The Jansport External Frame… the legend.
When I was about 14 years old, I signed up to do a backpacking "Wilderness Adventure" camp in North Carolina. Our guides would be Outward Bound grads and we'd learn the ins-and outs of self sufficiency in the Blue Ridge mountains for a week.
To be honest, my favorite part of the whole adventure was getting to Asheville. My dad worked for an airline at that time and we got to fly around for free or steeply reduced prices (flying stand-by of course). So my dad and I flew from Houston Intercontinental to New York where we were met by an old college buddy of his. We had dinner in Chinatown and saw a few sights like the Statue of Liberty, the top of the World Trade Center and the wonders of living in truly tiny apartments.
Then my father and his friend turned me loose at Newark airport and I flew to Charlotte and then hopped on a puddle jumper to Asheville where I thought I would be greeted by a camp representative. Upon debarking, I did not see anyone who appeared to be looking for a kid traveling alone. So I sat myself down in the bar and ordered a Coke. Perhaps an hour passed before the camp counselor found me. He said he'd seen me earlier, but I looked too at ease in an airport to be a lost kid. So I got in the van and trundled up to camp headquarters with a half dozen or so "lost kids".
I suppose in all there were about 25 of us kids and maybe a half dozen counselors who came and went as we were prepped for our coming week. None of us had our own gear, so we were introduced to our packs, our cookstoves, our tarps (and how to tie them) and the food we'd be carrying for the next 6 days. This was 1979 so Gore-Tex and other modern and lightweight miracles were not available to us. I guess we didn't know any better, but we were happy to be away from home and meeting folks from other parts of the country. I immediately, bonded with a guy named Clay from Mississippi who was more keen on Frank Zappa than even I was.
We learned about the joys of cooking with bulgar, sleeping in the rain and digging your own latrine. It was largely miserable, but we had a blast nonetheless.
When I got back home to Texas, I put "backpack" on my Christmas wish list and I still have that pack today. It has been all over Colorado, The Sierras and the Pacific Northwest. Unfortunately, that pack has been in my closet for 20 years, but last week it had the opportunity to break free and we can now say that it has seen the backside of the Truchas peaks.
It was insanely windy and a couple of nights, the temps dipped below freezing. It was miserable. It was also a blast.
