Date: 2015-09-07
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Lucky's Thru-Hikesee the video of the first part of this presentation in CharlottePart II, Now about that "love of my life thing."My hiking partner at the time, California, had skipped part of the trail and got ahead of me. As a section hiker, he could do that. He was hiking with the Hiking Vikings, with whom I had also hiked with for days, when they ran into a young woman in her 60s.They knew I was not far behind and that she would see me soon -- she was hiking south, I was hiking north -- and they told her about me, what a fine fellow I am. In the process they completely oversold me, that much is obvious, and they left out one salient fact: I'm married.I first heard about this lady from a south bound hiker who came into the shelter where I was staying. He asked me, "Are you Lucky?"There is a woman, a SoBo, who wants to meet you, he said. He said the Vikings and California told her all about me, that I would meet her the next day because she wasn't far behind.I did meet her. She had a pretty smile. We talked a few minutes.She was a flip flopper, which the Appalachian Trail Conservancy encourages, hiking from Harpers Ferry, near the mid-point, to Springer Mountain, the southern terminus. Then, in early July, she planned fly to Maine and hike south to Harpers Ferry. So she said we'd meet again, probably in the 100-mile Wilderness in Maine.I don't remember how it came up, but when I mentioned something about my wife, she said, "You're married?!"I hiked onto the next shelter, Matt's Creek, took a break there and checked the shelter journal. There, to my surprise, I found that the lady had written that she might meet the love of her life tomorrow.And she ended by asking, "Are you the love of my life, Lucky?" I responded in the journal: "Alas, I am not. I married the love of my life 51 years ago."The Vikings, and California, had not put her up the "love of my life" thing but they had commend me to her and thought the whole thing was pretty funny.Weeks later I was hiking alone -- the Viking were a few hours ahead of me -- when I came across a woman young enough to my granddaughter. She had pitched her tent near the trail and when I passed by she asked:"Are you Lucky?"Yes, I said.And she smiled and asked, "Are you the love of my life?" Obviously, she had met the Vikings. Trail namesAlmost every thru-hiker I met had a trail name as did most of the section hikers. A few waited to get a name more or less assigned to them, growing out of some incident on the trail. But that strategy was fraught with pearl -- you could fall in the mud and get a name like Dirty Bottom. So most hikers picked their own name.When I decided to hike to Maine several friends told me how "fortunate" I was to have the health to at least try and a wife who had said, "Yes.""Fortunate" didn't resonate with me, but "Lucky" did.   Here are some of my favorite trail names, and their origin.TemperShe was not a big woman, I'd bet she didn't weigh 100 pounds. But when I first met her I figured it was best to avoid any disagreement. You just know, with a name like Temper she must have a short fuse. But, turns out, her name had nothing to do with anger management or lack thereof and everything to do with an unusual job -- she had worked in a chocolate factory where she "tempered" chocolate.TadpoleHe planned to join the Navy after his hike with a goal of becoming a SEAL, a modern day frogman. And, as you know, a tadpole is baby frog.IcemanHe was a section hiker and trail angel par excellence. He brought ice to a little girl who has been broken her arm on the trail. She named him.O311This man got out of the Marines last summer. His MOS - Military Occupational Specialty - was 0311 - Infantry.CashmereShe said she sweated a lot. Get it? Sweater? Cashmere?JHe picked that name in memory of his brother, John, who died in infancy.WYSIWYG, pronounced Whiz-e-wigIt's an acronym for "What You See Is What You Get."BetweenHe was 17, going on 18, between high school and college.VerminatorHe told me that mice had eaten holes in his backpack and he was determined to trap and kill as many of them as he could. Not YetIt was his first day on the trail, and he wasn't going anywhere special, certainly not starting a thru-hike. He was just trying out his equipment.Someone asked, "Do you have a trail name?"And he replied, "Not Yet."Getting in shapeI began preparing for my hike in the spring of 2014, reading books and blogs, looking for tips. In August, 180 days before my start date, I began hiking and lifting weights. A few months later Donna and I began dehydrating food.My training hikes, back and forth to what I called the "fat farm" --also known as Planet Fitness--   were a hoot.One dear lady I didn't know stopped her car during a downpour and offered me an umbrella. Apparently she thought I was homeless. On another occasion two guys in a pickup stopped and the driver asked, "What are you doing? I can tell from the pants you're wearing that you're not a bum."   