Here in Japan smoking is still prevalent. It seems the majority of males have this offensive habit. I call it offensive if they smoke around non-smokers; otherwise I don't care.
It is very annoying on the trail to be hiking behind; or resting near someone who is smoking; due of course to the second hand smoke. But then, it is no problem passing these guys easily.
Carbon Monoxide has something like 255 times the affinity of O2 to stick to the oxygen receptors in your lungs, effectively blocking them for O2 uptake for hours. Thus, a smoker, or anyone who hangs around him/her will have a limited aerobic potential. (and reduced night vision by the way). Any Doctors here, please clarify my layman's explanation?

Edited by Brett1234 on 05/25/2008 01:19:10 MDT.

...and in my part of Montana; smoking on the trail is illegal in most areas, most of the summer, most years.

Yes, the CO has great affinity to the hemoglobin in RBCs which clearly affects O2 uptake and its eventual dispersal to muscles in desperate need. Just imagine smoking on Everest! Hmmm I wonder?

I wouldn't think constricted airways or blood vessels help either, but just tell that to someone on something a bit more powerful. Just a guess, but somehow I doubt there are too many studies on backpackers mainlining cola, lol. Chileans might be a good start.

Thats nuts people smoking on hiking trails. I wouldn't doubt it, but the Californian Patagucci hiker elite are pretty conscientious. One more thing I have yet to see, can't wait!

Edited by lococoyo on 05/25/2008 19:29:36 MDT.

"Here in Japan smoking is still prevalent. It seems the majority of males have this offensive habit. I call it offensive if they smoke around non-smokers; otherwise I don't care.
It is very annoying on the trail to be hiking behind; or resting near someone who is smoking; due of course to the second hand smoke. But then, it is no problem passing these guys easily.
Carbon Monoxide has something like 255 times the affinity of O2 to stick to the oxygen receptors in your lungs, effectively blocking them for O2 uptake for hours. Thus, a smoker, or anyone who hangs around him/her will have a limited aerobic potential. (and reduced night vision by the way). Any Doctors here, please clarify my layman's explanation?"

Yeah, I have a Ph.D. so I can confirm that sucking in the cigarette smoke from someone else is offensive.

I'm so stoked about getting back out into some serious hiking. It's been way too long. And one thing that really jazzes me up is the thought of scotch and cigars in the evening. I haven't done that since I was rock climbing with the gang a few years ago. Good times, good times.

Now to go searching for UL hiking humidors!

"Yeah, I have a Ph.D. so I can confirm that sucking in the cigarette smoke from someone else is offensive."


Oh Spare me .......

Where's the IGNORE button on this forum, anyway?

Edited by flash582 on 08/30/2008 07:58:50 MDT.

I'm late to this discussion, but I'll weigh in anyway. I have quit smoking cigarettes and it was precisely because of hiking and backpacking. I am feeling much better and getting in more mileage all the time. Nice to have the camel off my back.

I suppose if an ultralight backpacker brought along a cigar on a trip it would have to be a good, "cuben" wouldn't you say? :-)

Michael

i just got back from pt reyes, IM A SMOKER, i did 28 miles in two days, and two packs of smokes, (and a pint of single malt;) im not saying you guys are wrong about the health risks... its obvious smoking is bad for you... but it is what it is... HYOH!... and man was it funny walking back to the trail head today passing other backpackers shlubing along while i blaze by smoking a cig... "IF I WANT TO SMELL THAT I WOULD GO TO A BAR OR BUS STOP" LOL... man up, my god man, your in the woods.

"IF I WANT TO SMELL THAT I WOULD GO TO A BAR OR BUS STOP"
Got to agree with Jesse, man up! I mean you can't even enjoy a camp fire?????? That maybe one of the silliest things I have ever read on the internet. I prefer to think of my cigar smoke as idiot repellant.

The only experience I have with smoking and hiking I have is when I was prescribed medical marijuana. I would walk for two hours then I would smoke a blunt, then I would walk for another two hours and smoke a blunt, and on and on. This is very enjoyable, and who says pot smokers are lazy I was averaging 22 miles a day. I walked the Lost Coast in one day, and then I was walking the PCT southbound in the Mojave area. The fire danger was very high so I droped my ashes inside a can. I went through about one ounce of pot and an ounce of hash over one month of backpacking. If you have never tried smoking and hiking it is loads of fun. However this was years ago and I have now been sober, clean, for over one and a half years.
Hash is also considered a narcotic.

Smoking is a personal choice, but I do find it very inconsiderate for someone to smoke while I'm running a trail or hiking. If you want to do it in the privacy of your campsite, great and more power to you. But the smell detracts from the smells that I want to enjoy... fresh air, dirt, leaves and water. Plus when I'm working really hard to inhale enough oxygen/keep my heart rate down as I run... it's an awful feeling to be sucking in cigarette smoke instead.

So if the smokers who hike could keep that in mind, it'd be appreciated!

While you're lighting up at a trailhead and I'm winding down from an 8 mile run over a mountain... that smell is basically going to make me sick.

Some people LOVE to be offended. That's why those people NEED smokers, otherwise there wouldn't be anybody worth judging. I smoked for 8 years, and finally quit last year. I will admit that secondhand smoke is now very unpleasant to me, but that doesn't mean I have to act like a sissy deuschbag everytime I find myself in the company of a smoker. You do realize that there are worse things in our air than just a smidgen of secondhand cigarrette smoke. Things you can't see or smell. Things that will make you crazy! I'm feeling it right now! Hahahahahhaha!!!

I didn't smoke, then I started dating someone who smoked, and who had friends that smoked, and when you could smoke in the bars, it was easy to just take a cigarette and start smoking. So I socially smoked for 3 years, but then quit after moving to CA and getting serious about hiking/backpacking when it hit me that I was hurting my ability to hike. As if the cancer thing wasn't incentive enough.

