This will be short and sweet, as I don’t presume to know what’s best for you. I’m not going to get specific on how to work out or tell you “if you don’t eat your meat you can’t have any pudding.” But as a novice who became more experienced and knowledgeable, I do want to share some thoughts about what I’ve learned. This is really just advanced common sense.
✦ Mind
As I intimated earlier, the initial impact of being in the wilderness, particularly on a wild river, can be somewhat of a shock. Hopefully, the experiences I recounted about our rafting trips will help you in approaching your journey with your eyes open, fully prepared, and eagerly awaiting the adventure of a lifetime. The same applies for hiking. Be ready for an encounter with extremes: altitude, temperature, aridity, elevation change, possible apex predators, and the disorienting incomprehensibility of the place.
Adopting the right mindset is understandably challenging when you haven’t done this before. As you may have gathered, these are not vacations to kick back and hit the smorgasbord or to be entertained. It’s an experience of immersion and learning, as much about yourself as about the wilderness. Consuming high quality information ahead of time will help you to not only set your expectations, but also point you to the more subtle but awesome sights to watch out for that would otherwise escape your attention.
For instance, for Grand Canyon rafting and hiking, two references provide a really good sense of the river and the canyon: Belknap’s Grand Canyon River Guide and the book Over the Edge, Death in the Grand Canyon. The river guide will take you river-mile by river-mile through the canyon with all of its rapids, geology, and historical milestones. The book recounts in lurid and fascinating detail all the ways in which people have died in Grand Canyon, but more importantly, advises how to avoid getting into trouble in the first place. It also contains a rich history of John Wesley Powell’s groundbreaking 1869 expedition and the formation of the National Park, as well as insightful commentary about the issues facing Grand Canyon today. In the Resources section of this website you will find more sources of valuable information about wilderness destinations and activities.
Another important example of developing the proper mindset is related to venturing into bear country, mainly in the Mountain West. Like me, you may find the prospect of hiking through places where these magnificent beasts roam to be unsettling, to say the least. I found that becoming well-educated on brown and black bear behavior, encounters and deterrents helped me to feel more comfortable being in these areas.
Still, although undertaking a wilderness trip is best approached with purposeful preparation and planning, don’t worry that the spontaneity or sense of discovery will be lost. No amount of research will substitute for the experience of being there.
✦ Body
I know I’m stating the obvious that good fitness makes for a good experience in a national wilderness. I often see many folks on our trips that don’t look to be in the greatest shape and still seemed to do okay. But I’m just more comfortable knowing that I did what I could to enjoy, not to mention hold up well in, the extreme and unfamiliar conditions.
All elements of conditioning are important: cardio, lower and upper body areas, and the core. Whatever you can do to improve knee and quad strength for climbing and trekking, and arm and shoulder strength for gripping and lifting, is a good thing. You will be doing a lot of all these things on a wilderness trip. The core is also a key area, which includes the back as well as the abdomen. For me, paying attention to the condition of my back became more of a priority after injuring it on the 2020 road trip with Alex. Developing a stretching and strengthening routine for that area has helped me immensely, to the point where I have been able to resume full workouts and have renewed confidence in making it through a trip featuring many days of arduous hiking.
There are other steps you may want or need to take depending on your specific situation. In my case, I know I’m likely to encounter acute knee pain at about the seven mile point of a hike. I use poles to help cushion the impact going downhill. At times, knee braces provide stability and support and they do get me through to the finish line. But when I get home, it’s sometimes hard just to walk up and down the steps for about a day. When I travel all the way from the east coast for a once-in-a-blue-moon encounter with the western wilderness, I want to avoid this problem becoming a constraint. About a month before each of my trips over the past few years, I’ve gotten trigger point injections in my knees. These are small doses of cortisone in the muscle that are intended to reduce inflammation and remain effective for about eight weeks. I have found them to be beneficial and my doctor assures me they are safe (at the frequency and dosage we are talking about here). Clearly, it’s a personal choice, and before you do anything like this, you should consult your doctor.
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