How to Train For your Hike

Now is always the best time to start training for your hike, whether you're heading off to do some Grand Canyon hiking tours, Yellowstone backpacking, Canadian Rockies hiking, or Utah camping and hiking! If you live in hilly our mountainous country, it's best to get out on a long hike with plenty of up and down at least once per week, and make your hike 5-7 hours in duration. The rest of the week make sure you're hitting the gym or trails at least 3 times.

If you don't live in hilly or mountainous country it can be a bit more difficult, but not impossible, to train sufficiently. As with the above regimen, it's best to hit the gym 3-4 times per week, but while at the gym make sure you're doing a couple days per week on the Stairmaster. By the way, I'm not talking about the elliptical trainer, I'm talking about the Stairmaster with the rotating stairs like an escalator. Start out doing 45 minutes at a slow pace and work up to doing 1 hour at a faster pace with a 20lb backpack on your back. Kitty litter makes a excellent dead weight to put in your backpack for training.

Make sure you're stretching and eating plenty of nutritious foods. To increase your metabolism, eat several smaller meals per day vs. a few larger ones. This will help you shed extra pounds of fat and build more lean muscle. Also avoid processed flour and corn products like bread, snack mixes, pancakes...etc.

Good luck training and let us know if we can help in any way! One of our goals at The Wildland Trekking Company is that your trip be a vehicle for better health as well as enjoyment.

Best,

All of us at Wildland Trekking

The Havasupai Premier Tour - NEW!

We're excited to add an innovative new trip to our Grand Canyon and Havasu Falls offerings called the Havasupai Premier Tour, and I figured it would be helpful to write a blog about it. What we've found is that many people want to see the Havasupai Waterfalls and also want to experience the world class views that the Grand Canyon is known for. The problem has always been that Havasu Falls is a minimum 2 day trip, and if you're going to do it right, it's a minimum 3 day trip, which leaves little time for the rest of the Canyon for many people. Our solution is the Havasupai Premier.

The first 2.5 days are very similar to our regular Havasu Falls Tour in that we meet in Flagstaff, drive to the trailhead at Hilltop, descend into the Falls and spend two nights there. On the third day we hike out like usual, but then we drive you to Williams, Arizona which is home of the Grand Canyon Railway and Railway Hotel, both historic features of the Grand Canyon. We enjoy a nice dinner, showers, and a night at the Railway Hotel, then the next morning we board the train! A 2 hour train ride through the Ponderosa forests drops you off at the South Rim of the Grand Canyon, where we hike you down the South Kaibab Trail to Skeleton Point and back. The South Kaibab Trail boasts the best views in the Canyon, so it's a perfect top-off to Havasu's waterfalls.

We still offer our regular 3 day Havasu Falls Tour, now called the Standard Tour, so there are two great options now! We hope you'll join us to try one of them out. You can read more at http://www.wildlandtrekking.com.

Recent Bear Attack

The recent bear attack near Yellowstone has created quite a stir, and so we have decided to post some comments on it, so our guests understand where we stand, and why we are totally convinced that venturing into grizzly country can be done safely.

Grizzly bears, like any potentially dangerous wild animal, demand respect if we are to visit their homes and not endanger ourselves or them in the process. This recent attack was quite out-of-the-ordinary since the campground was generally tidy, without food or trash laying around, and the bear seemed to be in a solely predatory mode. The investigation has revealed little so far that points to any real conclusions as to what caused her to attack the campers so aggressively. There are concerns that a photographer may have been baiting bears to lure them close, and we understand authorities are exploring this possibility.

The simple truth is that bear attacks are going to happen occasionally - very occasionally. With hundreds of millions of people having visited grizzly country in the last century, less than 150 have been killed by bears. To keep it all in perspective here are some more stats about bear attacks:

• 1 person out of 16,000 commits murder but only 1 grizzly bear out of 50,000 ever kills someone and only 1 black bear out of one million does. So people are much more dangerous than bears!

• There are about 750,000 black bears in North America and on average there is less than one black bear killing per year.