I walked 1,000 miles getting ready for my hike, actually, 1,000.7 miles, but who's counting. And, oh, yes, I was aware then that walking around the gently sloping hills in my neighborhood would be nothing like hiking the Appalachian Trail. But I figured that was better than nothing. And I was right about that.Getting in shape was the smartest thing I did. Blood MountainAnd the dumbest thing?In the beginning I had little or no respect for bad weather. I had section hiked in snow several times. Just enough to cover the ground, mind you, in 30, 31 degree weather with no wind.   But, still, it was snow.Day Two of my hike taught me a thing or two and reminded me of one of my family's rules: "If you're gonna to be dumb, you gotta be tough."Here's the truth of the matter: Extreme cold or high winds or rain is unpleasant. But any two of them together are dangerous and, potentially, fatal. And if you encounter all three at the same time --cold, wind, wet-- well, you better be fully prepared or have your life insurance paid up, one or the other. On the morning of Feb. 15, when I got out of Brother Dave's car and began climbing Springer Mountain to begin my hike, it was 8 degrees, cold but beautiful. There was some wind on the top of Springer Mountain but I was dressed warmly and it wasn't snowing, or sleeting. The next day was grey, overcast, ominous. A storm was rolling in and there was a lot of wind. Off and on, all day and into the night it rained or sleeted.I had planned to hike to Neels Gap, to a hostel there called Mountain Crossings. But Blood Mountain, which I had to cross at the end of the day, was giving me pause. At 4,461 feet, it is the highest point on the AT in Georgia, and it was steep, especially on the north side. It would be icy, too. So I decided to spend the night at Woods Hole Shelter, well short of my goal. But better safe than sorry.But when I got to Woods Hole at 4 p.m., I didn¢t stay. I felt good. The weather wasn¢t bothering me so I moved on, right on up Blood Mountain. The climb was easier than I thought it would be. And there was a shelter on top; I¢d stay there.But the Blood Mountain shelter, which is made of stone, was dark, cold, and empty. I'd be by myself. At the bottom of the mountain, only 2.4 miles away, I could get warm food and a hot shower, and there might be other hikers there, waiting out the storm. It was already 6 p.m., almost dark, but I decided to keep going.It was a decision I would soon regret.The northbound descent from Blood Mountain is a series of long, flat rocks strung together by short pieces of trail. And on this night, the rocks were covered with a ice. In the end, all I could do was sit down and slide. Twice I careened out of control, bouncing off whatever got in the way. I hurt one of one of my knees, but I could still walk. White blazes marking the trail were painted on the rocks but, covered with ice and snow, I couldn't see them. Or, maybe, zipping by like a runaway train, I just didn't see them.When I finally came to a stop at the bottom I could not find the trail and, believe me, it wasn't for lack of trying.There was no going back. The ice made that impossible. My only choice was to bushwhack my way down the mountain, through the woods, until I found the AT. I held my cap light -- I was wearing a toboggan, not a baseball cap-- in my mouth to light the way, to free my hands so I could use my hiking poles, and started down the mountain.It was 7 o¢clock, dark, wet, cold, and getting colder when I finally found what looked like the trail.I turned to my left and hiked down the mountain for half an hour or more, until in my dim light I saw a blue blaze. The AT is marked with white blazes. I had stumbled on to the Freeman Trail, which intersects the AT somewhere on the north slope of Blood Mountain. But where? Which direction?I hiked on down the Freeman Trail for a ways and then turned around, retraced my steps, and searched in the other direction.At 8:30 p.m. I decided to call it a day. I had been hiking for more than 12 hours on two pop tarts I eaten for breakfast. I had skipped lunch and supper.   