AT Nobo, is not a Wilderness experience

[Just Bill]

Muir would not have understood the notion of thru-hiking...

"Hiking - I don't like either the word or the thing. People ought to saunter in the mountains - not hike! Do you know the origin of that word 'saunter?' It's a beautiful word. Away back in the Middle Ages people used to go on pilgrimages to the Holy Land, and when people in the villages through which they passed asked where they were going, they would reply, 'A la sainte terre,' 'To the Holy Land.' And so they became known as sainte-terre-ers or saunterers. Now these mountains are our Holy Land, and we ought to saunter through them reverently, not 'hike' through them."

Yes, but he was an overly emotional Scott prone to overly romantic and flowery notions and general navel gazing activities.
Not to mention his general underlying political and personal motivations to protect his good lord's pristine works to the best of his ability.
We Americans are hard headed goal oriented group of blowhards with places to go and things to conquer.

Not being much of a purist (nor too concerned about arbitrary lines defining a fine adventure) I prefer to travel along the trail.
I believe many look at a long trail as a guideline or a suggestion. The AT remains a fine way to travel from Georgia to Maine, especially if you let the trail takes you where it wants to.

Nothing wrong with having a goal underlying your walking though. Some need a start and finish line.
The bottom line is they walk at all... If you don't get too hung up on the details of it; a bit of sauntering may even sneak up on you when you aren't looking for it.


As Kevin mentioned above... I'm a big believer in the AT as a gateway of sorts.
There is a vast chasm between the couch and doing what Nessmuk or Muir did. You need a few baby steps along the way.
Too many lament the AT as some lost wilderness, when in truth it never existed.
It was carved back out of an already too quickly developing nation just before it was lost for good.

Now more than ever, few of us grow up in the country or with any connection to the land.
Fewer people come from backgrounds in 4H, scouting, or even the good ol' family vacation spent in the out o' doors.

The AT is a trail that someone can hear the call Muir heard and attempt to answer it for themselves.
A true novice can bumble through and survive to tell the tale without having to Chris McCandless their way into disaster.
People like Jennifer Pharr Davis or Andrew Skurka can be transformed... so can Joe and Jane Blow from the burbs.
The AT is what it was always meant to be... a trail for the people to visit the woods.

I wouldn't trust the average AT hiker to plan a week in the boundary waters.
Nor would I suggest they go on a tramp in the sierra with a loaf of bread and a pound of tea.
Even moving onto a lesser known trail which doesn't have the resources may be a stretch to put together.
But that takes nothing away from the AT, in fact to me it makes it unique.

As Kevin also points out... those taking the 'big walk' are still a rarity.
And how many who finally do go echo the general sentiment of awe, curiosity and wonder when they do visit for a day and discover that those white chips of paint stretch out for hundreds or thousands of miles in either direction. How many towns have you gone in where the local residents who give you a hitch are not even aware of the trail hiding in their backyard?

The Appalachian Trail is a bridge we need.
A strip of clean, green woods hiding under our noses in our own backyard.
A path that begins at a roadside crossing, a street corner, suburban home or even stumbled upon during a family vacation by accident.
It is meant to be found, to be walked, and to take you in.
It's that grandparent or old feller down the street who knows a little something you don't from a time gone-by... and is still willing to share it.

If'n the time has come that you've outgrown the front yard and want to go play in the wide world... then go do it.
But don't sit on the front porch moping about how yer little place has grown up and left you behind.
The AT isn't meant to be the place the journey ends, it's where it starts.
Nothing wrong with coming home, or taking the easy trip when you need to unwind.

The challenge of a thru-hike is a personal one... it's moving day after day and place after place with a load on your back and little but yourself to rely on.
It's a traditional pilgrimage just like any around the world we've done for centuries.
It's the travelers journey away from the familiar part of it that makes it special... the Camino can be just as 'pure' as traversing Alaskan wilderness in that regard.
Folks mix up that part of a long hike with where the hike occurs. It's why some complete it and move on with their lives with narry a thought to the woods again.

