Tough as granite. Really?

July 19, 2014July 20, 2014 / jim fetig / 5 Comments

Rangely, ME, Saturday, July 19, 2014 — I returned to Rangely today to continue my hike early tomorrow morning. Before I left Kennebunkport, my friend Ed taught me a new trick. First a little about Ed.

We first met Hashing in Panama where he worked for the Panama Canal Commission. After the canal reverted to Panamanian control, Ed stayed on to close the books and retire on the coast of Maine.

He’s also a busy guy, meaning he doesn’t know how to sit still. With manic levels of creativity, he has landscaped his property into a showplace in a neighborhood of showplaces.

It first started with mortar-free stone walls and morphed into granite. Then there are the flower gardens. Who knows where it will end.

I thought knowing how to split granite might be a useful skill to use at home and for maintaining the trail. So I asked Ed to show me how it’s done. After all, if he can do it…

How hard could it be? Turns out that breaking rock at its most basic level isn’t difficult at all. Learning how to read the rock is a matter for another day.

As we drilled the holes and pounded the wedges, it occurred to me that cracking rocks in two might be a metaphor for thru hiking. On the trail, as in life, being flexible and willing to adjust to people, circumstances or conditions is a productive skill. Otherwise you are at risk of being too inflexible and cracking like the chunk of the rock of ages (granite pictured below), and probably faster than you think.

The trail takes and the trail gives. An old hiker maxim says that the trail will provide. For the most part it does. Nevertheless, if you’re looking for perfection, without the flexibility to adapt to what you actually get, the end of your hike may be near.

That’s a hard lesson for those used to having the authority or resources to virtually dictate their will. You see, on the trail nobody cares about your title, rank or the size of your wallet. The trail doesn’t either.

It took longer to drag out the equipment than it did to split Ed’s rock. It went that quick. In those split seconds I realized that being as tough as granite really wasn’t that much of a virtue. Sometimes being strong isn’t what you think it is.

Wow! Elapsed time = < 5 minutes!!!

Bemis and Old Blue

July 8, 2014July 8, 2014 / jim fetig / 5 Comments

Pine Ellis Hostel, Andover, 13 mile slack pack, NH Monday July 7, 2014 —
We opened up this morning with a river ford , except we cheated. We didn’t even get our feet wet. Fallen tree trunks make fine bridges.

Early in the day I stumbled into a British couple with whom I’ve been corresponding since planning for this hike began. I walked over a rock dome and who should appear but Nigel Berry and his wife Christine. They have a wonderful blog that’s well worth the read.

Once again the hiking was backward (southbound). The direction accounted for a long ride to the trailhead in the morning capped by a short skip back to the hostel at the end of the day.

Today’s scenery featured more rebar than anything else. It’s indicative that the AT in Maine’s reputation isn’t entirely deserved. General people describe trail conditions with several adjectives including unimproved, rough, eroded, rocky, rooty, challenging, and even dangerous. Let’s just say for now that it’s more complicated than that.

All-in-all, another great day is in the books.

Just in case the perspective fools you. This is near vertical.

Baldpate

July 6, 2014July 6, 2014 / jim fetig / 9 Comments

Pine Ellis Hostel, Andover, ME, 10 mile slack pack, Sunday July 6, 2014 — A certain successful 2013 thru hiker whose blog I’ve recommended suggested by email recently that the hike over the two Baldpate peaks would be “fun.”

Her wry wit and acute sense of irony and sarcasm tickled my caution meter. She could mean fun per se, or she could upgrade the sensation to a form of hard rock terrorism. Was she messing with my mind? Mind you, I’ve been an easy mark for head games lately.

Well, it turns out she meant what she said. Today’s hike was a joy.

The Baldpate peaks are a couple of granite domes separated by a gentle saddle. The slope angles are walkable wet or dry without fear. The wind, on the other hand, might up the pucker factor on occasion, but not today.

The photos tell the story. The scenery and hiking we’re amazing.

Two more slack days remain. Each is challenging. More on that later. Once they’re done I have to disappear for a few days for a wedding in Atlanta I wouldn’t miss on a bet. (I don’t plan these things.) Then it’s on to Katahdin.

Nice trail work.

Baldpate west peak – where we’re going.

Baldpate east peak – where we’ve been.

Chasing Winter’s Tail

April 27, 2014 / jim fetig / 6 Comments

Rausch Gap Shelter, Penn., AT NOBO mile 1172.1, Saturday April 26, 2014 — The theme for next week is precipitation beginning Tuesday. There is a small probability of a sleet or snow mix. Will this winter ever give up?

Today I walked through a small cluster of Rhododendrons that I thought didn’t grow this far north. The buds have yet to form. When I last saw them in Virginia, the buds were more than an inch long. Spring has a lot of work to do.

