Originally Posted By: Tom_L
I suppose trekking poles MIGHT be marginally useful. Marginally in the sense that they will make hiking seem a little easier for a while until your arms tire and that's about it. Somehow I just find them amazingly annoying as an increasingly popular fashion statement, though. Everyone seems to bring along a pair nowadays, even on really easy treks and EVEN in the cities! That, to me, is just plain ridiculous. I must also admit that I know not a single serious outdoorsman under the age of 50 who ever uses trekking poles to any extent.


Not a single serious hiker I know *doesn't* use them, at least sometimes, if not all the time. Amongst my hiking buddies and acquaintances are writers for an ultralight backpacking magazine and a photographer for other outdoors publications, long-distance ultralight hikers, and a group of friends with whom I get out backpacking in the Sierra Nevada and elsewhere many times a year for trips where we cover anywhere from ten to 20+ miles a day, with thousands of feet of elevation change.

Trekking poles are particularly useful for easing strain on knees, for safely crossing streams, and for adding extra oompf on uphill stretches. They also can serve double-duty as poles for tarps or tarptents.

I personally favor ultralight carbon fiber poles like those GossamerGear makes; they weigh only a handful of ounces each, so I hardly feel them (especially when attached with a keeper strap, so that a strong grip is unnecessary), and they've saved a lot of wear and tear on my body.

So, "hike your own hike", as they say, but definitely don't discount or disparage trekking poles out of hand, especially if you've not tried them.