Date: 2005-07-26
To: Freedom of the Hills
Miles today: 0.0

Today this little entry appeared in my guest book from an anonymous writer. It's simply too good to pass up for comment:"The trail is wonderful experience, it's a shame you went too fast to see that!"I love these types of comments because it insinuates so much about me, and tells me rather a lot about them. It seems to say that 1) I went fast. Not true - I feel that I hiked at a relaxed pace which was comfortable and very enjoyable for me. 2) i didn't have a wonderful experience. That's pure bull shit. For those who haven't spent a lot of time on the AT, let's paint in the broadest brush strokes possible what type of hiker the writer is.They write that I went too fast to see that the trail is a wonderful experience. First this means that they hike slowly. Not necessarily that they hike physically slowly, but that they actually don't do much hiking. The trail experience that they are most likely talking about isn't actually the Appalachian trail. The Appalachian trail is in fact a footpath. The experience that the writer is most likely refering to generally occurs in shelters, hostels, towns and for some in bars and hotels. None of those things generally interest me.I like walking. I like simplicity. I like solitude at times, and companionship at times. I like spending time in the woods or perched on open ledges. I like taking quick dips in inviting pools streams and ponds. I like sitting cooking dinner watching leeches sniff around the rock below me. I like taking time in finding the dry route across a stream. I like the freedom step. I like watching hummingbirds and falcons and butterflies. I like climbing up big scrambles hand over hand. I like sweating. I like the journey not the destination.The difference between me and this writer is that I find pleasure in the doing. Certainly there is much pleasure and much to be gained by quitet reflection - I'd be the last to argue against that - I'm a Quaker after all. But isn't that what walking is? A quitet meditaion of foot on earth, skin on stone, muscle and tree, breath and air?The main point here is that people who think that someone is hiking too slow or two fast is wrong. That is what is so great about the trail! Everyone is free to do what they want - hike their own hike. I feel like quoting Wingfoot's definition of a "tour hiker" here. I'm not a tour hiker. You can be if you want - I don't care - that kind of hike isn't for me. And besides, I did 6 mile days all through the Whites! If that's too fast, I'd hate to see what slow looks like.But at the same time I'm not a hike who is out to accomplish a goal. I wasn't out there everyday trying to get to Katahdin, I was out there to walk, enjoy the beauty of the world and the kindness of the people around me. I remember one hiker who finished before me and who's entries I had read in the registers (he also happens to have a journal on this site). He wrote somewhere in Maine that he was so glad it was soon going to be over, because the trail lost all it's fun around Harper's Ferry. Well then for goodness' sake, why are you still hiking?!?!?! I'm not that kind of hiker.This is one of the most idiotic things about people who are on the trail - and I think that this mentality really gets carried by a lot of people who are in the crowd or who will be finishing in Sept/Oct. - that the trail is a big party, or a way to escape some distant punishing reality. I'm going back to that reality - not easily, but knowing that my place in the world is to help make the world more like the trail - a world of peace, justice, cooperation and true freedom, where we can do what truely makes us happy. Would this person say the same thing to Earl Shaffer? Would this person stand up and say that "The Crazy One" didn't have the correct trail experience after his first thru-hike took only 124 days? Would he say that Earl's line that he hikes simply because he likes walking and sleeping on mountains isn't a wonderful trail experience. Give me a break. And for all our sakes, why don't you spend some time in the woods?Power to the Peaceful,