I’ll be okay if it snows, but I’m no longer carrying serious winter gear – no base layer, fleece or mittens. I still have a light down jacket and a sleeping bag. I was considering switching in about 10 days from a sleeping bag to a quilt and ridding myself of the jacket, gloves, hat, etc. I’ll continue to reevaluate that thought.

Tomorrow is another deli day as we pass through Lickdale,PA, a truck stop haven. Tomorrow’s destination is the 501 Shelter, one of those tricked out shelters with ambiance to spare. I’ll take some pics.

Walked over some excellent stone work throughout the day built by the Susquehanna Trail Club. This stuff was built over years and years – it’s hard labor. Today’s photo is of a raised trail bed with parallel drains. It’s in an area where the water springs from the ground everywhere.

The Rausch Shelter is the most uniquely designed one yet. Someone was very creative. Best of all, the water is 10 feet away! I’m with three section hikers, two ladies from norther Illinois and one from upstate New York who was also at last night’s shelter.

Trail Brain

December 22, 2013December 22, 2013 / jim fetig / 1 Comment

After a day hike, I ran into Winter Walker wearing his replacement garment at the outfitters.

“I sure hope this isn’t pathogenic,” I said to Winter Walker.

Winter Walker is a Vermonter I met at a shelter south of Damascus. In real life he’s a trucker whose doctor told him to “get healthy.” So Winter Walker set out on a “thousand mile diet.” His intent is to hike along the Appalachian Trail until he thins out. When I met him, he was making fantastic progress.

When our paths crossed, Winter Walker had decided to begin his return trip. Once his goals are met, he’ll call relatives for a pick up. He figured that would be somewhere around Harpers Ferry assuming that severe winter weather didn’t interfere.

He is one of the good guys one meets on the trail. In Spanish you’d describe him as muy amable. We enjoyed each other’s company, humor, and easy repartee. One evening he hung a fleece hoodie he’d sewn himself on a nail protruding from the shelter wall. He forgot there’s nothing a shelter mouse won’t eat.

As the waxing moon glittered on the snowscape embracing our shelter, a stealthy field mouse munched away. By morning the mouse had carved out chunks of his hood that reminded me of a Congressional assault on the federal budget. The mouse was either after salt residue or trying to feather its nest. Regardless, the hood was so full of holes that it could have been repurposed as a Green Bay Packer cheese head. It was hardly recognizable for its original purpose.

Characteristically, Winter Walker found the humor and made the best of it. The fine folks at Mount Rogers Outfitters in Damascus would make a sale on a factory made replacement. Could the mouse have been in cahoots we pondered? “Great conspiracy theory!” I thought. No way, we concluded.

Winter Walker’s misfortune is what thru hikers learn to take in stride. Just another bump in the road. That morning, we packed up as the heavens began to cry rain with a volume your favorite high pressure shower head could only imagine.

“Let’s aim for early lunch at the Blue Blaze,” he suggested. “Bingo!!!” I thought. I’ll be needing an injection of hot nutritious food. It was 10 miles, mostly downhill, to Damascus. We’d make short work of that, and we did.

When we sopped through the Blue Blaze’s welcoming entrance, we made a beeline for seats at the bar. It was about 11:30, so we weren’t there to swill beer. We just wanted to be closer to the eats and faster service. It proved to be a good decision.

Enter my dilemma. Pony, the Blue Blaze’s owner and chef, peppered me with choices. Did I want the all-you-can-eat special, something from the menu, what to drink, and appetizer, did I have a trail name, why NOBO now, and more ?

Whoa! Waaay too much, too fast. I couldn’t process it all.

On the trail, things are fairly simple. One foot in front of another. Mind the slippery spots. I might add here that I hate exposed roots far more than slick rocks. More on the philosophy of roots another time.

While thru hiking, it’s best not to think too far ahead. My time horizon spans the capacity of one food bag. When it’s empty, I have to do what’s needed to fill it up. In between times, I stay inside the day at hand and the 2 X 6 rectangle of trail immediately to my front. Success is usually defined as not falling and making it before dark to that day’s goal.

Back to the bar. This wasn’t my first time with an overwhelmed processor. It happens every time I go to town. On the trail, your senses evaluate very different information. The cues are the sights and sounds of nature. Everything slows down. Your brain adjusts from highway speed to something more civilized to say the least. It’s not less, but more in a vastly altered context.

So, when Pony asked me to make a bunch of choices, my mind hadn’t made the transition. My aside to Winter Walker was rhetorical. I knew it wasn’t caused water I might have forgotten to treat. Instead, it was a prime symptom of the best part of my hike. It’s evidence of the transition from the inhuman pace of corporate existance to a more sustainable speed for a longer and more healthy life.