• For each person killed by a black bear attack there are 13 people killed by snakes, 17 by spiders, 45 by dogs, 120 by bees, 150 by tornadoes, 374 by lightning, and 60,000 by humans.

Other human beings remain the most significant threat regardless of where you are. By keeping a very clean camp, arming yourself and everyone in your party with pepper spray (which we do in grizzly country, always - and which has been shown to effectively repel bear attacks), and by traveling in groups with 3 or more people (which we always do), the odds of a bear attack are amazingly small - almost not even worth talking about.

So, we hope you'll join us in exploring the majesty and beauty of Yellowstone and the Canadian Rockies, and get to see one of these magnificent creatures while you're there. It's a wonderful and unforgettable experience!

Cancer Survivor Hikes Grand Canyon with Us

This is an abbreviated article from the Sunday News in Lancaster, PA, written by Jon Rutter, about Ron Callihan, a 66-year-old man who hiked the Grand Canyon with us. Lots of people hike the Canyon with us, so what's special about this gentleman? He was a recent cancer survivor and the goal of hiking the Canyon was part of what pulled him through. Note: pictures are not of Ron Callihan, but are of the same trails he hiked.

Ron Callihan, a 66-year-old Willow Street man, had recently rebounded from a life-altering bout with rectal cancer. He'd fixed on the idea of the hike as a way to confirm - and celebrate - his recovery. The journey had taken two years, and it marked a low ebb in Callihan's life.

Nine months after he was diagnosed, in November 2005, he recounted, his wife, Ann, died after cancer spread throughout her body. A large portrait of her sits on Callihan's dining-room table. Lying in bed after receiving doses of chemotherapy and

radiation, Callihan said, he didn't think he was ever going to be able to get up and go on. The treatments exhausted him so much that he couldn't work.

But, slowly, he got better and regained the 40 pounds he'd lost.

This past January, he contacted the Wildland Trekking Company, in Flagstaff, Ariz., and reserved a spot on its May 13-17 Rim to Rim hike.

I just wanted to prove to myself that I could do this, Callihan said.

In may, waking up to a spring snow storm, his group marched five miles down the Bright Angel Trail and pitched their tents at Indian Garden Campground, a leafy oasis perched on a massive plateau.

As they hiked to Bright Angel Campground on the Colorado River the next day, he gained new insight into the canyon. It actually looks prettier from the bottom, he said. Callihan's photos show fire-hued rock cliffs and mule deer browsing on desert vegetation. California condors with 11-foot wingspans sailed the azure skies.

The hikers crossed the cold, green Colorado aboard a spidery metal bridge and threw off their 35-pound packs at the campground. The trio mixed with other sojourners, including a ranger who cooled off by diving into the river, formally, with all clothing on, and some archaeologists commuting to a dig via river raft.

Erhart, who is also a writer, world traveler and commentator for National Public Radio, according to the Wildland Trekking Company Web site (www.wildlandtrekking.com), pointed out fauna and flora.

She knew every flower, every bug, every rock, said Callihan, who added that they saw scorpions but none of the Grand's famous sidewinder rattlesnakes.

On her day off she went on a hike, he said of the guide.

A meditative stillness reigned. At night, the dry air was luminescent.

It was almost a full moon, Callihan recalled, and down in the canyon it was like dawn.

After a day's layover at Phantom Ranch, the group tackled the climb to the North Rim via the North Kaibab Trail.

The group stayed the fourth night at the Cottonwood Campground, on Bright Angel Creek, partway up to the North Rim. The next day, with Callihan setting the pace, they polished off the final seven miles in less than six hours.

I'd sooner go uphill than downhill, which is harder for a backpacker to negotiate because of the extra momentum, Callihan said.

At the top, he said, We all shook hands and gave each other high- fives.

Soon, it was time to bid goodbye and return - by vehicle - 4 1/2 hours to the South Rim.

From Phoenix the next day, Callihan flew home to his job as a paperhanger and painter at Willow Valley Retirement Community.

