Author: Eric

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Out of Virginia

It only took six months, but I’ve finally escaped Virginia.

Crossing the Appalachian Trail border into Tennessee, about 3.5 miles south of Damascus (Va.), was a long-coming revelation.

After months in Virginia, this was a welcome sign.

Don’t get me wrong. Virginia is a beautiful state. It has the Shenandoahs and the Blue Ridge mountains. It has charming towns and wonderful people.

But for some reason that I have not yet deciphered, Virginia seems to be my Kryptonite.

When I rode my bicycle from coast to coast in 2021, it was the punishing hills of southwestern Virginia that forced me to shorten my daily miles and reconfigure my plan.

Then in fall 2022, as I hiked the Appalachian Trail south, having completed 1400 miles from Maine, I crossed the border into Virginia on September 27, 2022, and immediately contracted Covid after spending the night in a crowded bunkroom. Six days later, I limped out of my convalescent hotel room and hit the trail again, eager to ramp up miles. Too eager.

One week later, my right foot screamed with pain every time I put weight on it. Stress fracture, I later learned. So I left the trail, back home for the winter and healing.

The famous McAfee Knob, a Virginia highlight.

I returned to Virginia on March 18, 2023, to the exact spot where I limped off the trail five months earlier: Jennings Creek, about 30 miles north of Daleville. I anticipated resuming my AT hike all winter, but the first few days were rough. Freezing nights and mornings. Aching feet from a bad pair of custom orthotics I’d purchased to protect from getting another stress fracture. And, because I wasn’t back in trail shape yet, the hills (always the hills) were killer.

About three weeks of this, I started to regain my trail shape. Then, one fine morning coming out of Marion, Va., I developed an excruciating shin splint in my left leg. Three more days off, hanging out in Damascus. Tennessee beckoned only a few miles away, but I wondered if I would ever be allowed to leave this state.

New State, New Attitude

Finally, on Sunday, April 13, with new shoes, compression socks, a bottle of Ibuprofin and Arnica, I left Damascus and climbed up to the Tennessee border.

It seems far-fetched, but the minute I crossed the border out of Virginia, things changed. My attitude, for one. But also the trail changed, from a green, rocky tunnel through endless Rhododendrons to an open dirt path atop remote ridges overlooking layers of mountain peaks to the horizon. Even the trees suddenly had more leaf buds.

Then there’s my health. The shin splint has continued to improve thanks to Tennessee. I have little doubt that if I were still in Virginia, my shin would have hobbled me by now and probably spread to the other leg.

Finally, your perspective changes in Tennessee when hiking south. You’ve survived a lot by this point, including the fabled Virginia Blues. Now you’re in a new state, one that only takes about a week to get through. And once you do make your way through Tennessee, you only have two states left to complete the journey: North Carolina and Georgia, where Springer Mountain brings you to the southern AT terminus.

Many reasons to celebrate Tennessee.

Virginia Blues

I’m not the only AT thru-hiker to lament Virginia. The state is famous for its mid-hike doldrums. You walk and walk, day after day and the scenery rarely changes.

Or maybe it’s just that Virginia is the longest state on the AT, stretching 556 miles from north to south, nearly twice as long as any other state. We hikers hunger for progress, for variety and landmarks that let us know we are getting somewhere for all our effort. But Virginia just slogs along, week after week, for typically more than a month.

Or, for me, more than six months. I mean, not literally, since I spent the winter at home in western Massachusetts. But mentally, I never really left Virginia. All winter, my thoughts remained stuck to that rural road crossing at Jennings Creek where my cracked toe disallowed further progress.

Kelly and Linda Mulheren, trail angels extraordinaire.

I traveled back to Daleville and had a hard time escaping that town. The whole state has been one setback after another.

Yet, for all that, I love Virginia. I met wonderful trail angels Linda and Kelly Mulheren there. And I have many amazing Virginia memories.

Still, six months is enough time to spend mentally strapped to that state.

It was high time to have moved on. I’m happy to be in Tennessee.

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Midday Escape from Daleville

It was broad daylight. Around 11 a.m. I’d been trapped in Daleville for nearly two days. Holed up inside a kind of fortress that brazenly displayed a neon sign out front: “Super 8,” its bright yellow light screamed through the night.

I knew I had to get out, by any means necessary.

Daleville the town is harmless enough. A small burg in western central Virginia that specializes in strip malls, Cracker Barrell and unwalkable roads. Even the Super 8 served a purpose on my journey. Once. Twice. Now a third time.

I’d already spent a week at the Daleville Super 8 in late October 2022. It was the refuge I turned to when I hobbled off the Appalachian Trail with a stress fracture in my right foot, third metatarsal. The Super 8 was where I made the excruciating decision not to continue, to call a hiatus from the trail, return home and nurse my injury for the winter. It was from where I limped out every night back then, across the parking lot and up to the bar at Pancho’s, a Mexican restaurant, the only eating establishment within walking distance.

Super 8 of Daleville was where I returned once again on March 17, 2023. A place from which to launch my resumption of an AT thru-hike. Fly into Roanoke-Blacksburg Regional Airport and the Daleville Super 8 is an easy enough Lyft ride away. I arranged a shuttle pickup to run me up to Jennings Creek, about 30 miles north, where I last exited the AT.

