Backpacking Hike - Helpful Advice
Enjoying a backpacking hike is a fun and exciting excursion. You can add to the excitement by searching for artifacts and pieces of history on your trail backpacking adventure. Depending on where you plan your backpacking hike routes, you may encounter ancient burial grounds, areas once used for hunting and survival, or even Native American living areas where you can find pottery or other creations. By keeping a keen eye on your surroundings, you might be able to turn your backpack hiking trip into an educational and historical adventure.
Before you pick up that interesting arrowhead or piece of bone as a souvenir from your backpacking hike, take a moment to think about what you’re doing. Your find could be a very important part of a much larger archeological discovery. Your trail backpacking could have led you to an ancient burial ground. Or, the piece might be nothing at all. Unless you’re an archeologist, you have no way of knowing.
The best advice is to take a picture and leave the object where it is. By definition, the National Parks Service says that any object over fifty years old is considered an artifact. Removing that object from where you found it or from the park itself could cost you in many ways. The Native American Graves and Repatriation Act (NAGRA) has strict rules and regulations in place to protect Native American artifacts. People backpacking, hiking or riding along recreational trails are a threat to preserving artifacts and gravesites of ancient cultures. While most people have good intentions, there are people out there who poach these sites for profit. If caught as a poacher, you could be faced with fines ranging from as little as $250 to a thousand dollars or more.
During your trail backpacking trip, don’t touch any of the artifacts that you might encounter. Moving artifacts or pieces of ancient history will disturb the surroundings. Instead, contact the proper authorities and alert them to what you have found on your trail backpacking trip. There’s a possibility that they will begin a full archeological dig based on your findings.
The next thing to do is put up a discreet marker some distance away from the find. You don’t want to put a huge sign pointing towards the artifact that might draw less scrupulous people who may be looking for the same thing. After you have taken note of the location, contact a park Ranger or someone in the local authorities and let them know what you found. They will contact the proper specialists to conduct the research and investigation of the area.
In short, enjoy your backpacking hike and the scenery trail backpacking has to offer and keep in mind that while you are backpacking, hiking or camping, you are only a visitor and others lived on that land long before you came along.
By Nature Editor
