completely different in Yellowstone.

Both blog postings I have read from this author that were linked here in regards to touring seemed to just echo things he has read with the one you linked basically saying touring is not worth it. I disagree. What I will say is if you cannot terrain evaluate you have no business traveling in the backcountry in avalanche terrain. Especially alone. Drew Hardesty of the Utah Avalanche Center did a talk on risk a couple of years back. If you do not even know your risk profile you are doomed to get in over your head. This applies to all mountain travel. Touring has huge rewards. If he feels its not worth it that is totally fine. But I am not going to take his word as the end all when it comes to whether I do something no matter how much experience he has or what his skill set is. Simply not his place to speak for everyone nor claim to know it all.

As I mentioned in my post above "There is also the level of acceptable risk depending on your experience out there." What level of risk are you willing to expose yourself to? That is the risk profile you have to develop if you really want to dive deep into the human factors in backcountry travel.

Any advice I offered to the original author of this thread from my original post was solely based on personal experience.
 
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On one hand, you have the fact that solo travellers tend to make more conservative decisions than groups do. On the other hand, groups are better equipped to dig themselves out of the holes (sometimes literally!) they get themselves into. Which is safer? Kind of depends on the person and the group IMO.
 
LarryBoy said:
On one hand, you have the fact that solo travellers tend to make more conservative decisions than groups do. On the other hand, groups are better equipped to dig themselves out of the holes (sometimes literally!) they get themselves into. Which is safer? Kind of depends on the person and the group IMO.
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That was wonderfully succinct.
 
Not sure how I missed this gigantic thread. A lot of good advice here, especially with the InReach and always letting someone know the details of your plan before going. I always email my plans to my wife before leaving and she knows she can ignore it unless I go missing. I’ll add two more suggestions that might give you some more confidence.

- A trustworthy dog as a hiking partner. As with any relationship though, trust takes time to develop. Seems like dogs are pretty restricted out west though.

- If you are worried about being solo in questionable weather or conditions, picking a route with plenty of bailout options along the way is a good idea.
 
This has been a fun thread to read. I like being alone in the backcountry, be it land or water. Not speaking for a few days is interesting, especially when you like to talk as much as I do. A little angst (but not too much) is educational. I like having only myself and my equipment to rely on, and no one else. That is why I like my canoe trips. When the water is 50 degrees with wind and rain, is (or can) be a lot of fun when you are prepared. I have had a couple of river trips when I did not see anyone for 2 or 3 days. I can forget how screwed up things are.

Having said all of the above, I strictly avoid places where I can get eaten.
 
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