Two and a half days of hiking brought me right back to Daleville, to an annoying highway crossing two doors down from the Super 8. Back again. And again, the Super 8 offered the value of a room with Wifi to facilitate my writing deadline. For this third stay, having regained the benefit of my healthy foot, I could venture further from the Super 8, into Daleville proper. There I visited a series of establishments. Kroger’s, for trail resupply. Mountain Trail Outfitters for some sunscreen. And most importantly, Three Lil Pigs BBQ for sustenance, a much-needed change of pace from overused Pancho’s.

Three multi-night stays in Daleville. Three respites at the Super 8.

I knew I had to escape.

Breakout of the Super 8

High in the mountains above Daleville, Va., near Hay Rock.

It wasn’t an easy caper. I packed up in silence, hoping not to attract any suspicion. I pulled on my pack and surreptitiously descended the stairs to the lobby.

Melissa at the front desk appeared to know exactly what I was up to, and asked if I wanted a receipt. Surprised at her penetrating foresight, I stammered, unsure what to say. Finally, I whispered, “Can you email it?” She could, no problem.

She wished me well with all the transparency of a KGB thug. Behind her smile I suspected chicanery. She betrayed her motive and proved my suspicion correct when she welcomed me to “come back again any time” loudly enough for others to hear. “We love our regulars.”

So that was how it was. A Daleville Super 8 regular.

It was decided then. Escape I must, and quickly.

I smiled, too, playing Melissa’s game. Then I stepped out through the automatic sliding door. And I was outside. Ready to leave, it seemed. But surely this was too simple. I tried not to look back but relented to my curiosity. Back inside the lobby doors, Melissa watched me, the smile still on her face. I knew it. I would never be allowed to effortlessly walk away from Daleville and the Super 8 forever.

But for the moment, walk I did, continuing on my way. Past Pancho’s. Across the obnoxious, unwalkable highway (after waiting eight minutes for a break in traffic). I could feel Melissa’s prying eyes still upon me as I walked back onto the AT.

Was it true? Had I escaped Daleville?

Gone But Not Escaped

But of course, it was all a ruse. Even as I lost sight of the Super 8 for the moment, I could hear that incessant Daleville traffic. Would it ever cease its torment?

After more than two miles hiking, Daleville Super 8 remains in view.

I hiked for a full hour, climbing up, away, hope building with every step, every foot of elevation gained. I crested a mountaintop adorned with massive, humming power lines.

That’s when I fell to my knees in agony. Of course it was all too good to be true. I would never escape Daleville. For far below, even after hiking for two hours, lay an unobscured view of the town, splayed in all its mundane paleness. And directly across from me, glaring in a clearing, its neon sign reaching out to me miles away, pulling me back: the Super 8.

I hadn’t escaped anything. I hastened onward, still determined to leave Daleville behind for good. Another hour, another several miles along a mountain ridge. Still, relentlessly as I stopped for breath, the traffic and sounds of Daleville and that loud yellow sign yelling Super 8 reaching up to me in the hills.

I was convinced. I could hike all day, for days on end even, and still not escape this bland, nondescript town and the Super 8 that once offered succor.

If you squint, you can still see Daleville Super 8’s yellow sign far in the distance.

Even now, alone in the woods, night setting in, while I can no longer see Daleville below, nor hear its car horns honking, its truck engines whining, while the Super 8 sign doesn’t light up the forest, I know. It’s still there. Never far away. Beckoning me back. It will always be there. When I close my eyes. When in the silence I hear its echoes. Whenever I dine out on mediocre Mexican food.

I’ve left Daleville, but I haven’t really escaped. I will go back again someday.

I am, after all, as Melissa made all too clear, a regular at the Super 8.   

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Back on the (Cold) Trail

Sleeping bag liner? Nah, shouldn’t need it.

Insulated gloves? No way, overkill.

Base layer? Don’t want to carry the weight.

My first night back on the Appalachian Trail, March 18, it became apparent I had erred. I hiked 10 miles from a rural trailhead at Jennings Creek, about 30 miles north of Roanoke, Va. The hiking was awesome all day, around mid-40s and sunny. I stopped at a shelter named Bobblet’s Gap and humped a quarter-mile down switchbacks to the structure. It was around 5 p.m. when I arrived and the temperature was dropping fast. It wouldn’t have been too bad except for the icy wind, which picked up intensity through the night.

I bundled up, confident in my 20-degree sleeping bag’s ability to withstand the cold assault. I’d slept in cold weather before.

But not like this. Not with this freezing wind buffeting my thin layer of nylon. Not exposed on the slatted wood floor of a three-walled shelter with nothing holding off the wind. And not without having prepared for freezing weather with base layer, sleeping bag liner and, sometimes, insulated gloves.

At around midnight, I was remembering my errant rejections of those cold-weather supplies as the temperature dropped below 20 and seeped into my sleeping bag. My double-socked feet were the first to let me know this would be a fitful night as I struggled fruitlessly to get them warm and comfortable. Then I felt the frigid draft on my back every time I turned on one side as it snuck in the open top of my sleeping bag and wheedled down lower and lower like a snake seeking warmth. Eventually, the shivering began. I restrained myself from checking my watch every few minutes to see if this interminable night was working its way toward morning sun.

It wasn’t.

Move or Stay?

I considered getting up, packing my things in the midnight dark and start hiking again. It probably would have been the prudent thing to do. And if it were any colder and if I were not able to snag a few moments of sleep here and there I would have opted for that dire choice.

