Post Apocalypse Tripping World

[Black_Fly]

I'm hoping widespread testing will get outdoor activities reopen. Mail order permits and licenses should be the first steps, easily doable without reopening restaurants and hotels. Campgrounds will be the biggest impediment, but not impossible with rigorous sanitation procedures.

 

[Iskweo]

Same problem here as Doug pointed out. The hordes from the city are swarming the hiking trails...yoiu cant even find a place to park at the trailheads. They are all clustered up and snuggling at the picnic tables spreading their bio bug cornicopia amongst each other. If the pandemic would kill these dumb asses off I might learn to live with that. But it wont. It will kill old ladies with bad hearts, or diabetes and asthma.
I cant even visit my GF or daughter right now as we all live in different places hours apart and have immune deficient household members we are protecting. I cant be with my people. Thats the tough part.

 

[Odyssey]

Family Matters in this New Age

Our annual Good Friday family day hike and dinner replaced with Skype on laptops and phones followed by dinners alone. An unwelcome change.
Feeling a little sci-fi standing a few feet from their doors leaving Easter Sunday treat bags on door handles and waving hellos goodbyes through a solid pane of glass. Pain of glass.
Our son flies via military and commercial air home tomorrow from the far reaches of the southern hemisphere after hopscotching from isolation to isolation, to return to the bosom of family isolation. Body temps recorded in every port of call. But at least he'll be home. Wherever we call home it's always a good place to be.
I'm self-adjusting my attitude to accept distance from loved ones. Pretending I'm living miles apart, too many miles to permit a visit spontaneous or planned. Calling it my temporary vacation from the world whilst living here at home. And soon we'll be together once again. What stories to tell?

"Absence doth sharpen love,
presence strengthens it."

- William Shakespeare

 

[gumpus]

The Michigan stay at home order was just revised to ban powerboats and jet skis while allowing canoes, kayaks and sailboats.

 

[Guest]

I am not even thinking tripping right now. As much as I enjoy the preparation and planning and map reading and arrangement making, that fun-while-it-happens stuff is a lot less enjoyable when a trip is cancelled.

I made all the plans, preparations and shuttle arrangements for a multi-day down river family trip. Had everything packed or staged except last minute food. And watched the river gauge go higher and higher, and the watershed rain forecast change for the worse every day.

Flood stage and still heading straight up? That’s a big nope.

We completely changed plans, heading a couple hundred miles east instead of a couple hundred miles west, and waited a day for crap weather to clear. That mountains to Atlantic change meant different everything; boats (4 canoes already racked on the van), paddles, clothes and shoes.

Four boats off, four different boats on. Paddles too. Clothes and sleeping bags, tarp and everydamnthing. Including taking two vehicles for a self shuttle.

It was a wonderful and memorable family trip, and the hurried re-planning was at least familiar-venue easy. The packing, unpacking and repacking was little fun.

I am not making and long-term tripping plans just yet. I do need to get out on the water soon, but local restrictions, closed put-ins and other no-goes are piling up faster than I can keep track.

I think Gerald is on target timewise. Or I hope so; reopening prematurely, without thoroughly testing for infection or antibodies, seems like a recipe for a 2[SUP]nd[/SUP] wave, and would likely mean subsequent shut downs.

As tripping destinations re-open I have no idea what to expect, overrun by paddlers shaking off their desperation canoeing Jones, or filling slowly as visitors cautiously return? It’s gonna be summer at best; not my favorite tripping time locally, and that rules out heading much further south.

I am envious of folks who live on or near open paddlable waters. I never before wanted waterside property, for various erosion, rising sea level or dockage issues. And there was the sour grapes price and taxes unaffordability hereabouts

I’ll be keeping an eye out on what re-opens when locally. As re-openings happen where you paddle please let us know how it was, and any restrictions when you went.

