A Delightful Springtime Stroll

Happy spring, everyone! I took advantage of a three-day Easter weekend to do some backpacking in southern Utah. While the mountains may be my first love when it comes to hiking, red-rock canyon country is also a fascinating place to spend some time outdoors. More importantly, the shoulder seasons are the perfect time to go hiking in the desert, before it becomes unbearably hot and all the water sources dry up!

The weekend’s trip involved a trip down to the Grand Gulch, a canyon that cuts through the Cedar Mesa in southeastern Utah. Grand Gulch was one of the epicenters of pre-Columbian society from the B.C. era through about A.D. 1500. For those of you out there who are as nerdy as I am (Dad), this corresponds to the same time when Mesa Verde and the Mississippian mound-building cultures were flourishing. The canyon itself is lined with Indian ruins periodically, which was a major highlight of the hike.

Thursday involved driving down to Cedar Mesa after work. It was about a 6 hour drive, and crossed through some of the most desolate country I’ve ever seen. From Hanksville (which, I might add, consists entirely of pricey three gas stations and a mini-mart) to the Colorado River, I did not see a single man-made structure, or pass another car in either direction for 70 miles. The only signs of human existence are the road, and (unfortunately) herds of cattle grazing the open range and the canyon bottoms. I slept in the back of my car at the trailhead.

 

On Friday, I got my permit from the ranger station located at the head of Grand Gulch. I was shocked and appalled to meet government employees who were neither unpleasant, nor overly officious. I should have know, though - they were actually all just volunteers. Three cheers to the Kane Gulch rangers, who got me my permit a half hour before the per

mit office officially opened! I parked my car about 10 miles south, at the trailhead I planned to finish, and hitched back up to the trailhead. I was a little nervous about hitching in Utah (because it’s one of the few states that outright bans hitchhiking), but I caught a ride with the first car after about 20 minutes of waiting.

Friday was a wonderful day. The weather was wonderful, and the miles came easy. Taking a nap mid-afternoon is the height of hiking luxury! I saw a few ruins, however not as many as I expected. Other hikers, however, apparently saw them everywhere! This leads me to one sad conclusion – I’m not nearly as observant on the trail as I think I am. This also might explain how I managed to hike 2000 miles through the mountains without seeing a single bear. I had to set up my tarp that evening because the wind was absolutely howling. When you’re in a sandy canyon and it’s windy, everything gets covered in sand. Everything. I’m still picking the grit out of my teeth a week later, and my phone managed to get sand inside it, beneath the battery. Good thing I set up my tarp though, as it rained lightly for an hour or two that night.

The next day was another nice day; although there was a chance of thunderstorms, I felt five drops of rain. I trekked further into the Grand Gulch, into a seldom-traveled section. There was a wee bit of bushwhacking, and the trail faded in and out periodically. But solitude was abundant, and there was plenty of water. In a few side canyons, I saw some interesting, intricate rock art panels. The BLM asks that hikers do not publically mention where those panels are, to keep them better preserved. About midday, I turned around and headed back up Grand Gulch, to the confluence of Grand Gulch and Bullet Canyon. Bullet Canyon is a side canyon, which contains, in my opinion, the two finest ruins in the area. The Jailhouse ruin is set high on a canyon wall, and is remarkable in its complexity. Perfect Kiva, just a half mile further up the canyon, contains a kiva (underground room) that is remarkably well-preserved, and has been stabilized to allow visitors to actually climb inside it. I cowboy camped that night on a small knoll, with absolutely stunning views. Because the area is so remote, light pollution is virtually non-existent, and I saw the Milky Way (while eating Milky Ways and Snickers) for maybe the second time in my life. The following morning I hiked maybe six more miles back to where my car was parked.