Instead, I hunkered tighter from the cold, curling into an ever tighter fetal ball and waited it out. Morning would come. Eventually.

Welcome back to the Appalachian Trail.

Smart Packing

Packing for a backpacking trip is an art in itself. It’s a fine balance between stripping down your list to the barest of essentials and anticipating must-haves and levels of comfort.

Some thru-hikers prance down the trail with a pack weighing only 12 or 15 pounds, equipped only with a plastic tarp for shelter, no changes of clothes and a handful of energy bars. I admire them but it’s not for me. I’m not the heaviest of packers, but I insist on an enclosed shelter like a tent of hammock, a sleeping bag and things like rain gear, eyeglasses and actual meals.

But when I’d set the date for my return to the AT, I checked weather forecasts for the central Virginia region I’d be returning to, and they looked reasonable. Lows in the 30s, highs in the 50s. Sounded quite ideal for hiking.

My main error was not considering the elevation. A rookie mistake that I’ve sufficiently berated myself for. My shelter mate that night, trail named Cayenne, told me about a site named ATweather.org. Plug in the shelter you’re aiming for and it’ll give you the weather forecast at that location, rather than, uselessly, down in the towns 3,000 feet below.

That would have been good to have when I was packing. I might have thrown in my sleeping bag liner. Definitely would have packed my base layer. That surely would have yielded me a better night’s sleep.

Tough Morning

As long and uncomfortable as the night at Bobblet’s Gap was, the morning was even more intense.

Cayenne, a hardy Vermonter, rose at 5 a.m., well before daylight, and headed out into the dark. He’d been hiking since January and was equipped for the cold.

That left me alone in the shelter, deep down in the gap where, even as the sun rose above, its rays would not penetrate into this gully.

Sunset at Fullhardt Knob.

The most mundane of morning chores were a quick dash out and back into the sleeping bag to warm frozen hands. Brushing teeth. Retrieving water. Making breakfast. Each time, back inside the sleeping bag to recover. I was dreading the moment when I’d have to pack up the sleeping bag, my only source of refuge.

To make matters worse, all my water had frozen. No morning tea. And I’m a cold-soaker, meaning I don’t carry a stove to heat up water for meals. Eating my cold-soaked oatmeal was like chomping ice.

MacGuyver Time

Okay, I was caught off guard on my return to the trail. Made rookie mistakes. I certainly should have put a bottle or two of water inside my sleeping bag. That would have saved me from dehydration in the morning.

By the time I departed and climbed back up out of Bobblet’s Gap and the AT, it was mid-morning. At least I was moving, and my hands would thaw before long.

I climbed and built heat, the sun warmed the trail and gradually my layers came off. A pleasant hiking day ensued, for 13.5 miles, to a mountaintop shelter named Fullhardt Knob.

I took a sunset picture and checked the forecast, properly this time, on ATweather.org. Another frigid night, down in the low 20s.

I placed two water bottles inside my sleeping bag, along with my gloves. A childhood fan of the TV show MacGuyver (the old one, haven’t seen the new one), I considered everything at my disposal. I stuffed my tent rain fly inside my sleeping bag to simulate a liner. I zipped myself up inside my tent. I put on every layer of clothing I had, including rain gear. And though my sleeping bag zipper chose to stop working and wouldn’t close up at about midnight, I adjusted and slept restfully for nearly nine hours.

The forecast for the coming week looks perfect with highs in the 60s and lows in the 30s and 40s. I survived the freeze.

Welcome back to the trail.

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Rock Star on the Trail

My daughter Livvy is a rock star hiker.

I already knew this. But it was reiterated for me recently when I hiked through New Hampshire’s White Mountains as part of my Appalachian Trail thru-hike.

Livvy Weld finishes the Pacific Crest Trail

Livvy’s recent completion of the Pacific Crest Trail, a 2,600+-mile challenging hike from the Mexican border in California to the Canadian border in Washington, would be enough to qualify her rock star credentials. But she had already locked it up four years ago when she took her spring semester off from college to solo thru-hike the AT, at age 19.

I humbly follow in her footsteps. Except, where she hiked the AT from Georgia to Maine, I am hiking the grandfather of all trails from north to south, having started with a summit of Maine’s Mount Katahdin on June 30.

As I climbed among New Hampshire’s 4,000-foot mountains on a daily basis, I made a point of stopping in to visit each of the Appalachian Mountain Club huts dotting the trail throughout the grueling White Mountains.

Further bolstering her rock star credentials, Livvy has worked as a member of AMC hut crews (hut “croos” in the vernacular) for several years, in Zealand Falls Hut, and as hut master at Mizpah Hut. She recently started as hut master at the famous Lakes of the Clouds Hut, perched just below the summit of Mount Washington, for the fall 2022 season.

Celebrity Status

As I stopped into each hut during my White Mountain hike, I made a point of approaching the croo members. It went something like this:

“Do you know Livvy Weld?”

“Yes! We know Livvy! Oh my god, we love Livvy, she’s awesome, Why?” This interchange took place every time, without fail.

Then, my favorite part: “I’m Livvy’s dad.”

“You’re kidding! Oh my god, Livvy’s dad is here, what are the odds? Come in, have some free food, can I get you anything?”

Word Travels

Being treated as a celebrity because of my offspring was a highlight of my AT so far and defines New Hampshire in my memory.