Now I had to find a spot on the narrow trail wide enough and flat enough to pitch my tent. And I did, a four-by-eight-foot sheet of ice.I unstrapped my pack and, at that moment, my cap light battery died.It¢s hard to appreciate total darkness because we so rarely experience it. There¢s always a little light somewhere, if it¢s only from the face of a digital clock. When my cap light died on Blood Mountain, it was like standing in a closet at night with the door shut, wearing a blindfold.I dug in my pocket for a cigarette lighter, but I had allowed the flint to get wet. It wouldn¢t light.That's when I told myself: You make one more mistake and you're not going to Maine. You're not going home, either.I had a spare lighter in my tool bag. Now if I could just find it in the dark and coax my frozen fingers to make fire. I did find it, finally, and I did make fire in spite of the wind.   With the light from the lighter, I found fresh batteries for my cap light. And with light, I was able to set up my tent. In a few minutes, I was snug inside my sleeping bag. Outside my little house it was still sleeting.Did I pray any that night on the side of Blood Mountain? Oh yes, without ceasing. And then I slept, soundly.There was light coming through my tent when I woke up next morning. It was 6:40 a.m. Time to move. I had to get off Blood Mountain.My tent was frozen to the ground cover, and the ground cover frozen to the ice. My tent frame was frozen together. I could not take it apart until I huffed my warm breath on each joint. Zippers were frozen and could not be opened, or closed. Worst of all, I had left my wet mittens outside and they were frozen. I should have slept with them.The mittens were a problem. Unprotected in that kind of weather fingers start to freeze in a few minutes and then they stop working.I couldn't just put my hands in my jacket pockets because I couldn't walk on ice without my hiking poles. So I stuck my frozen mittens under my shirt, next to my belly, to melt the ice so I could get them on.My plan was to walk down the Freeman Trail until I found the AT or I found civilization. No more turning back. I jammed my frozen gear into my backpack and headed down the mountain.Two hours later, there it was, a beautiful white blaze. I had intersected the AT. In another 45 minutes, I could see the roof of Mountain Crossings hostel through the bare, ice laden trees. I stayed at the hostel the rest of that day and two more days. There were seven other thru-hikers there, hiding from a terrific winter storm and zero degree weather. I was glad to be indoors, but it was not the toasty refuge I had imagined it would be. It was cold inside. How cold? So cold I wore a toboggan when I took a shower. Okay, I made that up. How about this: the water in the dog¢s bowl froze. No, it wasn¢t on the porch. The bowl was sitting on the living room floor. And, no, I didn¢t make that up.I learned some lessons on Blood Mountain:¢¢        You had better develop a healthy respect ¢-fear is even better ¢- of wet AND cold.   In freezing weather, you must stay dry.¢¢        You have to use your head. You don't leave wet mittens outside where they are going to freeze solid. I ended up with frostbite on the thumb and two fingers of my left hand.¢¢        In icy weather you have to have some sort of crampon-like device for your boots, like micro-spikes. That wasn't the end of my problems with cold weather, far from it, but it was the last time I thought I might freeze to death. The end of cold weather didn't come until July 1, Day 137.   I was in Maine. And, yes, I said July 1. Apparently, Maine did not get the memo saying summer had arrived.I ended up that day hiding from the wind and rain in a privy, eating lunch there, and then going to sleep, but I guess I should begin this story at the beginning.It had rained the night before, hard at times, but by 5 a.m., when I got up to get ready to go hiking, the rain had tapered off to a sprinkle. I had no gear but maybe it wouldn¢t matter -- you can only get so wet.The trail I hiked that morning went over three mountains, all of them above the tree line: Saddleback, The Horn and Saddleback Junior. Before I got to the top of Saddleback it had begun to rain again, softly at first and then harder. And then it began to get cold, uncomfortably cold.The higher I climbed, the harder it rained, the harder the wind blew, and the colder it got. By the time I reached a series of balds on top of the mountains it was sleeting sideways. What had been a warm, wet day had turned nasty. The weather on July 1 was pretty much identical to the weather I encountered two weeks earlier, on June 15, while hiking above the tree line near North Woodstock, NH. That morning the Hiking Vikings and I took three hours to hike the first four miles. It's a little windy up here in the Whites!!Posted by To Katahdin on Tuesday, June 16, 2015I was so cold on the July 1 climb I thought about leaving the trail and making a bee line for the nearest trees below, anything to get out of the wind. But you can get lost that way -- been there, done that. When the trail finally went back down, the trees blocked most of the wind but I had to slow down because I had to work my way down a long series of ledges. I couldn't generate the heat I needed to stay warm. I needed to find the shelter quickly and get out of my wet clothes. I knew I was near the shelter and around every bend in the trail I expected to see it.   