I like to go hiking in Italy and I also want to visit Japan for the first time, probably would go hiking there as well or just stroll around the country.

I would go hiking in Italy with you. Don't care so much about Japan.

Ebin, are you free around Easter?

you know what you should do? people watching; it's my favorite thing to do during trips; well, that and visiting science/natural history museums, but not every place has a museum

Yes! Where do you want to go in Italy?

Alright, but are you ready to go on a trip with your fellow Bernd(s)?

Last year I was in Lucca (Tuscany). It was beautiful! Here is a photo I took (can’t post multiple, because KC filesize limit is too low). So we could go to another place somewhere in Tuscany, it’s very nice there and ideal for hiking. But of course, other regions of Italy are fine as well, don’t have much experience with them though. Did you travel to Italy before? Do you have a driver’s license?

Yes. I have ans car. Never been much to Italy. I did some multi day hikes, though.

Then you have even more experience than me probably lmao. I always got a cheap room and did day-walks returning each afternoon/evening.

That’s good, it’s not necessary, but especially if you want to go deeper and to somewhere more remote in Italy, it’s good to have a car, because trains won’t drive there.

Did you sleep outside in a tent and shiet on your multiple day hikes?

I have ans bivvy. High quality low weight tents are super expensive.

 

Sleeping outside over several days is something completely different to one day hikes I think. 15kg of weight is way more taxing than a day pack and you have to care about all the resource management. Like finding enough water.

Yeah, that’s true. What do you want to do? And how much would one have to spend on such equipment?

I still have to think about it. I'm very open to anything though.

 

the most expensive thing are the backpack for ~200€ and the bivvy for ~200€.

I think I wouldn't buy the bivvy against. Because resting in it feels a lot like being trapped in a body-bag because it shuts you in a very confined space with almost no access to the outside. I want to try out a tarp with a mosquito net some time. This would be way cheaper.

Also I wouldn't suggest to buy new equipment and go over several days right away. If the equipment does not suit you in a way that you get a restful sleep you will have a really bad time for the rest of the trip. You should first try it out for a single night at least.

I always want to travel...

 

I like museums, sometimes random places in middle of nowhere turn out to have the best where you don't expect them (basically someone's grandpa's private collection that is now on display)

 

I also have ans car and I drive around. But I've never done walking around with sleeping equipments (except for a couple multi day hikes in the mountains, but in those cases you stop in a mountain refuge and don't have to worry much about staying outside for the night)

I have been thinking for a while however about getting a trekking bike & travel with that.

So do you want to hike in Italy around Easter?

Depending on the weather, yes.

But specifically for Easter (friday - sunday), I gotta be with family.

The weather is excellent in April. But it's too bad you have to be with your family. I want to go there over the holidays.

In Slovenia state religion is Communism so our holidays are on around May 1 insteda.

*Clobenia

no, chud.

If you ever want to come to northwect USA I will show you some awesome hikes

I might convince bossman to send me to Vancouver for a couple months in next couple years

If I would hike alone in Italy I would probably try something like this and see how far I could get.

 

These kinds of trails have usually very good signage so you don't have to look at your phone all the time to go the right way. Also the trail for the whole vacation is already planned out so you don't have to chose where to go.

It seems like wild camping is not allowed in Italy and I have no experience in finding good spots were noone will find you with the vegetation there so I would probably try to go for campgrounds. This has also the advantage that you can properly clean yourself at the end of the day and get water.

How would something like that sound to you?

That means, do it in some place where there's not enough people to rouse suspicion.

Sounds appealing, do you think it's doable for a beginner?

Vancouver bc or Vancouver Washington? I'm guessing the former but I actually grew up in the latter

Vancouver BC.

I keep forgetting the other one exists. It's across from Portland, right?

Yeah it's by portland . But despite being not nearly as well known, it was actually founded before the Canadian vancouver. We also have this ebin kc tier flag

If you can hike for 15-20km through a Mittelgebirge (so not exclusively flat land) and wake up the next day and feel like you can walk again your body should be able to take it.

 

I didn't hike since last summer and would prepare by hiking once a week for 15-20 km for a couple of weeks.

Also we don't have to use camp sites and sleep in a proper accommodation then you don't have to buy camping gear. Or I can give you some recommendations on what to buy. If you buy stuff I would advice to sleep in it at least once beforehand so you know that you can actually sleep in it or change your gear accordingly if something does not fit your needs.

When I did that in Swiss Alps and Tuscany I always got blisters and had to rest a bit, but I wore cheap Deichmann walking shoes, which were shit, and I am relatively untrained as I don't hike regularly. But I think I should be able to do that with a bit of training and the right shoes.

I guess, that would be best for the beginning. As you already insinuated, sleep is key and to do proper hiking, one needs to rest well. I should probably focus on the hiking part and if I "succeed", I might be ready to do outdoor camping next time.

I'd definitely need to buy a larger backpack and some hiking clothes. I have similar shoes to pic related, do you think they're enough?

I'm not really knowledgeable about shoes. I've been using Haix adventure since forever. If you can walk with them without getting blisters they should be fine.

 

I'm also a big fan of trekking sticks especially with a heavy backpack and in hilly areas because they take huge amount of load from your legs.

I have a deuter aircontact lite 50+10 backpack but I wouldn't really recommend it. You can take off the upper part of it and use it as a small backpack. But I've never used it and this feature makes the construction unnecessarily way more complicated.

The only important thing about a backpack is that you can adjust it properly to your back so the hip straps can properly take the load off your shoulders.

Thank you for sharing your thoughts. So, are you really serious about all of this?

Sure. I tried to get some Kohlbernds together for a hiking tour last year on /trv/ but I didn't get any reliable responders together.

Ah, I might have seen that thread. An alternative to Italy could be hiking through Germany, as this would simplify a few things. But in general - no matter which country we will choose in the end - I was thinking of the hiking trip lasting one week in the two weeks surrounding Easter. I guess, sooner or later, we'll have to move to a different platform to communicate, you can suggest something which is comfortable for you. Whaddya thenk?

I like Italy because it would be something new to me. I think after 5 days of hiking I'm fed up with it anyway so we have one day to drive there and one day to drive back.

I would keep the discussion here for a little while more in case that other Bernds find it and might decide that they want to come with us.

You want to drive to Italy? Just so I'm clear, I don't have a driver's license, so you'd have to do all the driving.

I live in Stuttgart so I could drive there in ~8 hours. It might not be worth it because then I would have to find a parking space there were I can comfortably leave my car for 5 days and after 5 days of hiking we would probably have to use the train to get back to the car.

 

How would you suggest to travel there? Plane, bus, train?

I would probably choose whatever is cheapest. I haven't looked into train and bus prices, but I would assume flying to Pisa or Florence would be the cheapest, then we'd take a train from there to the point we'd want to start from.