I stopped by Carter Notch Hut amid a torrential downpour and met Bailey, Cooper and Caro. Caro even knew my name:

“I’m Livvy’s dad.”

“Oh my god, are you Eric?” Caro asked right away. (Livvy didn’t remember mentioning my first name to her croo mates.)

Livvy and me in the Mojave just before she departed on the PCT.

I next went to Madison Hut and met Riley, Noah and Will. They offered to let me work-for-stay, an option for thru-hikers in which they can help the croo with kitchen and dining duties in exchange for staying in the hut (sleeping on the dining room floor) and eating left over dinner once paying guests have finished.

I stopped by Lakes of Clouds Hut and met Acadia, who was Livvy’s assistant hut master last year, and Aidan and Lydia. Then over to Mizpah and met CC, who went to Smith College with Livvy.

By the time I worked my way to Lonesome Lake Hut and met Jo, she knew I was coming.   

“Hi Jo, I’m Livvy’s dad, I’m thru-hiking the AT while she’s thru-hiking the PCT,” I said.

“I know,” Jo exclaimed, to my surprise. “Word came through that Livvy’s dad was coming through the huts, and I so wanted to be here when you came by.” Jo offered me left over breakfast and a wonderful savory scone before I pushed on to climb the Kinsmans.

Opposite Directions

Since learning (over again) that my daughter is indeed a rock star on the trail (and that word travels impressively fast among croo members), I have proceeded to send many northbound thru-hikers her way. “Say hi to Livvy when you pass through Lakes of the Clouds.”

I wished my and Livvy’s trail timing could have worked out more in sync so that I could have seen her at work in her hut as I hiked through. As it was, we both appreciated the symbiosis of thru-hiking simultaneously, albeit her north near the west coast as I traveled south near the east.

But my experience meeting her croo mates and friends throughout the Whites provided the effect of helping me feel closer to my daughter as we co-thru-hiked our respective journeys. And, of course, it underscored for me, once again, that my daughter is truly a rock star.

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Shifting Credibility as a SOBO AT Thru-hiker

As an Appalachian Trail thru-hiker, once you’ve trekked southbound through Maine’s gnarly trails and into New Hampshire’s White Mountains, attitudes and perspectives change dramatically.

You gain a new kind of street (or, in this case, trail) cred. Fellow thru-hikers look at you differently, talk to you with a heightened respect and seek your knowledge in a way they never would have when you were a newbie back in central Maine.

View of Mount Washington in the clouds, from summit of Mount Pierce.

In those nascent days of first stepping into the 100-mile wilderness, the few northern-bound thru-hikers (NOBOs) floated by like battle-worn soldiers, having survived the Whites and the maddening, rocky, rooty climbs of southern Maine – not to mention 1,700 previous miles of AT. You nearly genuflected to their experience and superior knowledge, like a rookie thirsting for nuggets of wisdom.

I was talking about this with my hiking friend Grills on a recent descent down from the Franconia Ridge. Grills completed thru-hikes of the Pacific Crest Trail (PCT) and the Continental Divide Trail (CDT) and has hiked the Colorado Trail, the Arizona Trail and other rites of passage. His successful completion of an AT thru-hike will net him the vaunted Triple Crown, a rare accomplishment of having thru-hiked the AT, PCT and CDT. These people are regarded like hiking gods on the trail.

“It’s like everything changes once you get into the Whites as a SOBO,” Grills said. “Like all of a sudden you got respect.”

I had to agree, and said so. “I’ve noticed,” I said. “Now, NOBOs ask me for advice about the trail coming up and listen to what I have to say. It wasn’t like that in Maine.”

100-Mile Test

There’s no name for this phenomenon that I know of. It’s just a shift, a subtle accumulation of worldliness by virtue of having gone through something difficult and survived to continue on.

This is an earned respect, to be sure. Hiking the AT south through Maine is, by popular consent, a trial by fire, a grueling 280-mile test of will in which your body and mind will be pushed to their limits of ability, resourcefulness, patience and endurance.

On my first day heading into the 100-mile wildnerness, back on July 1, I stopped by a convenience store at Abol Bridge, the northbound entrance to Baxter State Park, to chat with a few fellow hikers. One 19-year-old NOBO was giving us SOBO newbies an account of what lies ahead.

“The 100-mile wilderness is a test to make sure you can even survive out here,” he explained. “Then you make it through there, and you climb up White Cap Mountain, your first ‘real’ mountain. That’s a warm-up for what’s coming up in southern Maine. And that’s a warm-up for the Whites in New Hampshire. It just keeps getting harder and harder, man.”

With each word me and my fellow SOBOs slunk deeper, our chins lowering heavily to the ground, daunted by his admonition. What were we getting ourselves into?

Earned Respect

That young NOBOs words turned out to be punishingly precise, and rang in my head every time I pushed my body to take another steep step upward climbing through the mountains of southern Maine and New Hampshire’s Whites.

Now, on the other side of the White Mountains, about to walk across the Connecticut River from Hanover, New Hampshire, into Norwich, Vermont, I understand with a rearview lens what all the admonitions were about.

Main intersection, downtown Hanover, NH

Hiking the AT SOBO will require grit right up front before your body and mind realize the need for it. The way I see it in retrospect is that I went into a kind of shock in which my brain became hyper-focused on the task – i.e. making it through Maine, surviving the seemingly impossible climbs of the Whites.