I hate telling other people what they should/shouldn't do. Well no, I don't hate it, I just realize it is wrong to do so.

The one thing about I smoking anywhere I keep coming back to is this; It takes up more than your alloted personal space and invades other people space. It's like listening to music too loud, or having a really loud conversation on your cell phone in a public place. Nobody else wants to hear it, and we all hate when somebody else does it.

I really don't want to say that people shouldn't smoke in the backcountry. So I won't. After all, fire smells too, but that's a camping acceptable/expected odor. And if I wasn't worried about odors and bears, I'd probably bring a tobacco pipe on a trip or two. But imagine if the campers next to you lugged a boom box out there, and were listening loudly to whatever style of music you hate? Or 1,000 times worse, what if they had a drum circle? You'd want them to turn it down. Cigarette/cigar smoke invades other people's space in the same way. I suppose the solution is to be far enough away that it's not an issue. Or for everybody to realize we don't get to makes all the rules and just deal.

I hate to see people smoking because my mother died of lung cancer in her 50's. On the other hand, it's their choice! And I know how hard it is to quit! I quit at age 22 after smoking only 4 years and haven't touched a cigarette since, but every once in a great while I still have a minor craving.

The big problem with smoking and hiking is the fire danger! At least in western US national forests, it's illegal to smoke while hiking, and with very good reason. Smokers should stop and do their smoking on a spot with no vegetation and pure dirt (no organic matter mixed in) where they can control where the ashes go. Make sure that butt is completely out--so you can easily touch it with your hands. And please pack those butts out with you! The tobacco and paper disintegrate pretty fast, but the filters last forever.

And it is simple courtesy to do your smoking downwind of non-smokers!

I generally don't say anything to smokers, unless they're smoking while hiking along the trail in the dry season. Most of these are obvious "tourons" on the lower parts of Columbia River Gorge trails. Then I politely mention the fire danger. I've gotten some dirty looks but noticed that the cigarettes were put out.

I knew I wasn't the only one :) to second another poster, I too am a medical marijuana patient, and its lucid side effects are very nice on the trail...

I also can dig what another person said about music or drum circles... (although I'd be checkin' out that circle, LOL) but if i was that bothered, well id pack up and keep movin :) thats the beauty of backpacking isn't it?

I guess I am pretty anti-smoking. I didn't read the rest of the posts but I will after I write this.

I come from a whole family of smokers. I am now watching my Mom's failing health because of smoking. She eventually quit at age 75 when her breathing was so bad that she couldn't puff on a cigarette anymore. The fact she quit is astounding but now I watch my little boy with her and how worried he is about his Grandma. She gasps for air as she sits. Walking the 20 feet to the bathroom is like a marathon for her. She can barely talk to her grandson on the phone.

Then there are my two remaining siblings, Margaret and Dan. Both have had heart attacks and the doctors have told them both that if they don't stop smoking they will have another. Do they stop? No.

I had bronchitis most of my childhood because of being in car with smokers.

I've never tried it (not even once) but I think it's a selfish habit that should be made illegal. I don't mean to offend but I am heartbroken when I hear my little boy say "I think Grandma won't be here next time Mom". Smoking makes me angry.

Smoking is inconsiderate in ways that people don't consider. Aside from second hand smoke being disgusting and harmful... what about your loved ones? Don't you think they'd like to have you around a little longer and with better health?

Anyway enough of the lecture - it's merely my point of view and I don't mean to be offensive - it's just that watching my mother dying from this preventable thing is upsetting.

Me and the Mrs. both quit about a year ago. I used the patch for the first 2 days while at work (I work at a busy coffee house at 4am and I didn't want any soccer mom blood on my hands) my wife quit 2 weeks later while on the trail. The first 3 days are the worst from a physical withdrawal standpoint, mental stimulus and physical exertion help with withdrawal so hiking helps. Being a non-smoker rocks 95% of the time but every once in a while on man I wanna sick a cuben in that primus stove or pull a hooka or a pack of winstons out of my pack and smoke up! But I don't I'm a good boy. But I will say I'm pretty sure I'll never get glaucoma if you know what I mean...

"Smoking is inconsiderate in ways that people don't consider. Aside from second hand smoke being disgusting and harmful... what about your loved ones? Don't you think they'd like to have you around a little longer and with better health?"

So true, Laurie. My Dad smoked all his life and ended up dying from the complications of emphysema. It was a long, slow, miserable process that exacted a terrible toll on my Mom, and on my brother and me when we were home. He came to realize this toward the end but, by then, it was far too late. My sympathy to you and yours.

Man there are so many things to worry about other than what other people do. If someone is getting on your nerves then keep hiking.

I've been smoking lightly for 3 years now. I was in denial about that for a long time - considered myself a social smoker...

But I wanted to stop altogether for my 30th birthday. It's the alcohol that gets me - if I have a few beers, the cigarettes call...

It doesn't help that my bf smokes. In fact - I probably would have quit already - I can go all week without smoking, and then we get together on the weekend, and he smokes around me and I'm done.

BUT, back to the OP question. My bf has been smoking for 13 years (since he was 17). He's tried to quite several times. Tried a pill, patches, gum, you-name-it. Nothing has worked. He's done his research - apparently, ifyou can make it the first 48, the craving for it is much easier to handle after that...

We are both enrolled in the WT1-SBP course for late this summer. No tobacco products are allowed.

And walking to the top of a small hill really winds me when it never did before.

He wants to quit, and I want to quit. And backpacking/hiking is definitely providing and incentive. Whether or not it will be enough of one to have sticking power is another matter. I think it will be for me. I don't know if it will be for him.