Can you get emphysema from campfire smoke?

Got back yesterday from backpacking in Bell Mountain Wilderness Area, a part of the Mark Twain National Forest.

My dad had been planning this for some time now, and we couldn't have picked a better weekend to go. Kristin was finishing her spring break, and I was just starting mine. For early March, the weather was wonderful: upper 50's-mid 60's during the day, mid 30's at nite...but no mosquitoes or no-see-ums yet and only a few spiders. None of the trees had leaves, so the woods weren't a pretty as they could have been (save for the sections of evergreen), but since much of our hike was off-trail, the lack of foliage meant we had better visibility and didn't have to fight too much with thorny brambles and thick undergrowth.

We parked on the east side of the wilderness at the end of 5 miles of gravel Forest Service road. The first mile or so of trail was an abandoned Jeep Trail, so it was pretty easy picking...but soon the trail faded and we were left to climb Lindsey Mountain (1662 feet) with no path to follow. We then had the trek down toward Shut-Ins Creek, which was again all bushwhacking without trail. Some of the tributaries had trickles and small flow, a few even with small waterfalls. The terrain was mostly rocky and covered with last season's leaves.

Once we hit the Creek we followed it upstream to an abandoned mine (only about 60 feet or so into the rock face, and filled with 8 inches of water) and pretty falls. We set up camp in that area near a geocache that we found, had dinner and a small-but-warm fire, and fell asleep to the sound of rolling waters.

Day two found us sleeping in late, hitting the trail and promptly crossing a stream (where K fell in...haha), and ascending up a steep wash back to some higher flat ground, where we leisurely set up camp and did the normal evening rituals including another terrific campfire. We finished the short hike back to the car the next morning and headed home to clean up and get my dad to the airport in time.

I put pictures from the trip up on my Yahoo album.