Once you do – once you survive that rite of passage and come out on the other side, that is, here in Hanover, NH – you have earned a certain aura of hard-earned respect based on your experience. NOBOs have not yet gone through this grinder, though they have survived the long-term slog to get this far north on the trail.

But at this trail transition, from the straight-up climbs, rocks and roots of Maine and New Hampshire, to the relatively smoother, dirt and pine-needle trails with vastly milder inclines of Vermont, Massachusetts, Connecticut and New York, we SOBOs and our northern counterparts are clearly on more even ground. The mere whiff of superiority from those NOBOs of Maine doesn’t exist here. We are closer to brethren, mutually respecting what each other has achieved.

And we’re still here, continuing on.

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The Perfect Harlequin Ending

Trigger warning: this story includes scatological references.

Rarely do a book of questionable value and a purpose borne out of desperation so perfectly align.

It was my first day heading into the 100-mile wilderness to begin my AT thru-hike. (It was actually my second thru-hike day, the first having been a hike up Mount Katahdin to begin the venture at the trail’s northern terminus at the summit.)

My friend Paul, who had summited Mt. Katahdin with me, had suggested stopping at Abol Bridge on my way in, where there’s a small diner and convenience store. He remembered from his hikes in Baxter State Park that the store there had a shelf of books. Knowing that phone battery power would be limited through the 8- to 10-day stretch of the 100-mile wilderness, he thought I might want to pick up a paperback book to have on hand for reading during that stretch, without using phone battery.

I appreciated the suggestion. It was essential, actually. I’m a book lover, and when I climb into my hammock at night, relaxing with a book after a long day’s hike, it’s one of my favorite and most comforting moments. So I checked out the store’s book shelf.

The only problem was, the books the store had available were all donated on a leave-one-take-one basis, so quality was lacking. Harlequin romances seemed to be the popular item for leaving on the shelf for some reason. I looked over every single title. Nothing appealed. In fact, a reflexive gag and near-vomit was the most common reaction.

Finally, picturing myself in my hammock at night with hours to spare and nothing to read, I decided to choose the lightest-looking book. Quality was no longer an issue. It was all about added weight in my backpack now.

“The Edge of Darkness,” I believe was the title of the book I chose. I can’t recall the author, or have chosen to forget. An appropriate Harlequin title. It limply told the story of a young man and woman who fall in love around an odd witch tale set in a town obviously themed on Salem, Mass. Whatever.

A Vital Resource

The serendipitous part of the story is what became of this novel that was better suited for something other than reading.

On about my fifth day hiking and camping in the 100-mile wilderness, a very bad thing happened: I ran out of toilet paper.

Now, I, like most others starting their AT thru-hikes, was new at this. I thought I estimated how much toilet paper I would need to last 10 days in the woods. But try it yourself. It’s not an easy thing to anticipate.

Still, you have to supply your own toilet paper. While the occasional camping lean-tos where we hikers tend to camp out usually have a “privy” – basically a composting outhouse – to accommodate hikers’ needs, they do not include toilet paper. To say it’s a calamity to run out of that commodity with at least 3-4 days left of hiking is not an understatement.

I panicked. I wondered how this could have happened. I considered options that I’ll never admit to, and leave up to your imagination to fill in.

Meanwhile, it had rained a lot in the first few days of my 100-mile wilderness trek. When it rains during a thru-hike, much of what you carry in your pack becomes wet and soiled. Which was precisely what was happening with my Harlequin paperback. I carried it tucked into the “brain” of my pack. That’s the attached compartment that sits on top of the main part of the pack. Water seeped in and dampened the pages of the book almost to the point that I could no longer read the pages. In fact, the cover, with a dramatic illustration of the young protagonist and her handsome hero, had long since slid off the book. (It was to my relief, actually; the risk was removed that fellow hikers might steal a glimpse of the trash I was reading on the trail.) The pages were so wet that I had to start removing them one by one.

That was when it hit me like a bolt of electricity. Sometimes necessity and circumstance have a way of miraculously coinciding to the benefit of all.

Once the idea leaped into my consciousness that my toilet paper solution was literally in my hands as I squinted to make sense of the wet printed pages of that Harlequin romance, it all made perfect sense. First I peeled off a soaked page and wadded it tenderly in my hand. Yes, yes, this could work.

Soft. Pliable. Ample. And of less than no literary value whatsoever.

Privy “Reading” Material

The next morning I headed off to the privy with my novel in tow. Without going into detail, I will say that the rain-soaked pages of this Harlequin novel worked ideally. I continued pulling off the water-softened pages and substituting them for toilet paper for the remaining four days of the wilderness hike.

At night, as I crawled into my hammock and got comfortable, I continued to read the unimaginative story. Hey, I was desperate for reading material, and there simply was no alternative.

I maintain, between this novel’s uses as a literary tome and a bathroom accessory, it’s clear which was more fitting. And for Harlequin, and its ad nauseum stream of boddice rippers, I have discovered a new appreciation.

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Just Let Maine Have Its Way

Maine is going to win. Of that you can be sure.

Hiking the Appalachian Trail in Maine is a matter of submission. When and how long it takes are the only questions.

Summit of Katahdin: the beginning of a southbound AT thru-hike.

