Out of the freezer and into the wet.

Hikers itching to get out on the trails after a long winter are now confronted with the rainy season. So, for the next month or so, it will be hard for avid hikers to avoid getting caught in the cold rain of the Rockies. Now, this can make even the jolliest among us miserable, but worse, we could be wrecking the very trails we love.

While tromping on muddy patches of trail or making a new trail, we can destroy vegetation, cause soil erosion and create a spiderweb of trails that confuse other hikers to follow. Some hiking clubs, such as the Adirondack Mountain Club in New York, recommend avoiding wet, poorly drained trails in the high alpine.

What to do? Well, huddling inside is one option. But we do enough of that already. Instead, outdoors guru Ben Gadd, the Jasper-based author and naturalist hiking guide who recently wrote The Canadian Hiker's and Backpacker's Handbook: Your How-to Guide for Hitting the Trails, Coast to Coast to Coast (Whitecap Books, $29.95), gave his input.

Gadd offered some great advice on how hikers or hiking group can minimize their impact on their beloved trail system. Read on and you should be able to hike in the rain with a clear conscience this spring:

1. Pick a paved or gravel trail close to home if you expect poor weather. Calgary has a great network of urban paths that keep you well within striking distance of places to warm up. (See Walking the Meanderer, page C8.)

2. Wear proper footwear such as hiking boots with gaiters. This will make it easier to walk in the muddy centre of the trail, which keeps you from damaging any rain-loosened vegetation beside the trail and inadvertently widening the trail.

Gadd admits this can be unpleasant: "Walking in the mud gets old pretty quick."

Luckily though, he adds, most trails in the Rockies are pretty, well, rocky. So you shouldn't have too many big muddy patches to walk around.

3. If you do have to walk around a mud hole, go 10 metres off the beaten path and walk in the leave no trace way.

This means spreading out in a line, about a metre apart, so that you don't accidentally stamp down a new path by following each other. Try not to step on many flowers, but don't flog yourself if you do, as they will likely bounce back.

"Once the weather dries the mud," Gadd says, "the next people to pass through won't even know you were there."

4. Add rubber tips (available at most outdoors stores) to your walking poles. These pop on over your steel tips and reduce damage to fragile vegetation. And you can use your poles to tap most of the moisture off wet shrubbery just ahead as you walk.

5. Carry a light tarp with you on hikes. When it starts to rain, pull out the tarp and huddle under it with other members of your group. Then just pull out your snacks and wait out the deluge in relative comfort.

tedwards@theherald.canwest.com