While this was a very leisurely trip for me, it served a great purpose. After the AT, I’d decided that I will never again haul that much crap on my back. This winter’s focus was on reducing my packweight as much as possible, and to that end, I chopped my baseweight (packweight excluding food and water) in half. I did so by reassessing how my various pieces of gear worked together as a system, eliminating stuff that I carry, but never really use, and making selective purchases to replace items that were simply too heavy. My Grand Gulch trip was the inaugural trail of my new system. I’m proud to say that the results are phenomenal. I’ve observed the following benefits:

• Quicker pace. I’m not a particularly quick hiker, as anyone who’s ever hiked with me can verify. However, with my new, lighter pack, I was blowing past everyone on the trail as if they were standing still. And this isn’t because I was trying any harder; I was simply being slowed down less by all the stuff on my back.
• More endurance. Would you really want to hike all day if you had forty pounds to carry around? Doesn’t seem like fun. With a lighter pack, hiking seems more like walking, and less like trudging. I hiked from first light until twilight, and while I was tired at the end of the day, it was a good tired, rather than exhaustion.
• Simplified existence. I carry a tarp that’s purely functional – it’s not my favorite thing in the world to sleep in. So I sleep under the stars whenever the weather will allow. I also experimented with going stoveless. Instead of spending a half hour hungrily waiting for my water to boil, the transition from “hungry” to “eating” took only the 15 seconds it needed to locate and open my food bag. In short, by minimizing what I carry, I have fewer things to bother with.
• Health benefits. This is easily the most important one for me. By minimizing the weight on my back, I am able to minimize the stress on my joints, which is important given the condition of my ankle. This trip marks the first time I’ve been able to backpack without ankle pain since I got off the AT

In short, a more minimalist pack minimizes the parts of the hike that I don’t enjoy, and helps me maximize my enjoyment of the journey itself. And so, this was an enjoyable journey.

Apologies for the ugly mug, but those who are related to me demand such things. Yes, I know that this picture makes me look like I'm 13

A Year in Utah

I know it hasn't been a year yet, but I like the alliteration, so there. A brief look at a few good pictures (taken by friends, who have actual cameras) and crappy pictures (taken by my ancient slide-phone). 

Mt. Nebo - Labor Day 2013 (tallest peak in the Wasatch - 11,900'+)

Did this one as a brief day hike while on a church campout in the area. For being the tallest peak in the Wasatch, it was pretty easy, disappointing even. The trailhead itself was over 9000 feet, so there was less than 3000 feet of vertical gain to get to the summit. View from up top was certainly nice, just a bit too tame perhaps. Lone Peak remains, in my opinion, the monarch of the Wasatch, even though it's not the tallest. 

White Pine Lake - October 2013

Not a supremely notable hike, but it does feature a couple cool photographs by my friend Justin that are worth admiring. Winter was coming to the Wasatch...

Flattop Mountain - October 2013 (Highest Peak in the Oquirrhs -10,600'+)

The last high-elevation hike was to a often-forgotten, but beautiful mountain range, the Oquirrh Range (pronounced like "ochre" [pronounced like OH-kerr]). Whereas the famous (and crowded!) Wasatch Range borders Salt Lake City to the east, the Oquirrhs border Salt Lake City to the west. An impressive range in their own right (the highest peaks are about 700 lower than those of the Wasatch), the Oquirrhs don't recieve a tenth of the traffic that the Wasatch do. You'll notice nice-quality photographs, courtesty of Justin again, and another friend Phil came along as well. The hike was about 15 miles in length and included a healthy 4500 feet of elevation gain, along with a thorny, nasty bushwhack. All in a days' work! 

The Needles - Armistice Day Weekend 2013 (Canyonlands National Park)

I finally got a three-day weekend, and took advantage. Constructed a 28ish mile loop through the Needles district of the Canyonlands. Highlights included the confluence of the Green and Colorado rivers (really, the Green is the primary tributary), the Joint Trail (a slot-canyon-like hike in between two huge rock formations), Chessler Park  (a beautiful flat area ringed by rock spires) and Druid Arch, which speaks for itself. 

