Trail Etiquette
One beautiful July day when Cora and I were hiking in the Indian Peaks Wilderness, we came across a lush field of flowers sprawling across a steep hillside. The trail cut right across the hillside, directly through the flower patch, but it was obvious to me that the best vantage point for a photograph was about 30 feet below the trail. I examined the area carefully and finally selected a circuitous route to my vantage point that allowed me to avoid trampling any flowers. No sooner had I made my picture, returned to the trail and continued onward, however, when I overheard a couple arguing behind me. "Stay on the trail!" the woman scolded her boyfriend, who was about to follow in my footsteps to make his own photograph. "But he did it!" the man replied, obviously referring to me.

Immediately I realized that I had made a mistake. The slope I had descended to reach my photo op was steep and unstable. Although I had watched my footing carefully, I had undoubtedly disturbed the soil and the low-lying plants as I edged my boot soles into the slope to avoid slipping. In addition to the damage I'd done, I'd set a very bad example – an example that had almost been followed immediately. Regardless of how careful subsequent photo maniacs had been, the fragile vegetation holding the highly erodible soil in place would inevitably have been injured. Once it died, erosion would have begun. Snowmelt and summer rains would have stripped away what little topsoil existed in that harsh, alpine environment, and within a summer or two that flower field, which had delighted thousands of visitors every summer for decades, would have disappeared, leaving behind an ugly scar.

The first rule of trail etiquette is simple: stay on the trail. The more heavily used the wilderness and the more fragile the landscape, the greater the importance of this guideline. Some beauty spots, like that flower field, should be treated like works of art. Few people are so boorish that they would trample across a painting if it were laid out on the ground in front of them. Alpine meadows should be treated with equal respect.

Staying on the trail also means refraining from cutting switchbacks, the places where a trail makes a hairpin turn and almost doubles back on itself. It's tempting to the ill-informed to leave the trail just before the turn and take a "shortcut," regaining the trail just after the turn. This too is an invitation to severe erosion, which, once started, is extremely difficult to stop. For the same reason, you should avoid walking side-by-side on a trail unless it was built to accommodate such traffic. Few trails are. Walking side-by-side will widen the trail and, if it crosses a steep slope, tend to break down the outside of the tread, the level portion of the trail where you walk, causing the trail itself to deteriorate. Whenever possible, avoid walking around mud holes that form in low spots on the trail. This practice turns narrow wilderness paths into highways as hikers' boots trample and kill the trailside vegetation. Instead, buy yourself a pair of waterproof boots and charge fearlessly ahead, straight through the puddle. You may find it gives you a perverse pleasure as it reminds you of your childhood when you went stomping through the puddles, throwing a glorious spray of water in all directions and greatly annoying your mother. In any case, mud will fall off your boots faster than vegetation will grow back. Treat little snow patches on the trail the same as mud holes: blast on through the snow rather than walking around and killing the vegetation to the side of the trail. During early summer hikes, when snow patches are frequent, you'll probably want to wear gaiters to keep the snow out of your boots.

The meaning of "staying on the trail" can be quite difficult to decipher when you suddenly find yourself confronted by three trails, all running parallel to each other about a foot apart. Multiple trails frequently begin when fussy hikers with porous footwear walk alongside a muddy trail rather than directly on it. In other places, multiple trails begin when the original trail has been built with too-few water bars, the low wooden or stone barriers across a trail that divert flowing water off the tread. Without sufficient water bars, the trail itself becomes a stream during the spring runoff. Soon the trail erodes into a foot-deep, narrow slit choked with boulders. Even when dry, such a mangled trail offers only difficult walking, and so thoughtless hikers begin a new trail paralleling the old. I've seen "trails" in rainy Scotland that could have accommodated a truck towing a double-wide trailer. A ranger once described to me a trail in Touloumne Meadows, near Yosemite, that was six lanes wide. The best solution when you're confronted with multiple trails is to pick the one that seems most used and stay with it as much as possible. To be part of the long-term solution, consider volunteering on a trail-maintenance crew. Many local conservation organizations organize such crews each summer. Federal land managers can often tell you which group is doing what.

