It's been a while since I read the book so bear with me if some of my recollections are a tad off.

Initially I was tempted to call him a romantic but the more I think about it the more I'm leaning towards fool.

He was a young man from a fairly well off family, out to make his mark on the world. He gave away most of his worldly goods and lived a lifestyle from which he'd been sheltered most of his life. He was a good worker when he needed cash, avoided substance abuse and had several halfway decent adventures.

He had "planned" his Alaska trip for several years but for all of his forethought outfitted himself with only marginal quality, discount store equipment and refused to accept any advise from those who had experience that might benefit him. With his education and obvious intelligence and all of the reading he had done on the subject I would have thought that he would better appreciate the neccessity of better quality gear for a solo expedition into the Alaskan interior. I got the impression that he never really thought that he couldn't procure more if things went badly for him. Same as when he abandoned his perfectly workable car in the desert.

I'm voting fool because everyone seemed to agree that he was very intelligent and well read and he should have been aware enough of what he was facing to make some smarter choices.

That's my $.02

Ed