Reality Check
Sun Aug 10 2025 17:00:00 GMT-0700 (Pacific Daylight Time)
Even An Alchemist Needs Lead To Make Gold.
I talk on here about learning faster than normal and pushing timelines into a tight schedule. I truly believe that people have a higher learning capacity than conventional systems assume, but it still has to come from somewhere and have a degree of reality. As an example, in one winter I learned the skills to climb technical mixed and ice routes and ended the season off with a trip to the Alaska Range. I paid for the entire trip working a full time entry level job making approximately $16-18 an hour while supporting myself in Alaska. However, I came into that with many years of athletic experience and about five years of rock climbing experience, and a willingness to ride everywhere on a bicycle and sacrifice a lot of sleep to get out into the crags and mountains to aquire the neccessary experience.
The point here is that there has to be a realistic base to your goal. I had broken down all the individual skills I needed to learn for the expedition and made sure I learned them effectively by the time I left. If you have no wilderness experience, limited athletic experience, are unwilling or unable to go on several preperatory backpacking trips, and don't want to run or workout regularly to prepare your body, you should not be trekking across Alaska.
These are not hand held guided trips. You lead yourself. This means that you get the richest experience possible, and learn invaluable life skills, but it also means that you have to be willing to put in the leg work.