Читать книгу Packing and Portaging - Dillon Wallace - Страница 1

ORDINARILY the verb to pack means to stow articles snugly into receptacles, but in the parlance of the trail it often means to carry or transport the articles from place to place. The pack in the language of the trail is the load a man or horse carries.

Likewise, a portage on a canoe route is a break between navigable waters, over which canoe and outfit must be carried; or the word may be used as a verb, and one may say, "I will portage the canoe," meaning "I will carry the canoe." In the course of the following pages these terms will doubtless all be used in their various significations.

Save for the few who are able to employ a retinue of professional guides and packers to attend to the details of transportation, the one chief problem that confronts the wilderness traveler is that of how to reduce the weight of his outfit to the minimum with the least possible sacrifice of comfort. It is only the veriest tenderfoot that deliberately endures hardships or discomforts where hardships and discomforts are unnecessary. Experienced wilderness travelers always make themselves as comfortable as conditions will permit, and there is no reason why one who hits the trail for sport, recreation or health should do otherwise.

In a description, then, of the methods of packing and transporting outfits the tenderfoot and even the man whose feet are becoming calloused may welcome some hints as to the selection of compact, light, but, at the same time, efficient outfits. These hints on outfitting, therefore, I shall give, leaving out of consideration the details of camp making, camp cookery and those phases of woodcraft that have no direct bearing upon the prime question of packing and transportation on the trail.

Let us classify the various methods of wilderness travel under the following heads: 1. By Canoe; 2. With Saddle and Pack Animals; 3. Afoot in Summer; 4. On Snowshoes; 5. With Dogs and Sledge. Taking these in order, and giving our attention first to canoe travel, it will be found convenient further to subdivide this branch of the subject and discuss in order: (a) The Canoe and its Equipment; (b) Camp Equipment for a Canoe Trip; (c) Personal Equipment; (d) Food; (e) The Portage.