It's nice enough to point at John Muir in his heavy wool coat with a few fistfuls of hardtack in his pocket and say that we have grown soft, but soft or not, I can't see any necessity for emulating Muir's approach, especially when he apparently spent a great many nights sharing the fire and possibly the food of the many shepards whose flocks grazed in the Sierras all summer and fall.

If I have the luxury of planning my trip and my equipment (as opposed to being caught out unexpectedly), then I'll be the well-fed old softie with his down sleeping bag, pad and tent, and NOT the tough old mountaineer laid out on the cold ground in a wool mackinaw gnawing on hardtack.