Date: 2004-06-12
From: Bearfence Mountain Hut

To: Big Meadow
Miles today: 8.0
Weather: light rain

Day #90 Last night the bazaar antics of the strange lady with no name continued. I was the closest person sleeping next to her. The lady laid the shelter broom between us with the bristles by my head. I told everyone in the morning that the broom was her get-away vehicle. As darkness fell she entered her cocoon of clothing and turned on a flashlight. She built some type of covering that went over her from head to waist. The light remained on throughout the night with constant guttural noises emitting from her corner. I had visions of waking up in the middle of the night, having her standing over me looking down with the flashlight illuminating her face. I slept with one eye open.Just before leaving a deer walks up to the shelter. My camera's battery is dead. Thank you US Post Office for my missing bounce box in Waynesboro. The morning's walk was a short 8 miler into Big Meadow. Had great pancakes for lunch. While talking with Lady Kritter I saw in Big Meadow a new born fawn and its mother. The fawn would disappear in the tall grass when standing still. When the mother moved you could see the fawn loping above the grass on shaky legs. It was a beautiful sight until the tourists discovered the mother and baby and scared them off.Met new hikers by the names of Lonesome Dove, Hawk and Catdog. These folks along with Quest and Pegasus got a small cabin near the Big Meadow Lodge. The group had a sit down dinner in the dining room of the lodge that was fabulous. After dinner, a couple of beers, then bed. For some reason the night felt so energized. I decided to stealth cowboy camp at Big Meadows to discover and absorb this energy.As an aside: In 1964, the United States Congress passed a law called the Wilderness Act to preserve wild lands from development of any kind by mankind so future generations could view what America looked like before the intervention of modern man. In this Act, the word wilderness was defined as "an area where earth and its community of life are untrammeled (to hinder, impede, obstruct, or encumber) by man, where man himself is a visitor who does not remain," and where there are "outstanding opportunities for solitude or a primitive and unconfined type of recreation." Now that I am almost at the halfway point of my journey, I have been asked by many people, "What have you learned on your Appalachian Trail hike?" My response is the following:I have said it before and I will say it again, "Since the beginning of my hike, I have witnessed small and large sections of rape and destruction of Mother Earth by modern man in the name of progress. The Wilderness Act was an attempt of the government to protect resources on their terms. Indeed, the Act is better than nothing. Let us go beyond the Act and collectively, as individuals, each do our part in keeping this free ride around the sun intact for future generations.Why the sermon? I see bicycles, vehicles, no longer useable appliances, thrown down mountainsides, in streams, creeks and rivers. I see litter everywhere, even in the wilderness. From vistas I see the scars of mining, or the building of roads destroying natural resources or archeological sites. I see wildlife trying to maintain an existence in a shrinking environment. And, because of this, I see death on Mother Earth with the small creatures mankind calls wildlife. Who are the ones running wild?