Stolen Sign Epiphany

September 1, 2013September 1, 2013 / jim fetig / 1 Comment

I lunched today with two fantastic southbound thru hikers, a couple of folks from the great state of Tennessee. Their blog on www.trailjournals.com is so creative, I just had to meet them.

Since Maine, they’ve been living for the day when they’d slide south of the Mason-Dixon line and return to the land of sweet tea, mac and cheese, biscuits and gravy, and almighty grits.

We met at my usual spot in Harpers Ferry. The Appalachian Trail Conservancy headquarters is like a temple where thru hikers memorialize their hike with an official photo that is filed in the official data base forever. They can bring their kids back decades later, open the book, and there they are in full glory. There’s even a copy to be found on line, so you don’t actually have to visit.

As I drove in, I couldn’t miss them. There they were marching up the hill distinguished by their bright orange pack covers. The international orange pack jackets are supposed to protect hikers from deer hunters figuring no one would ever confuse a deer with a traffic cone – would they?

After the obligatory introductions and photo ceremony, we headed out for lunch in the historic district where John Brown’s raid on the arsenal and some anecdotal civil war history happened.

We found a eclectic eatery nestled in a house erected in the early 1800s. We settled into a cozy patio carved from the rocky cliff behind the house. Shaded on a hot day, it was nice.

The conversation superseded pouring over the menu, so we ordered on the fly.

I need to digress a bit. I have lived enough in the south to be an honorary southerner with certain southern culinary habits. I like all of the aforementioned southern delicacies, and often substitute them for haute cuisine.

Back to the story. It wasn’t until I ordered sweet tea that my guests fully realized they were back on Confederate territory. You see, someone has stolen the sign demarking the Mason – Dixon Line. Without that reminder, who knew!

A quick check of the menu revealed mac and cheese and most of the other great southern dishes. So, there they were. Hike only half way done, but almost all the way home.

Trooper and Number 2, thanks for letting me have a tiny share of your most excellent adventure. Godspeed.

The New Fall Lineup

August 29, 2013August 29, 2013 / jim fetig / Leave a comment

The indicators are all there. School has started. The first college football games play this weekend. The automobile companies are ready to unveil next year’s models. The TV networks are unwrapping their new fall lineups. It’s fall. My favorite time of the year.

As Labor Day approaches the anticipation of autumn excites the senses. The pending ascendance of nutmeg as top spice in the kitchen helps complete the fashion shift from polo shirts to polar fleece. By the time the frost is on the punkin’, snow can’t be far behind if you live far enough north.

If fall is a-comin’ then my mid-February Appalachian Trail start date is just around the corner. Time to focus on the task at hand and lay down some boot tracks.

In any sport, cross training helps improve performance. But, no matter how much cross training you do, you still have to get the reps in for the sport itself. Football players lift weights, but they also block and tackle, baseball players hit, catch and throw and runners run. It follows that hikers should hike.

The trail is pulling me out of my comfortable rut and telling me to start putting one foot in front of the other, get funky and stress test the shelter, sleep, food, and clothing systems that will be used during my thru hike. Only a long trek can produce the realistic conditions needed.

The first item on the fall dance card is a joint National Park Service/Potomac Appalachian Trail Club two-day advanced trail maintenance workshop September 21 -22.

We’re scheduled to build erosion control structures with big rocks. Think Triassic tinker toys, building blocks and Lincoln logs all rolled into one giant play set.

This stuff is fun, especially the part where we’ll be car camping at Mathews Arm Campground in Shenandoah National Park. We get to bring a camp chair and coolers! They’ve got showers!! They’re even cooking the food for us!!!

I wonder if the cooks could just follow the class of ‘14 up the trail? We could all chip in…

A couple of days after the workshop, it’ll be happy trails for for me on the 160 miles of AT from Waynesboro, Virginia to Harpers Ferry. That’s enough miles to find out what needs fixing.

It has another advantage. It simulates the longest leg without resupply that I’m planning in the spring. That stretch is from Fontana Village, NC to Hot Springs, NC. I’m not particularly high on the options in between, so a simple by pass strategy seems reasonable caveated by a severe weather opt out proviso.

Here’s where it gets personal. This particular test hike is not happening by accident. It will determine whether my body will stand up physically to a thru hike. With all the weight training and running, you’d think it would be a cinch. Let me clue you in on a secret. It’s not even close.

Six years ago I severely injured my right ankle. The injury includes the effects of tibial nerve damage that may not withstand the continuous pounding and dynamic stresses that long distance hiking generates over time. If the outcome is going to be negative, it will be unambiguous and show up before the end of this little jaunt. My thru hike could be over before it even begins.

If that isn’t enough, a chronic running injury called piriformis syndrome adopted me several years ago. When the piriformis muscle gets irritated, it is literally a pain I the butt that hurts like hell.