There are a few exceptions to the stay-on-the-trail rule. The most common involves horses. Hikers should yield the right-of-way to horses by walking a few feet off the trail and standing quietly while the horses pass by. Hikers traveling downhill should also yield to hikers laboring uphill. After all, they're working harder than you are.

As you gain more experience, you may find situations where you want to leave the trail behind completely and take off cross-country. In many parts of the nation, the alpine tundra above timberline provides easy walking and breathtaking 360-degree views. Unfortunately, it's not always environmentally acceptable to succumb to the off-trail urge. In the White Mountains of New Hampshire, for example, rangers urge all hikers to stay on the trail at all times. There are simply too many people, and the land is too fragile. In Rocky Mountain National Park, short footpaths lead from heavily traveled Trail Ridge Road across the alpine tundra to scenic overlooks. Signs there urge visitors to stay on the paved footpaths rather than wander off across the easily-damaged tundra. In another part of the park, however, off-trail tundra walking is permitted, simply because the people pressure is far lower. In that part of the park, hikers have to follow a steep trail for a couple of miles to reach timberline. As always, the need to flex a little shoe leather quickly discourages the masses of people. When in doubt about the environmental acceptability of a cross-country hike, ask a ranger.

If you're walking off-trail with friends in places where there's no sign of previous passage, your group should spread out to avoid walking in each other's tracks. This minimizes the possibility that your passage will create the beginnings of a herd trail, which other hikers are likely to find and follow. Try to walk through areas that can tolerate the traffic: sandy areas, slickrock and granite benches, talus and scree fields, lingering snowfields. On the alpine tundra in parts of Rocky Mountain National Park, for example, boulders stud broad areas of alpine grass dotted with tiny wildflowers no bigger than a thumbtack. Try to hop from rock to rock as much as possible to avoid trampling the vegetation. Avoid marshy areas where your boots will compact the porous, waterlogged soil. You should also avoid steep slopes where you will have to dig in your toes on the way up and heels on the way down. Your footsteps can start a slope on the path to erosion. Yosemite has a regulation limiting groups to 15 people if they stay on the trail, but limiting groups to eight if they plan to travel more than a quarter-mile off the trail. This sensible regulation should be adopted by large groups everywhere.

On occasion, you will face a dilemma while hiking off-trail. You come across an incipient trail. Do you use it to confine your impact to already disturbed ground, or avoid it, hoping it will heal? If a durable route aside from the incipient trail exists (a granite bench or a sandy wash, for example), then take it. Otherwise, use your best judgment, balancing the fragility of the land around the trail with the degree of damage already done.

At times when you are hiking off-trail you may be tempted to build a few cairns (small piles of rocks) to guide you on your return trip. In general, you should refrain. Instead, learn to memorize landmarks both large and small. Make a careful mental note of that odd-shaped boulder that marks the correct gully for your descent off the ridge crest. Master a few additional map-and-compass skills so you can shoot a bearing to follow if a white-out blows in. Turn around frequently and study the terrain as it will look during the trip home. If you absolutely must build a few cairns for safety's sake, be sure to restore the area to its natural appearance by dismantling them during your return trip.

Trail etiquette includes a few other pointers, some of which are backed up by actual regulations. Pets are usually prohibited in the backcountry in national parks, as are weapons of any sort. Harassing wildlife is also prohibited. Enjoy animals from a distance. If you want to photograph them, buy a long lens (300mm or longer) or content yourself with composing a landscape photograph with the animal as part of the scenery. Feeding animals is also prohibited. Handing out tidbits corrupts the animals' normal eating habits and increases the population artificially, beyond what the land can support in the off-season when all the tourists are gone. In wilderness areas and national parks, every facet of the land is protected. That means that visitors shouldn't pick the flowers. It also means leaving antlers, bones, wind-sculpted driftwood and all historic and prehistoric artifacts in place. This includes pot shards and arrowheads as well as other objects.

Ralph Waldo Emerson expressed this well in 1846:
"I wiped away the weeds and foam,
I fetched my sea-born treasures home;
But the poor, unsightly, noisome things
Had left their beauty on the shore,
With the sun and the sand and the wild uproar."

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