Learn to use an axe, and respect it and you can't help but love it. But abuse one and it will wear your hands raw and open your foot like an overcooked sausage.

There is always a sadness about packing. I guess you wonder if where you're going is as good as where you've been.

Learn to use an axe, and respect it and you can't help but love it. But abuse one and it will wear your hands raw and open your foot like an overcooked sausage.

I have thought briefly about getting caught in rock slides or falling from a rock face. If that happened, I would probably perish on the mountain in much the same way many of the big animals do. I would be long gone before anyone found me. My only wish would be that folks wouldn't spend a lot of time searching. When the time comes for a man to look his Maker in the eye, where better could the meeting be held than in the wilderness?

To look around at what you have accomplished in a day gives a man a good feeling. Too many men work on parts of things. Doing a job to completeness satisfies a man.

Too many men work on parts of things. Doing a job to completion, satisfies me.