So many people comment upon completion that the journey has 'restored their faith in humanity'.
Why is that not a noble enough journey? Why must one decry the lessons learned when given a few days to yourself in the trees to evaluate the world around you.
What is the problem with moving in and out of society down a trail in the woods where you are given the opportunity to have the best of each.
Nearly every hiker has treasured memories of town stops, encounters with fellow travelers AND moments of profound connection to the earth they live on.

Many folks muck up the two trips.

If you truly wanted to test yourself in the wilderness then go there and fend for yourself for 6 months.
If you wish to be at one with yer dear Mother Earth, then park your butt on a log and mediate until the birds land on you and the bears feed you dinner.
If it's the siren song of Muir or the beat of an ancient native drum then don't go to the local city park and complain to the mayor about the lack of solitude.
Ma Nature is quite likely to kick you in the dick as welcome you for stepping in her backyard.
It's the front country she makes pretty and hands out candies... once you go strolling into the deep looking for her secrets all bets are off.


If you can't find the beauty an connection all around you on the AT perhaps you should saunter over to a pond and stare deep at yer own reflection and ponder the problem.
Maybe the problem is it's time to move on.
Maybe the problem is you're too scared to.

It's the journey away from home that makes the long walk special.
That shakes up the comfort and familiarity of our daily lives.
If the AT or a developed trail is no longer new, exciting, deep enough, too crowded or soft...
Maybe it's time to move on to a new challenge.

The world is not full of Muir's... it's inspired by the few such folks who exist.
Travelling the land and touching the wild places of this world is a craft.
The word Journeyman described a craftsman who had learned all they could learn from the place they began..And then left it.
There are other trails, other woods, and other places to learn... to truly master a craft one must travel to them.

It's the journeyman phase that takes them onto the next step, that makes them more than they could have been if they never left their first master.
Going out into the wide world is what makes the craftsman whole, complete, and gives them perspective.
But even then that did not complete the training or the path.

It was when the journeyman returned, and successfully taught an apprentice the craft that one could be considered a master craftsman.

So to you who begrudge the fresh faced apprentice who arrives at the trailhead to begin learning the craft you claim to love...

If you just want people to get off your lawn... unfortunately it's not your porch to sit on and bitch.
Perhaps you've 'retired from the trade' before you finished the path. Failure and regret do make a feller bitter.

If it's getting a bit crowded and there is now one too many apprentices in the shop... maybe you are the one has lingered too long under your kind and friendly master the Appalachian Trail.
And perhaps the trail is patiently waiting for you to discover that truth, and nudge you off on your journeyman phase to make room for the next apprentice.

If you have been out and about and consider yourself a journeyman... maybe it is time to take on an apprentice.
To pass on your love, respect, and admiration for the trade of woodswalking this earth.

Maybe the trail is planting these folks right in your path because you keep ignoring that it is time to truly master your craft by passing it on to those who are new.
Much as children reopen our eyes and remind us of when we were so new and fragile... so can a new hiker who still finds that the AT is a vast wilderness before their eyes.
Regain perspective on what a wonder these trails truly are by seeing them through fresh eyes.

No matter how much you love the woods, you can only chain yourself to one tree at a time... if you can't bear to help a beginner... at least have the decency not to run them off or dismiss their experience simply because you have had it before, or better, or differently on that one day long ago before the world moved on and forgot how to do it 'properly'.
After all your grandparents said the same about you, and your grandkids will say the same about their grandchildren.

The woods is filled with solitary hermits as well... but you won't find them posting here. So don't pretend that's what you want either... or you'd already be there.

Where ever you go, there you are.
If you haven't realized that the earth and your small journey on it is one single trail interwoven with every other with no termini; then I'm not exactly sure what it is you think you are doing out there on the trail besides taking up space.

Despite the alphabet soup of trails available to us.. there are in truth only two. Three if you count the Black road of spirit, but what you do during your path to the great dirt nap is your own business.
As the folks who lived here once said... you are either on the good road or the crooked path. From the day you're born to the day you're dirt... it's only those two choices.