Coyote Gulch - Presidents' Day Sale Weekend (Escalante, UT)

I took advantage of another long weekend to do a superb canyon in southern Utah. Unseasonably warm temperatures resulted in daytime highs pushing 70 degrees. The weather, combined with hiking down a beautiful wash and viewing incredible rock formations (especially the massive Jacob Hamblin Arch), made Coyote Gulch unforgettable. Plus, because it was before the magical first day of March, there was nobody else out hiking yet. 

I later learned that Coyote Gulch is a part of the incredible Hayduke Trail, a backpacking route (not a trail, there's no actual cut trail on the ground) that strings together the six National Parks of the Colorado Plateau, visiting the best of red rock country in an 800 mile end-to-end journey. Apparently it comes with a huge set of resupply, navigation, and water source challenges, but hey, that comes with the territory when you're hiking in the desert. 

Unsolicited Advice to Aspiring Thru-hikers

The more I hike, the more I realize I’m not an expert. I’m much more aware than I was 2000 miles ago just how much I have to learn. That said, time to give some unsolicited advice to aspiring thru-hikers. It's worth what you pay for it, I suppose, and above all, the HYOH principle applies - Hike your own hike! 

1)      Embrace reality. It sounds really awesome to be standing on top of Katahdin, a bottle of champagne in hand, celebrating the fact that you’ve walked there from Georgia. It’s significantly harder to actually walk there from Georgia. You will have mountaintop experiences. But the experience of the trail, like the trail itself, is basically a collection of PUDs. The trail is totally worth it. But it’s demanding. It’s never easy, despite the rumors you’ll hear about the mid-Atlantic. It’s awful at times. Do you really want to get out of your sleeping bag and walk through shin-high mud all day – for the fourth day in a row? Perhaps a better question is – are you prepared to do it if that’s what it takes to make it to Katahdin?

2)      Avoid “I will” statements. I hate pre-trail posts. They always strike me as highly presumptuous. For example “On March second, I will start my AT Thru-hike. Over the course of four months, I will walk over 2000 miles through 14 states. I will blog every Tuesday evening. I will be receiving food drops in Hiawassee, the NOC, Hot Springs, Erwin, Hampton, [insert a whole bunch of monotonous towns in VA, at which point the audience starts tuning out]… and Monson. I will spend two weeks fighting the heinous rocks in PA, cruise through the Mid-atlantic, and end on Katadhin, in less than 5 months.” Listen, you can prepare all you want, but nothing prepares you for the trail like the trail does. These ambitious, presumptuous people? They probably quit around Franklin NC, when they discover that the best laid plans get derailed by an all day, cold rain. They also don’t know that they’ll hate the PA rocks. Some people don’t mind them at all. Let the trail be the trail.

3)      Lighten your load. I don’t say this to be an ultralight gear weenie (I happen to find those people insufferable), but to keep yourself from injury. Hauling 40 pounds up a mountain is the quickest way to get blisters, joint problems, or back problems. Plus, you’re more likely to fall and break something. Not everybody should be carrying a 10-pound pack, but get rid of that stupid solar charger for your phone. Some people lighten up on the trail, but it’s really hard to switch out one of the “big heavies” (pack, bag, sleeping pad, shelter), since you get so dang attached to the thing after just a few weeks. Make smart choices before you hit the trail.

4)      Pick your moments. The trail is too vast to do and see everything. You could spend 7 months on the trail and still not take all the blue-blazes or stay at all the “must-stay” hostels. Many hikers, however, have the opposite problem. They’re so focused on hiking and making miles that they walk past incredible things and experiences without so much as a second glance. To find a happy medium, it’s important to know what’s important to you. Don’t skip the Kincora hostel (yes, the other one is nicer, but it doesn’t have Bob Peoples), but you can probably skip that quarter-mile blue blaze to the top of Brushy Sassafras Low Gap Mountain. Like peeing off of fire towers? Then skip High Point State Park (you can’t climb the monument anyway), but don’t skip the Shuckstack. Don’t skip the things that sound cool, and don’t feel obligated to do everything. It’s your hike, after all.

