Hiker completes 6,875 mile Great Western Loop

[chumley]

This makes the Trans-Supes hike look like a daytrip. (Speaking of which ... I haven't heard anything about that trip yet)

http://www.azcentral.com/news/articles/ ... k1109.html

[Hoffmaster]

Dude, where have you been? Te-wa, nonot, wallyfarak and myself have all written trip reports on the Supes trip. Te-wa's and mine are under "Trans-Supes Spectacle" and nonot and wally's are under "Circlestone."
I'm a little surprised that nobody mentioned Andrew Skurka's feat on this site, but it has been discussed in great length on ArizonaHikers.com, mostly by the same people who frequent this site. A couple of weeks ago, a group of hikers coming out of Reavis Ranch ran into Andrew Skurka and had a nice chat with him. A day or two later te-wa and fairweather8588 met up with him near Roosevelt Lake to chat, give him some supplies, talk about a re-route to avoid part of the Mazzy's, and remedy a hiking pole situation.

Just getting you up to speed....

[chumley]

Thanks for the update. Clearly I don't spend enough time reading HAZ trip reports... I now see Circlestone on the recent trips on the home page, but never saw any trans-supes anything.

[te_wa]

the article touches on why Andy took the journey: to raise awareness to Global Warming. But the article never mentions what is possibly causing it. It became clear to me about 6 months ago... JET plane contrails. Yesterday I noticed some of them that looked from the ground an estimated 5 miles wide...I mentioned it to my wife again about how those never seemed to be there before... then I realized just how infrequently people actually look up at the sky. Remember back a few years, maybe a decade when you could watch a jet plane leave a contrail under normal weather temps and humidity, and that contrail would dissipate or dissapear within seconds. Now, go look outside and you will see contrails not only remaining for hours, but spreading out to blanket the sky in a spiderweb of "clouds". The planet is said to be 20% dimmer than a decade ago. Wonder why? Seems like a no-brainer. So what is causing these contrails to remain in our atmosphere and block sunlight? Is this for real? Please go search Google for contrails, chemtrails, etc.. and filter through the nonsense conspiracy theorys and you will find definate evidence as seen by independent testing that shows reasonable examples of "something big". Let us know what you find.

[djui5]

Global Warming is a scam!

http://media.newsbusters.org/stories/we ... am-history


Andy is my hero, jeesh! What a long trip. Those kinda hikes have to be great for the soul.

[JoelHazelton]

I don't know why some people get so bent out of shape over global warming, saying it's all a scam and whatnot. Scam or not, there's nothing wrong with putting forth effort to convserve energy. That seems pretty indisputable to me, but apparently not to others.

[te_wa]

im not aware that global warming is either a)a scam or b)a reality as caused by humans.
there is possibility that the global warming "hoax" is propogated by politicians to ensure a future carbon tax. so what? an obviously biased news source paper which is very poorly written at best is not enough to convince some that the glaciers are melting at an unbelievable rate and science has proven methods (along with visual descriptions from "laymen" such as A. Skurka) of using ice coring to determine that yes the planet is slowly growing warmer. I personally dont worry much about global warming, as it might interrupt my normal day to day life and anything that takes effort is definately not worth investigation.
My jet contrail test was directly aimed at discussion of global dimming which, btw, is a proven phenomenon as studied by the Internationl Space Station, NASA, others.
What Im curious about is to see who else has observed the longing effects of jet condensation trails and what they think the effects are on our environment particularly the wilderness I hike in!

[chumley]

JET plane contrails.

Excuse my ignorance on the subject ... and i didn't take the time to google it, but i always thought that jet contrails are caused by the turbulence in the air created by the jet "cutting" through it. that turbulence, in turn, causes the moisture in the air to condense and form "clouds" (contrails). after a period of time and stability again, the "clouds" dissipate. You'll notice that contrails are more prevalent during different weather conditions.

I think many people think that jet contrails are actually a stream of exhaust, which is just not the case (at least not on any modern planes). I can't say if the exhaust that is emitted from jet engines contributes to the creation of the "cloud" in the disturbed air.

Whatever the cause of contrails, there are more and more planes in the sky every day, and your theory makes it even more amusing when global warming activists drive their Prius down to the airport only to hop into their private jet.

[joebartels]

amusing when global warming activists drive their Prius down to the airport only to hop into their private jet.

Think of all the fuel Skurka inadvertently amassed in caching or receiving help along the way. Not to mention all the faxes (or fossil fuel electricity) this whole thing will create over the media. A few more acres of forest gone as we spiral down the quicksand of hell. Bonnie Tyler was right!