I like to think Sai Muir would concede he simply discovered his own way to Saunter this ancient sacred path to the holy land. I think he'd understand a pilgrimage just fine.
After all; "When one tugs at a single thing in nature, he finds it attached to the rest of the world"
Being Scotch and a man of his time, he didn't speak Lakota or any of the hundreds of lost dialects and languages that teach the same truth.
Otherwise he would have known he simply plagiarized the phrase and concept of "Mitakuye Oyasin".
One well known to the peoples who had been walking the Sierra long before him that means simply...
'We are all related, we are all one'

If you truly want to take a walk in the woods... the path is lying right before you. And so is the crooked trail and the great smoking mirror.
Don't matter much if you learn that straight from ma earths mouth, in a buddhist temple on some mountain, from Ol John Muir, Nessmuk, Black Elk or some jabbering jackhole.

I fer one hope to see you on the trail, where ever and however you find it.

If you do find that interconnection... it might even occur to you that if another is on the crooked trail; then so am I.

[Pony]

The AT is what you make of it. If you only stop at shelters and towns, then you'll be around people most of the time. If you stop away from shelters and towns, then you can find solitude most of the time.

Hikers who make their journals public tend to fall in the first category. You read them, you get what you paid for.

I wholeheartedly agree. There are days on the trail where you want to be by yourself, and you can avoid people if you really want to. If you want to be around people, there are plenty of those to be found.

I don't think the AT was meant to be a wilderness trail. And "trail magic" isn't manditory. Just go out, have some fun, and enjoy 'Merica. It's not rocket science.

[Pony]

As far as journals go... I have a journal entry from every day I have spent on the AT. I am the only one who has read them.

[4shot]

As far as journals go... I have a journal entry from every day I have spent on the AT. I am the only one who has read them.

For some strange reason that I cannot fathom, I wrote every single night in my personal journal on my thru hike. Took many photographs which my wife very graciously had made into some sort of scrapbook and gave to me for Christmas one year. AS important as writing in my journal and taking the photographs were at the time, I have never ever gone back and looked at them. I really don't know why. My one possible explanation is that they will be underwhelming relative to the actual experience?? That's just a theory I have.

[stephanD]

4shot...exactly right. Unless you are a really good photographer with advanced equipment, photographs are nothing but pale imitation of the real thing. No camera can convey the 360 degree views from the top of a mountain, all the way to the horizon. I used to show my pictures to friends and family, and they are like, "that's nice". I stopped taking pictures all together.

[MuddyWaters]

4shot...exactly right. Unless you are a really good photographer with advanced equipment, photographs are nothing but pale imitation of the real thing. No camera can convey the 360 degree views from the top of a mountain, all the way to the horizon. I used to show my pictures to friends and family, and they are like, "that's nice". I stopped taking pictures all together.

Yep.
I take a few, but very few relatively speaking.
Most anything i want to photo, a pro has already taken better pic of, and its on internet

[rickb]

Here is one professional who took some amazing photos on his thru hike:

http://benbenvieblog.com/tag/appalachian-trail/

[Crushed Grapes]

Here is one professional who took some amazing photos on his thru hike:

http://benbenvieblog.com/tag/appalachian-trail/

Ben's work rules. One of the folks who've gotten me interested in taking full camera gear out with me on my hikes.

[Traillium]

Pasted from- https://wilderness.nps.gov/faqnew.cfm

What is wilderness?The Wilderness Act, signed into law in 1964, created the National Wilderness Preservation System and recognized wilderness as “an area where the earth and its community of life are untrammeled by man, where man himself is a visitor who does not remain.” The Act further defined wilderness as "an area of undeveloped Federal land retaining its primeval character and influence without permanent improvements or human habitation, which is protected and managed so as to preserve its natural conditions . . . ." (For the complete definition of wilderness, see Section 2(c) of the Wilderness Act.)