5)      Don’t live at home. I met entirely too many people on the trail who were more interested in blogging about their adventure than actually having their adventure. Similarly, there are some people who checked their phones daily (or more!) to make sure they weren’t missing any important text messages, emails, etc. Their bodies were hiking the trail, but they were allowing themselves to be consumed by their home lives. Keep in contact with the people who matter most to you. But at the same time, allow yourself to have a backwoods experience – and allow others the same.

6)      Don’t feel entitled. I fell prey to this one all too often. Listen, we get it. You’re a thru-hiker, which means you intend to hike the whole trail. And after being told “you’re so amazing; I could never do that!” about a thousand times by non-hikers, you start to think that you are amazing. This kind of entitlement leads to hikers skipping out of hostels (both fee and donation-driven) without paying, or getting angry when a restaurant declines to allow dirty, smelly hikers into its dining area for fear of grossing out their regular customers. Just bathe in a stream first… or put on sunscreen! The overwhelming of services that hikers need are very hiker-friendly. Count your blessings and remember that many of the hiker services we depend on are a result of wonderful people’s generosity.

7)      Know thyself. There are a lot of people who hike in groups, or hike with iPods, simply to keep their brains occupied. It’s almost like they’re afraid of being alone with themselves. How are we distracted or bored when enjoying a 2000-mile walk through God’s creation? Admittedly, there are certainly boring parts (although often in these circumstances, the beauty is just more subtle), But those boring parts gives us time to reflect. We reflect on what this hike means, how it’s changing us, who we really are, our dreams and goals, and God’s graciousness to us in all of this. Try doing that with an iPod, or while debating gear minutiae with Gandalf and Nomad.

8)      Expect to open up. Share a shelter with some other dirty, smelly, bearded freak for a couple nights. Spend an hour rigging up a tarp to keep snow from blowing in the shelter, and sit in your sleeping bags eating Snickers and GORP. You get to talking, and an hour later you’re sharing how after raising three kids, you still had really never done anything for yourself, and hiking the AT was something that you want to do for your own personal development. Or how you fear that even though you’re headed to grad school after the trail, you really aren’t sure whether that’s the path you want to take. And on the flip side, the trail will teach you to listen, to genuinely try to understand the path that the other person is walking. You may disagree, but the first instinct is to understand before you criticize. Expect it. Embrace it.  

9)      Keep a journal. I didn’t keep one until Hot Springs (mile 273), and I wish I had started at the get-go. My journal discusses what I hiked that day, my thoughts/feelings, anything notable that happened, and people I met along the way. In theory, at least. One day’s entry, in its entirety, was “I HATE WINTER”. On a related note, don’t take so many mountaintop view pictures; Standing Indian Mountain looks exactly like Tray Mountain, which looks pretty similar to The Priest, foliage conditions notwithstanding. Instead, take pictures of those funny orange salamanders, those funny orange-clad hikers, and trail angels handing out oranges. You love looking back on those. And, unlike me, keep taking pictures after the first month.

10)  Develop traditions. Traditions give us something to look forward to and ground us in our days. Every evening, upon settling into the shelter, I would announce that this was the best time of the day – dry sock time! I won’t tell you what I did at fire towers, just in case my mom reads this, but suffice it to say I was careful never to drop my pack downwind of the tower before I climbed it. 

Unfinished Business

“How was it?”

I get asked that by pretty much every single person I know these days. I’m not sure what they’re expecting to hear. Some of them, of course, are just being polite, in the same way that we say “how are you?” without really expecting a substantive answer. But for the rest of them, the people who really do want to know, what am I supposed to say? “Oh, it was great!” I suppose that’s true, but it’s so vague as to be meaningless.

How am I supposed to sum up four and a half months of my life in some sort of trite answer? The only thing I can say is this: It was wonderful, terrible, scorching hot, freezing cold, rainy, muddy, beautiful, frustrating, magical, perfect, lonely, socially stimulating, humbling, confidence-infusing, exhausting, refreshing… And I’d do it all again in a heartbeat.

