Date: 2017-10-18
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Thru-hiking the Appalachian Trail means hiking the entire 2,190 miles in a 12-month period. A thru-hiker is someone who does just that. When does a hiker setting off on a thru-hike become a thru-hiker? Some will say, ¢not until he or she completes the thru-hike.¢ Others will say, ¢At the first step,¢ which seems to me the more practical answer. Day hikers often ask, ¢Are you a thru-hiker?¢ meaning ¢Are you attempting to thru-hike?¢ Answering with a simple ¢yes¢ is most expedient, although it often leads to the 20 questions.Thru-hikers have a certain look and odor about them. The look is one of dirt, even filth, and by the time a thru-hiker has hiked several hundred miles, sunken eyes, emaciated upper body, and especially for the men, abundant facial hair. Then there¢s the smell, or more accurately, fetor, known as hiker stench.  In spite of this, it is generally easy to hitch a ride from the trail to the nearest town. Local drivers know that they are a hikers, but non-locals may mistake them for homeless.  I have often been mistaken for a thru-hiker. Do you remember Pig-Pen, the character in Charles Schulz¢ Peanuts comic strip? He was pictured with a unkempt hair and standing in a swirling cloud of dirt. That¢s me. I grub up instantly upon setting foot in the woods, so I pass muster as a thru-hiker even on the first day of a section hike. I attempted a thru-hike in 2013, starting in Georgia. The first time I was asked if I were a thru-hiker was by Canadian tourists at the stone observation tower on Wayah Bald in North Carolina. They had driven up. Answering ¢yes¢ to their question was a very special moment for me, an affirmation that I really was a thru-hiker. The next day, on the 3,000¢ descent to the Nantahalla River, my knees gave out most painfully, and I was no longer a thru-hiker. But for that one moment, I was.I have been mistaken for a homeless person several times. There used to be a fine, hiker-friendly bakery where the Appalachian Trail crosses U.S. 206 at Culver Gap, New Jersey. I was waiting when they opened on a Sunday morning and soon was in a sugar bliss, sitting on the sidewalk in front of the shop, leaning back against the store front, with a bag of doughnuts, orange juice and coffee beside me. Twice people left with flats of doughnuts for their Sunday school classes and each flipped me a quarter, without saying a word. ¢God bless you!¢ I chimed, not wanting to disappoint them.  The number of thru-hikers has exploded in recent years. Please double click on the chart in the upper left hand corner of this page. Hit the back arrow to return to this page. The number of northbound (NOBO) and southbound (SOBO) hikers was compiled by the Appalachian Trail Conservancy. I¢ve estimated the number of flip-floppers at 8% of the total. When I started hiking the Appalachian Trail in 1996, there were approximately 900 thru-hikers. This doubled by 2010 and has increased 150% since then, using the preliminary 2017 figures.  Approximately 82% of thru-hikers start in Georgia, 10% in Maine, and 8% somewhere else, like my planned flip-flop hike. The current number of northbound thru-hikers overwhelm trail facilities, like shelters and privies, in Georgia and the southern states, and the problem appears only to be getting worse. ATC is actively encouraging alternative hikes and has started a voluntary registration system so that starting thru-hikers can be aware of the most crowded starting dates (March 1, March 15, March 21, and April 1). The increase in numbers makes good Leave-No-Trace practices even more crucial.  I have hiked southbound from Harpers Ferry through Shenandoah National Park several times, most recently in early May 2015 and 2017. The increase in thru-hiker numbers was staggering. This year, at Blackrock Hut in the southern district of the Park, I was joined by about 25 thru-hikers filling the shelter and ringing it in tents. Laurie Potteiger, Information Services Manger for ATC, assures me that I only experienced the vanguard of the 2018 bubble. I had planned for my 2018 thru-hike to start southbound from Harpers Ferry to Georgia and then to wrap around to Maine, hiking southbound to end at Harpers Ferry. My experience this year was enough to change my plans so that I can stay ahead of all but the fastest NOBO hikers.How many of these hikers succeed in completing their thru-hikes? About 20 to 25 percent, depending on the year. About a quarter of starting NOBO thru-hikers don¢t make it through the 78 miles of Georgia, and only about 50 percent succeed in reaching Damascus, Virginia, 469 miles from the start. The most common reasons for leaving the Trail are injury, running out money, family issues at home, or simply discovering that walking up and down mountains carrying a heavy pack in the rain is not always fun. Imagine that!  The Trail remains a white male bastion, but the percentage of women thru-hikers has increased to 25 to 30 percent, and solo women hikers are no longer a rarity. I spent one night at Maupin Field Shelter in Virginia with six women. The shelter is rated for six persons, so we were cozy. It turned out that each of the women was a solo hiker and none had met any of the others. The Appalachian Trail Conservancy has made diversity a core value and adopted strategies of partnering with other organizations, expanding its educational programs, and offering guided hikes including an annual African American History Hike in Harpers Ferry. Hikers tend to be in two age cohorts: 20-somethings, often recent college graduates, and retired folks, like myself. Not very many middle-aged people have the luxury of spending six-months in the woods. International hikers are common. Offhand, I can recall meeting hikers from Canada, Mexico, Jamaica, Chile, Ireland, Scotland, England, France, Denmark, Netherlands, Germany, Switzerland, Italy, Japan, Australia, New Zealand, and even Yap Island in Micronesia. It is great fun using idiomatic expressions, like raining cats and dogs, around someone struggling with English. Until you know someone very well, it is unusual to know their occupation and much about their life off the Trail. The favorite cocktail party question, ¢What do you do?¢ is seldom asked.Trail names are a tradition on the Appalachian Trail, going back at least to the first thru-hiker Earl Shaffer, who was known as The Crazy One, reflecting the general belief in 1948 that hiking the entire AT in one year was an impossibility. Names can be given by others or self-chosen. Some are inspired by physical attributes or traits, like Sasquatch, Red Bandana, Wrong Way and Food Vortex. Names can reflect geographic origins, like Brooklyn and Cheesehead.  Character names from Lord of the Rings (Frodo, but never Bilbo, Strider and Gandalf) and Star Wars (Skywalker, Princess Leia, and even a Jabba) remain popular, but I have yet to meet a Harry Potter or a Voldemort. The fastest female thru-hiker, Jennifer Pharr Davis, branded herself Odyssa. She was a classics major in college. Gods are a popular theme, and I¢ve met Zeus, Hera, and Odin. One of my favorite trail names in recent years was a young man who introduced himself, ¢Hi, I¢m Demented.¢ I replied, ¢I¢m merely deranged.¢ And perhaps I am for feeling this compulsion to leave a very comfortable life here in Burlington, Vermont for six months of rain, mud, suffocating heat and humidity, bug bites, things that go bump in the night, and monotonous food for only the occasional clear, cool day, panoramic view, and the company of dirty, smelly disreputable fellow travelers.