I'm still unclear why so many folks feel that the most popular long distance trail in the world, passing through the most populated region of the US, with the very best volunteer trail labor force providing; blazing, signage, shelters, and a gloriously maintained footpath qualifies as a wilderness experience.

It's not. By definition having a trail at all is pushing it.

It's okay that it's not wilderness. Other than trying to impress your friends, family or social media following there is no reason to delude anyone that it is.
If you think of yerself as some brave adventurer trekking into the untamed wilds... joke is on you.
Having the expectation or delusion the AT is a wilderness dilutes what a true wilderness experience is... and also ruins the AT as well.

The AT is quite an achievement... carving out and reclaiming a thin ribbon of continuous woods for people to easily access and enjoy.
It's on par with an exceptional state park. Busy in the front country, rarely too far from a road, passing near towns, and generally safe to use.
It's a string of 3-6 day hikes, but rather than looping back to the state park lot... you connect to the next trailhead and continue on in an unbroken line.
You get to show up when you want, get off where ever you want, easily travel, walk with relative ease, and move from place to place with little or no navigational needs, permits or planning.
(PS- nearly every place everywhere else requires you to get a permit. Especially wilderness areas).


It is a social trail, meeting people and traveling through the different cultures the trail passes through is part of the trail.
You pass major metropolitan areas and single stop sign towns in podunk nowhere.
National historical sites, amazing national parks, urban parks, rail to trail conversions, college campuses, main street USA to the wilds of Maine.
Hell you walk through a building and a zoo. You cross bridges, highways, interstates and country roads. Bear, deer, and dozens of other trails crisscross and share your path too.

You meet everyone from the true hillbillies of deep appalachia to rich celebs in new england and nearly every american in between.
You'll pass or stay at country farmhouses, regular suburbia, remote cabins and what can feel like walking though an episode of this old house.
You'll hike with folks from all around the world, from every walk of life, of every age and every background.

You may even meet swingers or a yoga instructor. Might even meet the fella who owns the place if'n that's what you're looking for.
You're also free to spend very large amounts of time with yourself, to carry more food and visit town less.

You're free to bathe at camp, skip towns, not visit a restaurant, nor stay at a single hostel.

You can mail your supplies just like one would leave food caches on a true wilderness trip.
With little more than a quick duck into the post office or one of the quiet businesses that service the trail- you'll be resupplied and back on the trail in an hour or less.
If an FKT hiker with no time to smell the roses can 'do it wrong'... surely you too can quickly get back to the wild trail in 60 minutes or less.

You can travel the trail however you like and live whatever fantasy you choose.


But you will not be in the wilderness.
It does exist if you want to go there, though I doubt many long distance hikers would enjoy bushwhacking, planning a route, using a compass or carrying multiple weeks of food at a crack.
Not seeing another person for several weeks is actually a mildly unnerving experience. And not being able to share such things with a fellow human is a hard way to be living for long.
Most Chris McCandless devotees seem to forget that was the lesson he learnt... though it cost him his life to learn it. In truth, the wilderness is not a very nice place.


There are many wilderness areas, there are places on this planet you could wander for weeks at a time with only your reflection in a pond or the occasional plane overhead to remind you there are more two leggeds out there somewhere.


I'll go paddle deep into Quetico and find an unnamed lake or two when I get the itch to really get out there. One day I'll head west and find a blank spot on the map perhaps.
Though I can wander out of bounds in the local state park and find a quiet spot for a sit with the spirit that moves though all things without the help of a blazed trail or a ride across the country.

And as anyone who has been truly out there will tell you... in truth no matter where you go, there you are.
If you are unhappy here or there; perhaps it's not where you are but simply that you are in bad company.


But if I want to just show up to a place I can traverse a ridgeline, sleep on a bald, stretch my legs, give ma nature a big hug, hoist a pint with a German feller, a dirty hippie chick, and ol Man Willy; all in the span of a weeks time...

Enjoy the Appalachian Trail for what it is.
There is truly only one and it is an amazingly unique place.

Well-said! I’ll join you any time in Quetico!