The trail was the best four and a half months of my life. It was FUN. But it wasn’t fun in the same way that, say, spending a day at an amusement park is. Think of the closest relationship in your life: it’s not always fun, but it’s always worth it, and on the whole, it’s your highest enjoyment. It’s not shallow fun, it’s a joy.

But let me back up. I last updated in Hanover, NH. Hanover is the gateway to the White Mountains, the most rugged section of the entire trail. I was pumped. And I was totally justified in doing so. The Whites were AWESOME. I stopped in Glencliff, NH at the Hikers Welcome Hostel (yes, it was just as inviting as it sounds) and refueled, got some good advice on stealth camping in the Whites. Then it was off to climb Moosilauke, the first real peak in the White Mountains. At over 4800 feet, it was almost 1000 feet taller than anything since southern Virginia. It was also the first mountain on the trail that was above treeline. It reminded me of being out west. You know, actual mountains. We (Bright Side, Passover, Witchdoctor, and I) had an absolutely perfect day to summit: sunny, clear, and warm. The wind was only about 40mph, which is about as good as you can ask for in the Whites. Each afternoon, it started thunderstorming, which is rather concerning if you’re holding two metal poles in your hands above treeline, but with a little planning, I managed to play the weather pretty well.

Well, almost. On the day I summited Mt. Washington (the second highest peak on the trail, at 6200 feet), Bright Side and I got up really early and hustled to try and get to the Madison Spring Hut before 3pm, after which there was a likelihood of severe storms. As a side note, there are very few places in the Whites where you can legally camp. There’s a 20-mile stretch, in fact, totally above treeline, and the only places to stay are at the Appalachian Money Mountain Club’s “huts”, which are basically small hotels on top of mountains. They go for $130 per night. There are “work-for-stays” available for two thru-hikers each night. This means that you wash dishes, sweep up, etc, in exchange for feeding on the leftovers from supper, as well as being able to throw your sleeping pad on the dining room floor after all the guests go to bed. You get treated like a third-class citizen (by the guests; the hut crews in general love thru-hikers), but you get ALL THE FRESH-COOKED FOOD YOU CAN STOMACH!

Anyways, the entire stretch from the Mizpah Hut to the Madison Hut (15 miles) is above treeline, with no place to camp. I arrived at the Madison Hut just in time; it hailed on me on the way, but I was safely inside the hut by time the lightning started striking where I had been about 20 minutes prior. Then came the twist. The Madison Hut crew is evil. Since we got there “too early” (you’re not supposed to get there much before 4pm), the crew sent us out… in a lightning storm, over the top of 5700-foot Mt. Madison. Sprinting across boulders above treeline isn’t fun in the slightest. Of course, we weren’t the only people that the sadistic Madison crew screwed over: they made one guy hike over Mt. Washington, in a thunderstorm, with a leg bleeding so bad he had to get stitches. Why? Because he too made the egregious error of arriving 30 minutes too soon. There’s following the rules, and then there’s being morally irresponsible.

Really, though, aside from the miserable experience at Madison, I had wonderful hut stays in the Whites. The hut crews fed me well, treated me well, and (if such a thing appeals to you) liked to share their booze. Yeah, they’re college students, in case you haven’t gathered.

The Whites were hard. But they were worth it. I had a great day on Moosilauke, an epic windy and foggy day on Washington, great views along the entire Presidential Range, and reconnected with some trail friends. The Whites were hard, absolutely. But they’re my favorite part of the trail thus far.