 

[Erica]

We set up our Yukon trip last fall. We have purchased airline tickets and reserved shuttles, float planes, etc. We still plan to go if the border is open. Mid-July.

 

[PaddlingPitt]

We set up our Yukon trip last fall. We have purchased airline tickets and reserved shuttles, float planes, etc. We still plan to go if the border is open. Mid-July.

Where are you planning to paddle in the Yukon? More details, please.

 

[Erica]

We are planning to paddle the Upper Liard River starting at Caribou Lake and paddling down to the Alcan Highway, I think it is. It is supposed to be a 10 day trip, but we are taking 14 days on the water to have plenty of time to explore, rest, fish, contemplate what is around us.

Originally this was planned as a solo trip for me, so I had researched a lot to try to find a river with few portages and not much in the way of white water so that I could enjoy the trip. And one that is not much paddled. It looks like the Upper Liard only has a few groups on it per season.

It's quite a bit different, as has been noted before, to coordinate varying preferences of people paddling together. I'm happy with minimal food, eating the same easy thing over and over again, and he isn't. So we are planning actual meals. At least some actual meals. Maybe we will catch a lot of fish.

We are both stern paddlers when paddling tandem. So we had to work that out. I will be in the bow because I have been trying to learn how to use the front half of the boat in my solo tripping skills. We did a long weekend on the Peace River and it went pretty well.

I'm also a traveler that never uses a fire, unless actually needed for warmth or to dry out things. He likes to have an evening fire. This may all be moot if there is a fire ban.

Just examples of two people adjusting to each other's style and preference. It is going remarkably well considering the potential for trouble.

 

[duNord]

We have a trip to the Snake River in the Yukon scheduled for mid-July. I'm not optimistic that the trip will happen and given the uncertainty surrounding the pandemic at this point, I'm kind of hoping that it doesn't. I'd hate to get out there and have one or more people become sick (we have a group of six people).

We can supposedly get our money back for what we've already paid for hotels and charter flights. I haven't contacted them yet, but the outfitter's terms and conditions say that the 25% downpayment we made for canoe rentals and shuttles is non-refundable.

Our biggest outlay so far is for non-refundable commercial airline tickets for our flights to/from Whitehorse. If we cancel, we're out over US$800 each for the tickets. If the airline cancels, I'm hoping we'll get something back. I'm sure the airlines will fight tooth and nail to not have to refund cash. At best, I figure they may offer vouchers. But since airline vouchers often have to be used within 1 year of when you purchased the ticket, that doesn't really do much good since it's not like we can do a canoe trip in the Yukon in the winter.

 

[yellowcanoe]

We have a trip to the Snake River in the Yukon scheduled for mid-July. I'm not optimistic that the trip will happen and given the uncertainty surrounding the pandemic at this point, I'm kind of hoping that it doesn't. I'd hate to get out there and have one or more people become sick (we have a group of six people).

We can supposedly get our money back for what we've already paid for hotels and charter flights. I haven't contacted them yet, but the outfitter's terms and conditions say that the 25% downpayment we made for canoe rentals and shuttles is non-refundable.

Our biggest outlay so far is for non-refundable commercial airline tickets for our flights to/from Whitehorse. If we cancel, we're out over US$800 each for the tickets. If the airline cancels, I'm hoping we'll get something back. I'm sure the airlines will fight tooth and nail to not have to refund cash. At best, I figure they may offer vouchers. But since airline vouchers often have to be used within 1 year of when you purchased the ticket, that doesn't really do much good since it's not like we can do a canoe trip in the Yukon in the winter.

Kind of a personal decision. If you get sick you probably got it at home. Depends on where you live. If it were me in a low population density area I would not hesitate to go. I did the Snake from Duo Lakes to Ft Mc Pherson twenty years ago . An awesome trip.

At home I am just waiting for the North Maine Woods to open and I am gone. I see virtually no one from day to day and am not worried at all. Other folks have to see lots from day to day so decisions will differ.