I began my thru-hike of the Appalachian Trail with a summit of magnificent Mount Katahdin on June 30. I opted to take the Knife Edge trail to the summit, where the northern terminus of the AT begins. The Hunt Trail down Katahdin is also the AT, and thus began my thru-hike all the way to Georgia.

Following the Katahdin summit, a southbound AT thru-hiker (known as a “sobo”) then heads south through Baxter Park to Abol Bridge, the south park entrance, and the official beginning of the 100-mile wilderness. This is a trail stretch known for its isolation, lack of towns or amenities, comforts and exit routes. It’s just wilderness.

What the 100-mile wilderness also offers are breathtaking vistas, countless water bodies, no limits on serenity, peace and nature.

Hiking in Maine

I began my thru-hike into the 100-mile wilderness with the arrogant thought that I’d done a lot of hiking over the years, pretty much knew what it was about and would be the controller of my hiking destiny. That worked for a couple days. I had outlined a hiking schedule in advance, knowing it would be a flexible plan.

If you look closely, you can see a trail under all those roots.

What I learned fairly quickly is: hiking in Maine isn’t like hiking in most other places. Hiking in Maine is rugged, gnarly and slow. The environs are spectacular, but Maine’s trails feature massive, boa constrictor-sized roots that snarl up to snag your ankles and trip you at every opportunity. And not just every once in a while; constantly, and bunched together relentlessly. And in the few areas where there are not roots, there are rocks. Not evenly sized rocks, but all different sizes, cluttering the trail haphazardly so you can never take two steps the same, you’re always varying your speed, step and pace.

It’s always either roots or rocks. And that’s the easy part of hiking in Maine. That’s before the mountain climbing starts, heading south. Then it becomes all of the above except now you’re ascending a steep (no switchbacks in Maine) slope for two thousand vertical feet.

Who’s in Charge?

After a few days of pushing along imagining that I would cruise through Maine according to my schedule, insisting that I was in charge of my own hike, I soon learned that that was not the case.

I wasn’t in charge. I’m not in charge. Maine is in charge.

Spectacular summit of Saddleback Mountain

As soon as I relented, slowed down and agreed that I was subject to Maine, not the other way around, I began to enjoy its trails more.

Maine sets the rules, not you as hiker. Maine tells you when you will be able to cruise along for a few miles, when you will get tired, and when you must go very slow.

The sooner you realize that on this state’s trails, the more you will enjoy the experience.

Just let Maine have its way.

Praise to Maine

I’m relieved I gave in to Maine and recognized its natural dominion over me. Thankful I genuflected early on to its obvious authority and relaxed into it.

Hammock camping next to Little Jo Mary Lake, a highlight of the 100-mile wilderness.

Now, as my unwritten pact states, I accept what Maine agrees to grant me. I appreciate the precious few moments when the hiking is smooth. I slow way down to a single mile an hour on numerous occasions, to get up tall, unforgiving mountains, to pick my way intentionally through the maze of tree roots and sharp rocks strewn across the path. I respect the dangers of being hasty and trying to move through this state too quickly. That’s a recipe for injury.

Maine has been one of the hardest places I’ve hiked. In a way, I look forward to working my way beyond this state. In other ways, I will miss it.

Anyway, it’s not like getting through Maine offers any great reward heading southbound on the AT. Next up: New Hampshire’s White Mountains.

That should be much easier.

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6 Tips for Mentally Preparing for Your Next Big Adventure

As any of us know who have taken big, protracted adventures: it’s more of a mental endurance test than it is physical.

Not that we won’t be tested physically. If your next adventure is going to push you beyond where you’ve been and deliver the kind of emotional triumph you seek, it will likely challenge you physically, maybe more than anything you’ve done before.

But even as we are pushing our bodies and wringing every last ounce of our energy to complete a day’s goal, the mental game will be the bigger test over the long run.

Once your body adapts to the daily grind (which it eventually will), that’s about when the mind games begin. When you settle in for the long middle section, and the novelty of the road or trail or river starts to wear off. When the change of scene starts to slow down and revelation turns into monotony. I’m talking about when that dangerous little question starts to seep into your mind: why?

Why am I doing this again? What’s the point? Why am I putting myself through this pain? Why did I imagine I could conquer this challenge?

No Reason

I’ve heard and had to overcome the whys before, we all have. They can be incessant and self-destructive, eating away at your aspirations from the inside.

I expect to hear the whys again on my own upcoming adventure, a north-south thru-hike of the Appalachian Trail.

These whys attack when you’re at your weakest. When things hurt the most. When your feet are burning with every step. When your quads are refusing to power up that next hill. When you want to curl up in a fetal position and go to sleep but the mosquitoes are buzzing loud in your ear.

It’s at those moments when you must remind yourself: you are not responsible for answering that question. There is no answer. There is no reason. You are simply doing what you are doing, end of story. Nobody needs to know why, not even your nagging inner voice.

6 Tips

To ease such moments of questioning amid adventure – to help mitigate the draining effects of the whys and prepare your mindset for your next long-haul endeavor – I offer these six mental training notions. These concepts are intended to be incorporated into your pre-departure routine, as part of your run-up to adventure readiness.

