Date: 2017-10-14
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The Appalachian Trail stretches either from Maine to Georgia or Georgia to Maine, depending on whom you ask. North-bound thru-hikers will insist on Georgia to Maine, since that¢s the way they experience the Trail. South-bounders will call it Maine to Georgia for the same reason. I will be a flip-flopper, meaning that I will start around the middle of the trail in Harpers Ferry, West Virginia, hike north to Katahdin in Maine, and then return to Harpers Ferry and hike south to Springer Mountain in Georgia. So for me, the AT runs both directions. However you parse it, it¢s still about a 2,200 mile long footpath crossing 14 states, including ten of the 13 original colonies: Maryland PennsylvaniaNew JerseyNew YorkConnecticutMassachusettsNew HampshireVirginiaNorth CarolinaGeorgiaThe other four states are:West Virginia - separated from Virginia in 1861 becoming the 35th state, the only state to separate from a Confederate state.Vermont - claimed by Massachusetts, New Hampshire and New York, but first a part of New France. Vermont was an independent republic from 1777 until its admission as the 14th state in 1791.Maine - originally a part of Massachusetts even though not contiguous with the rest of Massachusetts until it became the 23rd state in 1820.Tennessee - originally part of the Province of Carolina, Tennessee became the 16th state in 1796.The Appalachian Trail not only runs along the spine of the Appalachian Mountains in a physical sense but also runs through the cultural and natural history of the eastern United States. History comes alive while walking through the faded earthworks of Fort Dietrich Snyder in Pennsylvania where a young lieutenant Benjamin Franklin served in the French and Indian War. The AT crosses the Overmountain National Historic Trail near the North Carolina Tennessee border, following the route used by patriots marching from what is now east Tennessee to join the Battle of Kings Mountain in the Revolutionary War. Each gap along South Mountain in Maryland, just to the east of Antietam, has historical markers commemorating Civil War battles. The trail passes through Harpers Ferry, West Virginia and follows the Chesapeake & Ohio Canal Towpath for about five miles in Maryland, a rare level treat! The last time I hiked from Georgia to Virginia in 2005, i recorded over 125 species of wildflowers. The Great Smoky Mountains are said to have more species of trees than all of Europe. I¢ve seen black bear in 11 of the 14 trail states.  The official length of the Appalachian Trail in 2017 is 2,189.8 miles but will undoubtedly be longer when I hike in 2018. When I started hiking the AT in 1994, it was merely 2,147 miles long. No it hasn¢t stretched. Land acquisitions have made it possible to take the AT off roads that it first followed. The trail has also been rerouted to make the footpath more sustainable and to allow fragile and damaged areas to regrow.  The trail ranges from 124¢ above sea level at the Bear Mountain Zoo by the Hudson River in New York to 6,643¢ at Clingmans Dome in the Smokies.  The total elevation gain is about 464,500', equivalent to climbing Mt. Everest 16 times. The footpath is usually narrow, characterized by roots, rocks, and mud, but occasionally follows old woods roads where hikers can walk side-by-side.  It¢s sometimes extremely difficult but never rising to technical climbing, and only rarely a walk in the park.  A forester and regional land planner Benton MacKaye proposed An Appalachian Trail in a 1921 article in the Journal of the American Institute of Architects. It¢s said that Benton dreamed up the idea of the trail while sitting in a tree atop Stratton Mountain in Vermont, where coincidentally in 1909, James P. Taylor first envisioned the Long Trail that runs the length of Vermont from Massachusetts to the Canadian border.  Some serious mojo on that mountain!  There was sufficient interest to organize the Appalachian Trail Conference in 1925, since renamed the Appalachian Trail Conservancy. Things really didn¢t get moving until a Washington admiralty lawyer Myron Avery became ATC¢s chair in 1931. Benton was a dreamer and inspired others. Myron was doer and coerced others, resulting in the completion of the trail in 1937, just in time for a hurricane to damage severely the trail the following year. Myron didn¢t declare the trail once again open continuously from Maine to Georgia until 1951. Being a native of Lubec, Maine, he would have phrased it that way.  The first generally acknowledged thru-hiker was Earl V. Shaffer in 1948, walking off his experiences of World War II. I met Earl on his 50th anniversary hike in 1998 in Vermont. He was hiking north and I was hiking south and we sat down and visited on the steep rocks on the south side of the trail crossing of VT 9, near Bennington. He was wearing his pith helmet and shouldering his WWII rucksack. He complained about everything, especially the rerouting of the trail off the roads and out of towns and villages. It started to rain. I asked if he were going to put something on, and he replied, ¢Naw, that¢s for sissies!¢ Not wanting to out myself as a sissy to Earl, I sat there in rain that soon became torrential, like a Florida thunderstorm, until he broke off our conversation. Earl did express disappointment that no one wanted to hike with him for very long. Hmmmm.  The passage of the National Trails System Act in 1968 led to the Appalachian Trail becoming the first national scenic trail and a unit of the National Park System. More importantly, this act and subsequent legislation in 1978 led to a vigorous land acquisition program by the federal government, sometimes using condemnation authority. The last major land acquisition needed to protect the trail wasn¢t until 2014. Most of the Appalachian Trail in the south runs through national forests and national parks, but the trail through much of the mid-Atlantic and New England region threads a narrow corridor of land varying from 50¢ to 500¢ in width.  A focus now is protecting the landscape through which the Appalachian Trail passes.  I doubt that the acquisition phase will ever truly be completed.The Appalachian Trail Conservancy continues strong in its mission of preserving and managing the Appalachian Trail, in close cooperation with the National Park Service and U.S. Forest Service, and approximately 32 state agencies. The real work of building the trail in the early years and the continued maintenance of the trail rests with the 31 very independent maintaining clubs, some of which predate the founding of ATC. Thousands of volunteers contribute about 270,000 hours to the AT each year and they are the real soul of the trail. If you want to support me in my hike, consider joining ATC or one of the maintaining clubs! In the interest of full disclosure, I served on the ATC board from 1997 to 2011 and continued to chair a board committee until this year. Through my board service and through 25 years of hiking it, the Appalachian Trail has become a real part of my life. This thru-hike is a celebration of that relationship. For more information about the Appalachian Trail or to support the Appalachian Trail Conservancy, visit www.appalachiantrail.org.