Anybody that bitches about global warming and uses fossil fuel (including electricity produced by such) isn't really helping. Case closed. Which in the US narrows it down to maybe homeless people. They're frowned upon by the bitchers.

Everybody join in!
We are the issue. We are problem. We are the ones to make a dimmer day so let's keep typing. There's a choice we're making. It's killing our own future. It's true we'll moan and groan. But in the end it's quicksand for you and me.

[Hoffmaster]

Global Warming is a scam!

http://media.newsbusters.org/stories/we ... am-history

This very well may be the first time I have agreed with an opinion of yours! Mark your calendar; we'll celebrate next year!
I heard this speech on the Glenn Beck radio show today. I thought it was awesome!

At the same time though, I agree with azpride. We don't need an invented problem as an excuse to save and conserve energy...we should be doing that anyway. But if energy is neither created nor destroyed why do we need to conserve it? Isn't it always there in the same amount? Just thought I'd throw that out there...ya know...just for fun!

[djui5]

This very well may be the first time I have agreed with an opinion of yours! Mark your calendar; we'll celebrate next year!

At the same time though, I agree with azpride.

I agree too. There is nothing wrong with conserving energy/our planet, even if we don't need to. That's why I hike, to enjoy what is left of the world we live in. 500 years from now there won't be much left I'm afraid. Not at the rate we are populating this planet.


Hope I didn't upset anyone, I didn't mean to.

[nonot]

The Earth is warming, it's hard to deny it. Icecaps and glaciers are melting, some are gone already. You can never "prove" man-made global warming. To do so, you'd need another, um, Earth to use as your control.

Whether it is because of pollution, the sun getting hotter, or some unknown reason, there is cause for concern. What happens when water sources dry up? When it gets too hot to grow food? If the sea levels rise will we have Californians and Florideans looking for new homes? Venice will become unihabitable in 50 years, unless they build their flood control gates, what will happen elsewhere you can't build gates?

The pollution man is dumping into the environment is increasing every day. Asthma, Cancer, and other worse "diseases" that will probably see in our future, are likely results of this. How does the human body respond to having increased levels of poisons in the air we breathe, the food we eat? What are the limits? Noone really knows. On the other hand, someone finally has figured out what the appendix does 2000 years after it was known it exists.

BTW, jet contrails may in fact be preventing global warming. When the skies were shut down after 9-11, and the contrails all dispersed, there was a noticeable increase in the high temps across the entire country. But, again, since it cannot be repeated unless everyone wants to shut down the skies again, you could chock it up as a fluke or a hot day.

I'm not saying everyone should go live in trees, but if we can make cars more fuel efficient or find alternate fuels (voluntary 30 mpg plus initiative, ethanol/hydrogen research), if we can create energy more efficiently (billions and billions are being spent on fusion research), if we can reduce pollution, if we can build effective mass-transit systems (Please note, I'm referring to NY and Chicago mass-transit, not the joke that is Phoenix), these are steps in the right direction. If the US could buy its energy from itself, instead of areas of the world which are less stable, there are economic and political benefits as well. Luckily, you've got the king of Saudie that doesn't care how the money is spent, and a pacified kuwait, for now, but things tend change over decades.

But people never think ahead, and noone thinks of what will happen a generation ahead, until it is too late to matter.

It will start with small changes, requiring more efficient lightbulbs (mini fluorescent) and computer power supplies (80-plus initiative), all electronic devices sold in the future will have to become power-factor compliant (PFC); your car has to pass ever stricter emissions controls, car makers will be required to increase mpg or support alternate (ethanol) fuels. Nuclear power will slowly make a come back. New Appliances that are sold will be required to be more efficient (energy-star). Energy costs will increase to discourage overuse. Water restrictions will increase (bye, bye phoenix lawns). Trash can no longer be incinerated. More money will be spent on mass-transit systems, or carpooling may be required. More forests will become protected and the US government will buy back forest land. (0.08% last year in the US). Most of these you can see already happening around the world, but what everyone is wondering is if these small changes are enough to turn the tide, or if the tide can even be controlled by anything we do.

[te_wa]

and then, theres China

[big_load]

To get back on topic, I just got out from a 4-day out-and-back on the Safford-Morenci Trail. The last person before me to register at the West TH was Andrew Skurka, a whole month earlier. I took a picture of the register for my eventual TR.