Southern Maine doesn’t get the press that the Whites do, but it’s almost as tough. Doing a 15 mile day is still a huge accomplishment over that kind of terrain. One of the highlights of my hike was the so-called “hardest mile on the AT”, Mahoosuc Notch. Imagine a canyon with sheer vertical walls, and in the bottom, a “jumbled pit of boulders” the size of houses. You have to climb over, around, and even under these rocks. It takes some people up to 3 hours to traverse the mile. I think that there were much, much harder miles on the AT, but this one was certainly the most fun. I thought it was just a big rock jungle gym. The Notch was the last major psychological barrier to break on the AT. For a few months, I had wanted to at least make it that far, to prove that I could take the absolute toughest that the AT could throw at me. And I passed with flying colors.

After the Notch, it was time to get off. Those last few days were some of the most difficult trail days for me. I couldn’t think about anything else other than that emptiness that getting off the trail prematurely would certainly bring. It’s not the fact that I’m not a “thru-hiker” that bothers me; I just want to know what’s around the bend. I want to climb to the top of Avery Peak, Saddleback, Bigelow, and most importantly, Katahdin. But more than all of that, I want the hiking life. I love the freedom, the independence, the simplicity, the importance, of life on the trail. Some people were counting down the miles until their hikes ended. Not me.

I’ve thought a lot about what it feels like to be off the trail. When I look at everyone’s Katahdin pictures, something seizes me, and it’s tough to say what it is. I guess the best way to describe it is “unfinished business”. That trail is mine, and I’m going to finish what I started. Period.

I was going to end the blog on that  note, but that doesn’t seem quite fair. Because I’ve gotta roll the credits. Thanks go to:

·         Mark and Wendy, trail angels in the Smokies, for picking me up after a really frustrating, icy day

·         Miss Janet, for bailing an entire tribe of us off the mountain in the worst snowstorm in years

·         Bob Peoples, for being the Most Interesting Man in the World

·         The Bastian United Methodist Church, for the best breakfast I’ve ever eaten, anywhere

·         Nomad. Not just for the good work that you do, but for the spirit of service to God. Straight out of Matthew 25

·         The fine folks at the Bears Den Hostel

·         Blue Moon, for being a wonderful friend, baseball connoisseur, and considerate person. I never had a true “hiking partner” on the trail, but I’ll admit it was tough to say goodbye back in PA.

·         Bright Side, for sticking together to make it through the rain in New England.

·         Passover and Witchdoctor, for bringing so much joy wherever you went. Also for motivating me to push through the pain

·         Mary Jo and Jerry! Thanks for taking dirty, smelly hiker trash into your home for a couple days. Had an absolute blast with some dear friends

·         The Glencliff hostel, for great service, stealth camping info, inspiring dreams of the PCT, and preparing me mentally for the Whites

·         Coups, Dirty Mike, Chino, and Ayce, for not running me over as you flew past me on the trail.

And a special mention goes to my family, for being there for me. They were a listening ear when I complained about endless snow and cold. They sent me stuff as needed. They prayed their hearts out for me. And they actually read every word of these silly blog posts:

·         Dad, for being unfailingly encouraging

·         Mom, for being willing to do anything and everything to help

·         Grandpa and Grandma Start, for praying, following my blog, and getting almost as excited about my adventure as I was.

·         Josh, Jennifer, and Nichole, who made my entire week better when I had chances to call them.

I am blessed.

There is a God in Israel

It's been a long time since my last blog post. Sorry. No pictures this time, as my phone got wet. Not sure if those pics will be recoverable or not.

Anyway, Topics!