But when turned uphill I stopped. No way I was going back to the ridge, back above the trees. I had just passed a privy next the trail --they build privies next to the trail in Maine-- so I turned around, went back, went in the privy, and made myself at home. Finally, I was out of the wind and rain.I stripped off my wet shirts and put on dry ones as well as a dry, insulated jacket, and dry socks.I ate lunch.And then I got comfortable and went to sleep.Almost two hours passed before a knock on the privy door woke me. The rain had stopped and the wind had died. A south-bound hiker, a woman, wanted to use the facility.Of course, I said, and I quickly began packing up.¢Why didn¢t you go on to the shelter?¢ she asked.¢Where is the shelter?¢ ¢About 100 yards up the trail,¢ she said.see the video of the next part of this presentation in CharlotteYou just never knewIn addition to the people I met, and the unlimited amount of food I could eat when I was in town, the thing I liked best about hiking the AT was the uncertainty of it all. You just never knew for sure how the day was going to turn out, what good surprises were in store for you. And mostly they were good.On March 6 I was in the Smoky Mountains of North Carolina, hiking in a winter storm.   The trail was badly eroded and I was walking in what amounted to an icy, slushy ditch. That afternoon it had just begun to snow again when I spotted a hand-written note to taped to a post, 1.7 miles south of Newfound Gap and US 441.Griswold, Tadpole, and the Hiking Vikings, who were ahead of me, had changed their minds about hiking on to Icewater Spring Shelter (how appropriately it was named), where we had all planned to meet that night. They had decided to get a shuttle to Gatlinburg, get warm, get dry clothes, get something good to eat ¢ and dodge a zero degree temperature night on the trail.Did I want to join them?Does a bear live in the woods -- oh, yes!I called them and left a message saying I would be at Newfound Gap by 3 p.m. They were a mile or two ahead of me, I was afraid I would miss them, and I did. When I arrived at Newfound Gap, they were not there.The wind was howling, blowing snow this way and that, and you could feel the temperature dropping. Should I wait for Stretch, an Israeli who was the sixth person in our party? He might not even be coming. He might have stopped at the last shelter. [In fact, that's what he had done.] Should I hike another three miles to Ice Water Spring Shelter? Or should I hitch a ride into Gatlinburg?Gatlinburg -- hot food and a warm bed -- won. I started walking down U.S. 441 planning on hitching a ride. But it didn't take long to realize that that wasn't going to happen. Not a single vehicle appeared from either direction. Because of the blizzard, the highway had been closed. I was on my own.Well, in for a dime, in for a dollar, I thought. I'd walk to Gatlinburg. I didn't know exactly how far it was, but it couldn't be that far, could it? It was a trail town, wasn't it? And what difference did it make? One way or another that's where I was going.I had been walking through the storm for almost an hour when the law arrived in the person of Heath Soahn, a U.S. Park Service officer.   He slowed his cruiser, stopped beside me, and rolled down the passenger window. Warm air rushed out. "Where are the other four?" he asked. And then he told me to get in.One minute I was walking down the highway in a blizzard and the next minute I was safe.Turns out the other four were back at Newfound Gap. They had taken refuge in a heated restroom -- heated to keep the pipes from freezing. Soahn was looking for them not because they had called for help, but because they had called for a shuttle. The shuttle folks call the U.S. Park Service to find out if the highway had been closed, and told them about the four hikers.Soahn drove back to the parking lot at the top, blew his horn, and out they came. The five of us shared a suite at a hotel in Gatlinburg that night ¢ 12 bucks each ¢ and went out to eat together. I had ribs, with ice cream for dessert.And, exactly how many miles was it to Gatlinburg, how far would I have had to walk through the storm?Seventeen, the officer told me.Tomorrow: Part III, Q&A followed by the best story I heard.