First, though, he phoned his cheering section back home - his daughter, Paula Brewer, of Lancaster, and her children, Rebekah, 11, and Evan, 9.

He was very active and fit before he was diagnosed with cancer, Brewer said.

Seeing her father recover and accomplish the canyon hike has been gratifying, she added.

I'm just proud that he did it.

So, of course, is Callihan, who trained for the challenge by filling a borrowed backpack with 40 pounds of dumbbells and trooping around the Pinnacle Overlook (near Holtwood) and Mount Gretna.

The result: no blisters. No aches. No pains. No problems, either, with the 8,300-foot altitude of the North Rim.

Callihan said he was thrilled by the Western tour, which he deemed worth every cent of the $1,050 trip fee.

We had a great time. I would do it again tomorrow.

Short Tutorial on Map and Compass Use

Being proficient with a map and compass is an important skill for our guides, particularly the ones who are leading trips that go off trail. One of our goals for the future is to incorporate more off trail hiking - you know you're truly in the wilderness if when you hike for days and finally come to a trail you feel like you're back in civilization!

So here is a brief tutorial on the steps for using a map and compass effectively. Before you set off on your off-trail adventure, it's best to practice your map and compass skills in the front country.

Map to Terrain

1. Set declination (the declination is the degree to which magnetic north differs from true north, which varies based on where you are and will be noted on your map)
2. Put straightedge of compass baseplate on your location and your destination – point direction of travel arrow (etched arrow on top of baseplate) in desired travel direction.
3. Line up orienting lines inside compass housing so they are aligned vertically and parallel with true north, south lines on map
4. Make sure north on compass dial faces north on map
5. Remove compass from map and “box” magnetic arrow needle
6. With needle boxed, follow direction of travel arrow

Terrain to Map (triangulation)

1. Set declination
2. Shoot an azimuth (the direction in degrees the feature is from you) to known landscape feature (magnetic arrow needle will be boxed)
3. Put compass baseplate on known landscape feature on map and turn entire compass until orienting lines inside compass
4. Housing are aligned vertically and parallel with north, south lines on map – make sure north on compass is pointing is facing north on map – disregard magnetic needle now – it won’t be boxed
5. Draw line along baseplate straightedge – your location is somewhere on that line
6. To pinpoint location, repeat process on 2 or 3 more landscape points

It Aint All or Nothin'

In the world of hiking the Grand Canyon, "having it all" would probably mean doing the Rim to Rim hike. Starting on either the North Rim or the South Rim, you hike down to the Colorado River and back up the other side, finishing at the opposite rim. On a Rim to Rim tour, you get to experience the fullness of the Canyon. The North Rim is more than 1000 feet (300 meters) higher than the South Rim, so the rims themselves are quite different. And of course the Colorado River is over a mile deep from the North Rim, which means you're going from a mountain environment to the climate of Phoenix.

However, the truth is that you don't have to do all of that to have an incredible time on an overnight hike at the Grand Canyon. You actually don't even have to get down to the Colorado River. Horseshoe Mesa is one of my favorite trips, and it doesn't get

anywhere near the bottom of the Canyon. Descending the historic Grandview Trail - which was built by a miner in the 1800s - you hike down, down, down until you get to Horseshoe Mesa.

The mesa is a wonderful peninsula extending out over the empty space of the Canyon, like the deck of a battleship. It has some truly stunning views. Once at the mesa, we set up camp and then it's off to explore all the mesa has to offer!

Horseshoe Mesa is home to the only cave in the Grand Canyon that guests are allowed to explore, and it' s a blast. Scattered across the south side of the mesa are the artifacts of the miners who once worked there, and there's even an old miner's cabin.

Down the west side of the mesa is Cottonwood Creek, an oasis in the desert, which makes a

great day hike. And down

the east side of the mesa is Hance Creek, the trail to which plunges off the mesa in steep, exciting switchbacks. Hance Creek makes for a long, very exciting day hike.