• The rain. May was rainy, June's been worse. We've had more than 9 inches in the month of June, which turned the clay soil of Vermont into an absolute mess. For those of you who go/went to Calvin, think walking through the Mud Bowl, for 150 miles. Yesterday was the first time in a week and a half that my feet stayed dry. Protip: if you saturate your socks in mud for 4 days, they will literally fall apart when you throw them in the wash. 
• Actual mountains. It's all about readjusting your expectations. The mid-Atlantic was pretty flat (with the exception of half of New York, which contained a bunch of absurdly steep, rocky, and generally horrible pointless ups and downs. NY earns very low marks. Plus, I did it in the one week of heat that we've had so far (heat index 100+). But once I hit Vermont, the Greens were a nice change. Killington was over 4000 feet; Stratton was nearly that. If the terrain is going to be steep and/or rocky, I much prefer going over big mountains as opposed to this pointless up-and-down stuff. 
• The blues. I managed to avoid them in VA and through most of the rocky, flat horribleness that is PA. From NY through about mid-Vermont, I was in a twilight zone where there were zero thru-hikers around me. The monsoon, heat, and pointless nature of the miles was really getting me down. I suppose every hiker gets it at some point. One particularly rough day in CT, I realized that "THIS is where I earn Katahdin". It's no accomplishment to hike when you want to hike. You earn your stripes when you soldier through the drudgery, knowing that it's worth it in the end
• Those moments. Sometimes the AT wears on you, but there are also those moments of pure, undiluted awesome. I had one of those days in northern Vermont. It was the first beautiful day in about three weeks. I was hiking through a state park and got stopped by this lady's puppy, who was doing the typical puppy thing and jumping up on me. We got to talking, and soon enough I was sitting at their (Kim and Patrick) trailer drinking coffee and eating fresh fruit. An hour later, I had to leave and hit town on my way. But as soon as I got to the main road running through the campground, I saw Passover and Witchdoctor for the first time in more than a week. And of course we all three made a happy ruckus, and Kim walked out and invited them for coffee as well. So all three of us headed back to their trailer, and feasted on cinnamon rolls and more fruit. And didn't leave until three hours later. A complete waste of a morning, hiking-wise, but I can't think of a better waste. And that was just the second best part of the day. There's a cabin and lookout tower just a tenth of a mile off-trail on top of a mountain. It's on private land, but the owners allow hikers to crash there for the night. After spending all morning not hiking, I realized that I could still make it to the cabin, if I hustled. So I got on my horse and made it there around sunset. I climbed the lookout tower to check out the view. I'm not normally a sunset person, but on this occasion it was simply overwhelming. I unfortunately had no way to take a picture, not that a photo would have done it justice anyway. There were several layers of mountains in view, the first green, almost black. The subsequent ridges were progressively bluer, then grayer, and finally, in the distance, a purple ridge. The jagged peaks were a sharp contrast to the smooth contours of the thin layers of clouds, fading from dark gray into yellow, to bright orange. Right in front of the setting sun were three puffy cumulus clouds, "the size of a man's hand", I joked to myself. In the Bible story in question, Elijah prays that God sends fire on his sacrifice in order that the people may know that "there is a God in Israel". And that's exactly what I experienced. If nature is a "theater" of God's glory, as John Calvin put it, then I was certainly on Broadway.
• The Whites! I've been looking forward to the White Mountains of New Hampshire for a long time now. They're apparently brutally hard (think 1500 feet of elevation gain in a mile), but beautiful. Most thru-hikers say that New Hampshire or Maine were their favorite parts of the trail, even though they're undoubtedly the hardest. Makes me think that the difficulty has got to be worth it!

Mini-picture Post, Take Two

Got a snazzy update for the blogger app on my phone, so I figured I might as well put it to good use. A photo essay, of sorts. Disclaimer: I totally cribbed all of the content of this post from Blue Moon, whose site you should definitely check out.

Me and Blue Moon decided to hit up a sunday buffet. Watch the video before scrolling down.

The verdict?

Food and drink for all :(

Milestones

Goal-setting is a funny business. You set a big goal, and begin to work toward it. Each individual step is small, almost inconsequential. What's the significance of hiking 20 miles when it's just 20 out of 2,184? But after time, these insignificant achievements add up to something significant. As I type this, I'm at mile 998.6. Tomorrow morning, I will hit 1,000 miles, followed later in the day by reaching the "psychological halfway point" of the AT, Harpers Ferry, WV. How in the world did I get here, when each day means almost nothing in the grand scheme of things?

