What do I carry?
All that I own.
I hunt nearly 100% on foot and many times in the hills or mountains. So there is no rifle I don't carry.
In the summer if I go back-packing, and I am not hunting, I carry an M-1 Garand many times, and if I want something to go inside my pack I carry an AR15 taken apart.
2 times I carried an AK47 with a folding stock.
The ARs and the AKs don't get "babied" at all, and I can let therm bang around and not worry about them. At times that's pretty cool. I use them and carry them with the same mindset I carried rifles when I was a Marine.
If the stock is wood, I tend to try to keep it in good shape, (even my M1 Garand or my excellent condition Mosin Nagant.)
But metal or plastic gets about the same level of care of a hiking staff.
You're lucky. Here, outside of hunting season you can't carry a rifle or shotgun in the woods unless it's cased. Applies even to coyote and woodchuck hunters traveling to their hunting spot, which must be in "open fields" once the other seasons close. We can carry a sidearm, open or concealed for personal protection, and no permit is required for that, but by the letter of the law, you might get into trouble if you use that sidearm for a random poke at a legal varmint on your hike.
