summer tramp. two cups of coffee before I started, drinking sugared cordial from a small bottle on the track. eating nuts raisins and chocolate, walking up a mountain in mid twenties heat in the sun... big dehydration problem.... couldn't get down to the river fast enough..
last time I ever drank coffee before a trip, last time I ever drank cordial. in the future took far more water. avoided eating too much dry food on a hot day...
Continual cramping of my quads on the 3 passes,started halfway to Harman Pass and continued while slogging up Whitehorn Pass.Nothing worked,so took an eternity to get to the top...then I remembered I had some of that cramp stop spray stuff in my first aid kit.Doh.
all those years carting around heavyweight winter gear in the middle of summer, wearing heavy wool tops in summer, wondering why I had prickly heat down my back..
Wearing a short sleeve polypro top in mid summer and nearly cooking myself on a steep climb up Golden Crown Ridge in the Ruahines. Didn't take any sunblock so couldn't go shirtless. Came very close to heatstroke that day and now only wear a very light baselayer no matter what the weather (I usually run hot anyway).
Assuming female dog walkers have common sense. I learnt that one a long time ago and am constantly reminded on a almost daily basis.
Not taking a camera with me on most of the tramping, climbing & work trips I did back in the 70's & 80's!
Not taking enough water for an overnight bivvy on Mount Alford. Refilled my water bottle at the last stream I saw, but that was an hour below the summit. Drank most of it on the way up (hot day) despite knowing I would need it later. When I got to the top, I had enough water for a single serve BCC meal and a quarter cup of coffee. My dessert? Dark chocolate :(. By the morning my mouth was as dry as the gravel I slept on. That first drink at the stream on the way down, and first cup of coffee, sure was good :)
The really awful part of this story was that I had stood in Darfield Four Square on the way to the tramp, looking at a 2.5 litre bottle of water, before deciding not to buy it because it looked too heavy to cart up the mountain.
Leaving too much dishwashing liquid in my water bottle. Yuck.
Also (another trip), loaning my spare 1L bottle to someone else who hadn't bought one, then drinking far too much in the first hour of a long, summer day with no more water. The offered the bottleback to me mid-afternoon, which was awesome because there was about 200mls in the bottom, but then proceeded to empty it into their mouth in front of me before handing it over. :)
This post has been edited by the author on 17 February 2015 at 13:50.
tramping with a lightweight tramping freak, who did everything to avoid taking group gear and needed to loan gear from us at the hut and then gave it back before moving on,, he broke out a can of coke half way into the three day trip... he did actually take the stove at the start of the trip and said he'd race ahead and get a brew on.... later on he came up behind me having lost is way to the hut, he promptly gave the stove back to me before taking on a big climb up to the mountain ridge
taking a softshell jacket on a tramp I knew there was going to be torrential rain on... and believing the reviews it was as good as a waterproof jacket..... some places in the world must have a rather different definition of the words waterproof and rain to the NZ definition....