As far as I see it, the big achievement is almost less significant than the multitude of little achievements, because the big achievements are merely derivative of the little ones. The real victory of the AT comes not in hitting these milestones, but in daily choices. An example: I bought new shoes in Waynesboro, VA. After breaking them in, I discovered a manufacturing defect in the left shoe that has given me a nasty and excruciating blister-bruise combo on my left heel. And about 10 miles into each day, the temptation to quit early for the day sounds absolutely delightful. But if I make a pattern of getting off my feet until they're comfortable, I'll never get anywhere. The AT is a lot about pain tolerance, and knowing when to listen to your body, and when to grit your teeth and suck it up. These choices are what make 1,000 miles possible.

People often talk about the "Virginia blues". Virginia is a really, really long state. It contains about 550 miles of trail (about a quarter of the entire AT), and I, like most hikers, spent a bit more than a month in the state. After a while, the monotony of travelling in the same state can become oppressive, especially since a good chunk of it is spent walking nondescript ridges. I never got the Virginia blues, however. I found Virginia to be punctuated by a few really delightful sections. One of them was the Dragons Tooth. It's a gigantic rock outcropping atop a mountain that sticks more or less straight up into the air. It's a really fun climb, and blurs the line between a rock scramble and straight-up bouldering (yes, the little nondescript figure at the top is me). You don't get very many of those adrenaline-rushing "oh crap, I'm gonna die! This is awesome!" experiences on the southern half of the AT, but this was definitely one of them.

Virginia was also the place where I finally got my trail legs. It had been a source of some annoyance to me that, although I was feeling stronger, I was still plodding along through the southern part of the state. However, around mile 750, I finally started to hum along at a good pace. First I started doing a couple of 20 mile days per week. Then I did a pair of 20s back-to-back. And finally I could do 20s on a daily basis. I went from doing about 100-mile weeks to 115 mile weeks. And when the terrain became easier in Shenandoah National Park, I could do a 130 mile week. The goal isn't to do big miles, of course. I know a lot of people (especially young people) who ramp up the pace to keep up with their friend-groups, and end up with shin splints, tendonitis, or stress fractures. But after a while, an 18 becomes a short day, and you're able to do 20 and still take the time to sit on a rock and admire a view, or to play a 15 minute game of peek-a-boo with a pair of deer.

Anyway, tons of things have happened since I updated last, but I don't possibly have room to describe them all. Also, I'm lazy, and am running out of themes for my ever-expansive blog posts. So I have an assignment for you: if you wouldn't mind, PLEASE leave a comment on the bottom of this post (or shoot me an email/facebook message/text) to let me know what YOU want to know about this here hike. I'd like to make it interesting and relevant to the readers, and to avoid having to come with with good post ideas. I will answer pretty much any question except the following:

• "Do you bring a gun?" If you think I'm gonna tote a five-pound brick of dead weight all the way to Maine on the odd chance that a bear even looks askance at me before running away in sheer terror, you crazy. A gun will do nothing to protect me from any actual dangers on the AT (namely: hypothermia, giardia, or slick rocks in a rainstorm)
• "How to you eat?" I open my mouth, insert the food, chew sufficiently (sometimes), swallow and digest, and burn it as energy, much like you do! Now if you're asking where and how often I get the food, that's a different question entirely.
• "I just met a guy with a beard on the trail, but I can't remember his name. Do you know him?" Yes, probably, but "guy with a beard" describes every thru-hiker who has a Y chromosome. Try to be more specific, and don't include stuff like "scruffy hair", "was carrying poles", and "flew past me really fast".
• "How far are you going?" This question is always ambiguous, because I'm never sure if they mean where I'm stopping for the night, or how far I'm going on this trip. If you misinterpret, you either look like a braggart, telling them you're a thru-hiker when they really just wanted to know if you're gonna take the last spot in the next shelter, or too reticent to share what you're doing.
• "Do you wear deoderant?" Yeah, like that would make any difference after you've been sweating from every square inch of your body and haven't showered in two weeks.

Seriously, please post your questions so all my posts aren't as boring as this one is. kthxbai.