That's one thing I loved about hiking the Appalachian Trail. Out there, it doesn't matter who you were in "real life." You get college kids, lawyers, bankers, auto mechanics, carpenters, brilliant people, mentally handicapped people. Everyone's dressed the same, and smells just as bad after going for two weeks without a shower. A banker can't walk any faster or further because he makes more money than the short order cook. Everyone shows up at the shelter at the end of the day and takes off their smelly shoes and socks, and farts out loud, and grumbles about not having enough to eat. Everyone eyes everyone else's food like a hungry wolf, because it doesn't matter if you have more money; you can't carry more food because it's heavy. Backpacking is a great equaliser. One person might have started off with a plastic K-Mart poncho and another with a $400 Gore-Tex Patagonia jacket, but after a month the jacket's torn and stained, and you realise that Gore-Tex only works in the city, so you throw out the jacket and buy a K-Mart plastic poncho, or go without a raincoat at all because you'll get wet no matter what. It's society boiled down to its most essentials: you need to eat, sleep, and crap, and that's what people talk about. The most important things, no matter that you're dressed in sweat-stained rags that mice chew on because of the salt, that you haven't showered in a month, and your beard is longer than most women's hair.

There's probably a psychology/anthropology experiment in there somewhere.

Andrew.