 

[Cheeseandbeans]

Hey duNord-I got a credit from United for tickets I had planned at the end of June. They gave me two years to use the money towards another trip. May be worth inquiring if you don’t go.

Bob

 

[Black_Fly]

We have a trip to the Snake River in the Yukon scheduled for mid-July. I'm not optimistic that the trip will happen and given the uncertainty surrounding the pandemic at this point, I'm kind of hoping that it doesn't. I'd hate to get out there and have one or more people become sick (we have a group of six people).

We can supposedly get our money back for what we've already paid for hotels and charter flights. I haven't contacted them yet, but the outfitter's terms and conditions say that the 25% downpayment we made for canoe rentals and shuttles is non-refundable.

Our biggest outlay so far is for non-refundable commercial airline tickets for our flights to/from Whitehorse. If we cancel, we're out over US$800 each for the tickets. If the airline cancels, I'm hoping we'll get something back. I'm sure the airlines will fight tooth and nail to not have to refund cash. At best, I figure they may offer vouchers. But since airline vouchers often have to be used within 1 year of when you purchased the ticket, that doesn't really do much good since it's not like we can do a canoe trip in the Yukon in the winter.

Are the plane tickets transferrable?

 

[lowangle al]

Are the plane tickets transferrable?

I pretty sure they are not transferable.

 

[Steve in Idaho]

Once again, I have to ignore this misuse of the word "apocalypse". No one ever looks up what it actually means. But anyway....

We had a family trip planned for six weeks in Alaska, by way of RV's and the Marine Highway. Had to cancel reservations when the AMH started dropping service to ports we had scheduled, and with Canada closing the border.

My "big adventure" backup plan now is Bowron Lakes....if that opens up by late summer. In the meantime, I have two or three options as a canoe poler, that will definitely be open to me in Idaho and possibly another in Wyoming. One coming up soon on the Owyhee River system nearby.

No public land is closed here, other than the parks....which I mostly avoid anyway. I have noticed the same as Doug with crowds at the popular accesses. The local lake where I paddle for exercise has been a zoo at the boat ramps, which opened up on 04/20. Until then, I had the whole 9800 acre lake almost to myself. It's still pretty unpopulated at my preferred access points though (you know - the ones you can't launch a Wake Boat from). Most available trips that I know in my area are three or four days at the most, but I can stretch a poling adventure into about a week in some cases. The Owyhee River at Three Forks being one of those.

First thing coming up though is an overnighter on the Weiser River. No reason to skip that, the way my state is going.

 

[Black_Fly]

Apocalypse. Apocalypse. Apocalypse.

 

[Steve in Idaho]

Apocalypse. Apocalypse. Apocalypse.

That actually works - as an introduction.

 

[yellowcanoe]

Still waiting. Pretty sure that we will discourage tourists and that the North Maine Woods will be open especially if we self shuttle. The Canada Border is iffy: would love to be paddling in Labrador and Quebec (Manicougan ) Meanwhile we find peace at home. We paddled some ten miles on our local lake system enjoying the company of loons and fishermen. Absent are the out of staters with overpowered boats. Sat half an hour just listening to the sound of running water at a beaver dam and watching the eagles.

 

[Black_Fly]

Apocalypse (def): an event involving destruction or damage on an awesome or catastrophic scale.

 

[PaddlingPitt]

Fair enough, Black Fly. But that was not the original meaning. More like a modern, common meaning. Sort of like “decimate,” whose original, and “literal” meaning differs markedly from today’s intended meaning.

 

[Black_Fly]

Granted, this is not really an apocalypse. I have no doubt mankind will face a self-inflicted one someday. The resulting world will be a mess. Nuclear power plants will melt down, cities will be dead canyons of garbage, roads will be clogged. Nature will take over and adapt, but it will never be the beautiful blue marble it was. If aliens ever visit they will not stay, as it will repel and disgust them.