  1. Visualize. This is a vitally important first step. It sets up your mind for building toward success and making happen what you set out to achieve. Look toward your upcoming journey and create detailed scenes of what you imagine it will look and feel like. Close your eyes for best effect and take a few deep breaths. Imagine yourself in the scene as you want to be, to feel. Strong. Joyful. Successful and triumphant. Fill in as much detail as you can. The more specific your imagined picture of the near-future is, the more you will assist your mind in making that picture become reality in the moment.
  2. Project. This exercise is similar, but more practical than the visualization step. Again, look ahead through your adventure, but this time take into account all that could happen, the dangers, the unexpected mishaps, even worst-case scenarios. This will prepare your mind for resiliency in the moments – and there will very likely be some – when things don’t go your way. This is an exercise to gird your mind for dealing with whatever happens, and not crumble when something goes wrong. If nothing unfortunate happens, wonderful, you won’t need to deal with setbacks. But it’s better to be mentally prepared going in.
  3. Chunk it Down. Big goals are made of small goals strung together. You may have a big aspiration in front of you, but when you’re in the middle of it, it’s best to break it down into smaller goals, daily, weekly, monthly, the next town or the next big meal. It can be daunting and overwhelming to always be thinking about your big end goal. Chunking it down into bite-size pieces eases the mental burden. All you have to do is make it to the next rest stop. Then the next one, and so on.
  4. Build in Flexibility. From the outset of planning your adventure, adopt a mindset of flexibility. Be ready to shift your goals on any given day, and adapt to realities on the ground. Listen to your body and allow your plans to change as necessary, when you’re simply too tired to achieve a goal, or the weather turns bad, or you’re running low on food, or you discovered the perfect camping spot right next to a refreshing mountain lake. Know that your short-term goals will have to be malleable and that on any given day things can change. Allow that change. Be willing to give yourself permission to adapt.
  5. Don’t be a Hero. Go at your pace, hike your hike, not anyone else’s. Everyone has different abilities, strengths and weaknesses. Go into your adventure knowing that you may not comfortably align with the pace set by someone else. You may be a faster hiker than your hiking buddy, or you might cycle a little slower than your companion. It’s fine to slow down or move ahead and separate momentarily or for a day. If you want, make a plan to meet at a designated place down the trail or road and regroup. But if it’s creating a drag on your experience, don’t push too hard just to keep up with someone else.
  6. Enjoy it. That is, after all, at least part of the point. Aim to be in the moment as much as possible on your adventure. Take in your surroundings, engage all your senses and absorb the full experience. Appreciate each moment (even the painful ones). Don’t become so consumed with finishing the task that you forget to enjoy getting there. You are lucky to be taking this adventure.

Happy adventures!

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What Have We Done Lately?

25 Years Later, a New Chapter

When I started my current day job back in the 20th century as a news and public relations writer and event planner for a private college, I had no intention of spending 25 years doing it.

It’s not even like me. I crave variety in life, of experience, geography, flavors, relationships and knowledge. Spending 25 years at one place didn’t fit with my life narrative.

It was 1997 when I joined the college, armed with some newspaper and freelance writing experience, having spent a decade traveling and living around the world. The U.S. was on a roll, guided by President Bill Clinton and an economy that lifted all boats. I had entered matrimony and invited a new child, Elliot, into the world the year before, with a second, Olivia, on the way. Raising them to adulthood has been its own, wonderful adventure.

I’ve never viewed spending 25 years at the same job (basically) as any kind of adventure. But I can allow how I might be corrected on that spurn now. Adventure? Not sure, but it has certainly been a time of personal and professional growth.

Now, after 25 years at the same job, it is beyond time to move on, to begin real adventure, new horizons. When I recently announced my retirement from this quarter-century employment, I viewed it as a grand step toward that endeavor.

Let the adventure begin.

Sunset at Dog Pier, Ocean Beach, San Diego

4 Elements

To explain what I mean, I refer to my four conditions of adventure, four tenets that I define must be present in order to refer to an experience as adventure:

  1. Challenge – it must include some kind of challenging goal, something to overcome and achieve.
  2. Risk – let’s face it, without at least a dose of risk, an activity isn’t an adventure.
  3. Out of the ordinary – it’s got to be something that you don’t do routinely, something distinct from everyday experience.
  4. Movement or travel – some kind of transportation from one place to another, whether that is virtual or actual.

Working the same job for 25 years is a lot of things. It’s a living, it’s a platform for professional advancement and a source for funding life’s necessities. It also includes aspects of adventure, such as challenge and, at times, some risk.

But, I argue, it does not meet the definition of adventure per se because it lacks important defining characteristics of that term. Movement, for one. My day job has not involved a lot of movement or travel, not enough to term it adventure. And as for being out of the ordinary? Well, remaining in the same job for 25 years is the antithesis of extraordinary. Rather, it defines ordinary by its nature of repetition.

Onward to Adventure

The way I see it is, I am leaving the ordinary for the extraordinary. Adventure is what lies before me, beyond retirement. This will be the chapter that includes challenge, risk, most certainly, living out of the ordinary, and lots of movement.

The challenges of my next 25 years will be multiple, intentional and unforeseen. I will purposely plot and tackle physical challenges, beginning with a thru-hike of the Appalachian Trail. And because it’s life, I know I will encounter challenges that I can’t imagine from this current vantage.

As for risk, there’s no question that the act of stepping off the financial cliff of a regular paycheck and venturing into the unknown is risky. Though I will maintain and pursue other forms of income, there are any number of ways I could fail and return to destitution I once knew, in my youth.