So, while going all the way to the river is fantastic, there are many ways to enjoy the Grand Canyon. Horseshoe Mesa is just one of several options that don't go all the way. Others are Havasu Falls and of course our guided day hikes. But no matter what you choose, you'll have the adventure of a lifetime!

Spring is Coming to the Grand Canyon!

We've had several tours in the last month filled with courageous guests who have braved icy trails and snow storms, but the welcome, first signs of Spring have arrived. For the next 10 days, there are only two days with any precipitation forecast, and they're both for light rain and snow only at the Rims. The forecasted high today is 63 degrees fahrenheit! The snow is melting rapidly, and the Canyon is warming up. For guests and hikers heading into the Canyon in the next 10 days, things are good.

In southern Arizona the desert is literally covered with green grass in places. It's a lovely change from the sandy, barren soils of usual. So for people shuttling up from Phoenix, you're in for a treat as you drive from the green, grassy desert into the spring time mountains. And our wildflowers should be just around the corner!

Fossil Mystery Solved in the Canadian Rockies

What makes the Burgess Shales in the Canadian Rockies special is that they contain fossilized soft tissues of animals, and how exactly this happened has baffled scientists since the fossils' discovery in 1909. Normally fossilized remains are only of the "hard" parts of animals - the bones, teeth, shells...etc. But at the Burgess Shales, the finer details of the animals are present because their soft tissue is intact.

This soft tissue evidence has allowed scientists to discover and name animals they had no idea ever existed and that bare very little resemblance to anything else they've discovered. They discovered an animal with 5 eyes and a vacuum cleaner-like snout, a crustacean with fins, a worm-like being with pincers and 7 pairs of symmetrical spines, and many other truly fascinating animals.

What the scientists now believe happened is that these animals were covered very quickly by a large slide of mud and pushed so deep in to the ocean that they couldn't undergo the normal processes of decay. So they remain beautifully intact, have given scientists a wealth of information, and given the rest of us one more interesting thing to enjoy about the mountains!

Firearms in Yellowstone

In February 2010, a law was passed that will allow firearms in Yellowstone for people who can legally possess firearms in the states of Wyoming, Montana, and Idaho. Firing of firearms and hunting is still strictly prohibited inside the park.

At the Wildland Trekking Company we don't allow firearms on our tours for obvious liability reasons. Instead we incorporate smart, proven systems for safely visiting areas with grizzly bears and other wildlife. All of our Yellowstone and Canadian Rockies tours carry several cans of bear spray, which has been shown to more effectively propel bear attacks than sidearms. We keep very clean camps and hang our food, which is the most effective way to avoid bear encounters. Most importantly, we travel in small groups, and there isn't a single documented incident of a grizzly bear attack on a group of 4 or more.

We love seeing wildlife on our tours, and seeing a grizzly bear is something you will never forget. Our systems provide a context for enjoying wildlife and doing it in as safe a way as possible.

Flagstaff and the Grand Canyon Getting Hammered!

The Colorado Plateau has been hammered by snow storm after snow storm this winter. Another one is on its way starting tonight and snowing into Monday. For those of you heading out soon, know that the winter weather only extends about a mile down into the Canyon. As you hike down, you'll soon be out of the snow. We provide crampons for your boots near the rim because it can get icy. What's amazing is that at the bottom of the Canyon the temperatures are similar to Phoenix, so while it could be snowing at the top, the bottom can be in the 70s!

Also, this wet winter is GREAT news for wildflower enthusiasts! It's in wet winters that the spring flowers come out strong, so those of you joining us in March and April for Grand Canyon tours, you're in for a treat!

Yellowstone and Canadian Rockies

Arguably some of the most wild and beautiful country in the Rockies, Yellowstone and the Canadian Rockies are really just a day's travel from anywhere in the US or Canada. With AMAZING hiking, incredible wildlife, and unsurpassed scenery they are beckoning the adventurers of the world to them!

Welcome to our new blog!

We're excited to add this blog as a feature to our new website. Thanks for visiting! This picture is on one of our camps along the New Hance to Grandview Trail.