Of course the hurt has a bonus effect. The swelling irritates the sciatic nerve. And that my friends is a joy to experience, not to mention a potential show stopper! Both injuries are in the same leg. Has anyone ever hiked this thing on one leg?

I’m actually shocked that my right leg and foot haven’t filed a class action law suit for abuse.

The effects of these injuries can be moderated by systematic stretching, religiously limiting miles, and frequent rest. But in spite of everything, piriformis misbehaves on its own schedule. Moreover, the neuropathy in my right foot attended the same reform school and they’re both frequent recidivists.

Drama aside, there’s plenty of optimism. After all, I’ve made it through a year’s worth of heavy duty trail maintenance without problem. My intermittent hikes with a full pack have gone well. We just need more a more realistic test before actually reporting for duty in Georgia.

Triassic rocks and a little long haul truckin’ – a couple of nice shows for the fall schedule wouldn’t you say? Ah, but it gets even better. Get this.

Following a successful hike to Harpers Ferry, it’s immediately home to refit and head out to rendezvous with a member of the class of ’13 who flipped and is now southbound for Harpers Ferry on a Thanksgiving deadline. I get to observe a real lab rat performing the act itself.

The social benefits of having a compatible hiking partner aside, a medicinal traipse through the Pennsylvania rocks will notch up the difficulty factor enough to be an absolute validation of my body’s ability to perform over six months. Can’t wait.

What comes after Thanksgiving?

Last December I saw someone who gave me a great idea. This guy was decked out in REI’s finest while hiking with a ginormous pack on the Capitol Crescent Trail – an old street car line that’s now a nice walking path from Silver Spring, Maryland to Georgetown, D.C. Only later did I realize that he was training for the AT.

Thanks to the anonymous hiker, I’ll devote several hours each day, regardless of weather, to following his footsteps while wearing a full pack until it’s time to do an about face, jump in the car and motor to the Peach State.

BTW, I used to work at Georgia Tech. Georgia is a nice place if you haven’t been there.

If everything works, I’ll feel a lot more physically prepared to play my part in the 2014 Appalachian Trail reality show. I can only hope it’s not going to be “Survivor – the Earnest Shackleton Edition.” Whatever mamma nature plans to throw at us, it’s coming to Trail Journals in February. Hope to see you there. Sisu

If the weather is ugly, ole Sisu is comin’ anyway. He’s got backup.

The Value of Zero

August 15, 2013August 15, 2013 / jim fetig / Leave a comment

Some people know the cost of everything and the value of nothing. That’s the rap on more than a few of the bean counters out there in the business world.

It’s a fact: 1 x 0 = 0. That equals nothing, nada, zilch, zip, empty, nil, naught, nix, nicht, and without value. It follows that 2 x 0 = 0 and so on. So, zero’s worthless? Don’t kid yourself. On the AT a zero can be priceless. A zero can save your hike.

Recently a hiker I’ve been following wrote a blog post embroidered with frustration and punctuated by despair. It wasn’t unlike dozens we’ve seen in all seasons this year when hikers have reached their wits end. Cold, heat, sow, rain, mud, bugs, discomfort and falls all add up. My hiker friend, who has anonymity, was ready to cash it in and go home.

Enough was enough. The rain, mud, bugs and all finally added up. But no, that wasn’t enough. Then came the fall. It wasn’t the first, but this one was serious – a faceplant into a rock. There was blood, and it hurt – a lot. I was heartbroken for my friend.

Every hiker has an inner reservoir of mental resilience much like a checkbook balance. The balance ebbs and flows as a hike unfolds.

Debits are obviously related to cumulative experiences with rain, cold, heat, snow, rain, plague, mud, fatigue, hunger, aches and pains, etc.

Deposits come in many forms – trail magic, hot showers, town food, trail angels, new friends, and cool experiences, etc. Everyone tries to keep the balance in positive territory.

My friend was in a mental overdraft situation – out of gas and without the will to even take another step. Worse yet, there were no zeros on the schedule and the nearest exit was literally in the middle of nowhere, and probably the most austere “trail town” there is with a hostel. Its only claim to fame is jewelry literally made out of dung and we’re not talkin’ buffalo chips! Think of it as the only fly-over burg on the whole AT.

Then a miracle happened (Enter deus ex machina.) in the form of two unplanned zero days (2×0) notable for the hostel owner’s generous hospitality and remarkably spiked with the company of a gaggle of friendly hikers who showed up to duck some nasty storms.

Gently stir (not shake) it up over a couple of days and guess what? Total rejuvenation. Mental over haul complete! Back on the trail and ready for the next challenge.

Cue the bugles. Charge! Never quit on a bad day, right?

Who says zero has no value? Sometimes a zero or two can be the difference between success and failure. What’s that worth?