Walking the Appalachian Trail

by Larry Luxenberg

That storm, which devastated parts of coastal New Jersey, Long Island, and New England, ignited Roger’s lifelong interest in weather. As a nine-year-old, he lived through it, and as an adult he wrote a book about it: The Long Island Express: Tracking the Hurricane of 1938. It killed hundreds of people, destroyed thousands of buildings in its path, and altered the course of A.T. history. The final section of the trail was blazed and opened on August 14, 1937. Thirteen months later, the trail was devastated, as thousands of trees were blown down by high winds.

They finished in late September, six months after starting at Springer. Six weeks later, Georgia Maine Satterlee was born. “If it had been a boy, we’d have called him Anthony Thomas. The initials would be A.T.”

“Then we hiked for a week, and I joined the circle because he was right. It wasn’t reality. Reality is waking up in the morning, making yourself breakfast, making the beds, maybe having to go to work during the day and living a life. Reality is not rolling out of your tent in the morning and having a deer walking by, and you can about reach out and touch it. Or walking through fields of flowers waving in the breeze. Or smelling a pine when you’re walking through a pine forest. And being free of any responsibility.”

If younger hikers mature during a thru-hike, then older hikers must become young. Steve “Offshore Steve” Gomez, who is in between old and young, said that during his eight years as a commercial fisherman, while still in his twenties, he felt old. Now, as a hiker, he feels young. Perhaps that’s enough benefit for anyone.

All you need in this life is ignorance and confidence, and then success is sure. Mark Twain

There is no completely satisfactory answer to the question of why people form such strong attachments to the trail. Jeff Hansen suggested, “That will always be a mystery to all of us. But I wonder if it’s not just that people can have a sense of adventure and a sense of belonging all at once, and people miss both of those things in their lives.” Dorothy Hansen added, “With other trails you could test yourself. You could get the adventure, but you couldn’t get the camaraderie.”

With a droll sense of humor, Harry can joke about his Indian heritage. When he and Jeanne hiked the Oregon Coastal Trail, they crossed the Pioneer Indian Trail. Looking at the trail sign, Harry said, “Let me be the pioneer this time. I get tired of always having to be the Indian.”

Everyone wanted to see Ziggy or take his picture. He was the only cat they’d ever seen on the trail. “I’d have to try to keep him out of the sun, since cats overheat,” Jim said. “If I stopped to talk, he’d start pacing on the pack, and when he was ready to move on, he’d bat me on the head.”

Some hikers end up regretting that others swayed them to hike faster or slower than they wanted, to blue-blaze, or to hurry out of towns. Enjoy people’s company, the Monk is saying, but don’t let them dictate the terms. Theres a joy in companionship, but there’s a price, too.

The most common piece of advice from veteran thru-hikers regarding the A.T. is “Do it.” Few who’ve completed the trail regret it, and most regard a thru-hike as one of the highlights of their lives.

“You have to get into hiking condition,” said Mike “Hago” Harrington. “If you’re going to do enough to get into hiking condition, you might as well hike the trail.”

As Earl Shaffer put it, “Carry as little as possible, but choose that little with care.”

Keep in mind that a successful trip is one that you enjoy.

“When you have a successful thru-hike on the A.T., it’s like a jewel inside of you, and whatever you do afterwards, no matter how bad things get, you’ve always got that jewel that you can take out,” Mark Di Miceli said. “Maybe it’s just a shelter you spent one night at out of the rain, and you were happy that you were dry, or maybe it’s just a turn in the trail, and you don’t even remember where it was. Maybe it was some time you were sitting under a tree having some cold water. But that’s your jewel, that’s the oasis in your head that you can always pull out when times get tough. It’s a wonderful thing to have.”

His beginning pace feels slow, but he won’t have to stop. If you have to stop to catch your breath, he suggests, you’re walking too fast. When you’re in good shape, you should be able to walk from the bottom to the top of every mountain on the A.T. without stopping. He says, “I’m not saying don’t stop. But don’t let the mountain break you. Stop when you want to stop. And once you do that, it becomes money in the bank. You know when you get to any mountain, that mountain belongs to you. It’s a good feeling. It’s the whole key to backpacking, when you know how to pace yourself.

“You’re going to have to hike when you’re no longer having fun. That may be through three months of smoldering, bug-infested, God-forsaken weather. It could be raining every day. But you’ve got to always keep your goal in mind: to hike the Appalachian Trail.

What sends most people off the trail is their inability to deal with themselves,

For months as a thru-hiker heads north on the A.T., people ask him where he is headed. He answers Maine, and at first it seems as distant as the moon. Then, after months of walking nearly every day, in a little clearing, he crosses over from New Hampshire and the end no longer seems so distant. In a few weeks Katahdin appears as a small speck on the horizon. For more than a hundred miles, it continues to grow until the huge massif is straight ahead. Many thru-hikers spend their final night on the A.T. at Daicey Pond, with Katahdin looming large above the water. From there, it is a flat two-mile walk to the base of the mountain.

After more than two thousand miles on the trail, you can expect to undergo some personality changes. A heightened affinity for nature infiltrates your life. Greater inner peace. Enhanced self-esteem. A quiet confidence that if I could do that, I can do and should do whatever I really want to do. More appreciation for what you have and less desire to acquire what you don’t. A childlike zest for living life to the fullest. A refusal to be embarrassed about having fun. A renewed faith in the essential goodness of humankind. And a determination to repay others for the many kindnesses you have received.

But I remember feeling when I got to the end that if I had the time and money, I would have hiked forever. It wouldn’t necessarily have had to be the Appalachian Trail. But you do develop a love of the trail itself as an entity. People call it an escape. I’d say it’s a running towards, rather than a running away from. I can understand just wanting to do that forever. You just feel so good about yourself.”