Shifting gears after 25 years of doing the same thing is the definition of living out of the ordinary. Moreover, my next 25-year chapter plans aim to avoid things from becoming too ordinary, to keep it fresh and malleable, to always invite change and new experience.

And movement. This is perhaps the most important aspect of adventure for me. Moving is my element. When I’m on the move, I am most fulfilled. Therefore, my next quarter century will be a series of movement, travel and various forms of locomotion: walking, hiking, biking, driving, boating, riding, flying and training.

Crossroad

Retirement is a demarcation. It marks the end of one road and the beginning of another. I know what is ending, but unsure what is beginning. Within that transition is always opportunity for adventure. The unknown. The abyss.

That is where I’m voluntarily heading. Into who-knows-what and where. Wide open.

Now that’s adventure.

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What Have We Done Lately? Across the U.S. in 2.5 Days

We live in a big country.

And yet, in some ways, not so big.

I’ve been treated to both perspectives in the past year, most recently in late March when I drove from San Diego, Calif., to Easthampton, Mass., in two and a half days.

Bike on Long Beach, CA
July 7, 2021, Long Beach, CA, after riding from Easthampton, MA

This was at least my sixth time driving across the entire U.S., and I can’t count how many times I’ve driven partially across. But I’ve never made the trip in such a compacted time frame, and wouldn’t necessarily recommend it. Before this drive, the last time I traversed the country was via bicycle, in summer 2021.

Across the United States by bicycle: 68 days. Big country.

Across the United States by car: 2 ½ days. Maybe not so big.

There was something beautiful and fluid and thorough in this exercise of sprinting from coast to coast by car in a truncated period. It allowed for a nearly uninterrupted portrait of the country – of the narrow strip through which I traveled anyway. From the Pacific’s glow to the desert’s aridity, the spectacular mountains bifurcating the middle, the interminable flatness of the vast Midwest, and finally the infinite trees and rolling hills of the eastern states.

This quick trip also allowed for a survey of radio stations across the land, from the Mexican music of the southwest near the border to the broad selection of country music, endless religious proselytizing across the Midwest, rock, bluegrass, pop, hip hop, talk, and a small dose of classical and jazz, in that order.

Across the Mojave Again

This drive was a functional traverse. It followed a wonderful three-day excursion with my daughter, Livvy, from Phoenix to San Diego in her Honda Fit, which she has appropriately named Buttercup. The plan was to get her to San Diego, from where she would work her way to the terminus of the Pacific Crest Trail to begin a five-month thru-hike. I was to then drive her car back to Massachusetts for safekeeping while she hikes.

Livvy and me in the middle of the Mojave (Buttercup in the background).

Our three-day drive took us across the Mojave Desert, along the same route I happened to bike last summer.

This was a surreal experience for me. When I biked last summer, from Parker, Arizona, to Twentynine Palms, California, a 111-mile stretch through unforgivingly hot, exposed terrain, it was a daylong ordeal through the 107-degree heat of July. It stands out as one of the most intense days of riding – of my life! – I’ve ever had.

Driving along the same route with Livvy took less than two hours, in an air-conditioned capsule with windows closed and a podcast piped over the speakers. Crossing the desert in a car gives no hint to what it’s like on bike. Crossing the country in a car is equally as distinct from a coast-to-coast traverse by bicycle.

Alien Encounter?

Traveling with my daughter was a true joy that went by far too fast. Our senses of humor are ridiculously in sync and we laughed our way through California.

Except, we weren’t laughing on our second night, when we camped out on Bureau of Land Management land outside Joshua Tree and were buzzed by either A) a highly experimental, but human-made, flying device that looked and sounded like nothing I’ve ever seen or heard; or B) an alien ship. Read the story here.

Still flummoxed but seemingly undisturbed the next morning, we drove three hours to San Diego and stayed in Ocean Beach, where I lived as a younger iteration in the late 1980s.

Driving Through the Night

To drive coast to coast across the United States in 2 ½ days, you’ll need to put in some long stretches.

I set out from San Diego on March 18 at 10:15 a.m. and drove through the day, passing through Albuquerque at 11:30 p.m., then through the night up into Texas, across the Oklahoma panhandle and into Kansas on a small, deserted highway. In Kansas, I spotted a pullover picnic area at 5:30 a.m. and stopped in for a snooze. One hour later, the sun blazed on me through the windshield and the snooze was over.

I took the wheel again and headed east through the day. By the time I stopped for a needed overnight and a bed, outside St. Louis, I had driven nearly 30 hours interrupted only by the one-hour nap in Kansas.

I should mention, my energy was fueled by a succession of convenience store coffee. I’m not a coffee drinker, so when I drink that caffeine-injected liquid, it jolts me for many hours. Cheap date.

Fortified after a solid hotel sleep, I headed for home at 8 a.m. on March 20, arriving in Easthampton, Mass., at close to 2 a.m. the morning of March 21, a 15-hour drive.

Waiting to Move

Thankfully, I love to drive. Give me open road and a tank full of gas and I’m gone. Add in coffee and decent tunes and I’m good for hours on end, even days.

But it’s more accurate to say, I love moving. The mode of transportation is secondary. Bike, car, walking, paddling. Give me constantly changing scenery, the sensation of locomotion and the notion of covering ground and I’m happy.

That’s how I arrived back home following my whirlwind excursion to California with my daughter. Happy. To have moved, to have spent time on the adventure road again.

The time in between is simply waiting for the next chance to head out and move.