Let The Training Begin

I am a hiker. Some would say an avid hiker. Others might say I’m a fanatic. There are a few who think I am nuts. Needless to say—I like to hike. I’m not sure why and I have often wondered what makes me want to put a bunch of stuff in a sack on my back and haul it up a hill. Not only do I like to day hike, but I also like to backpack. Now we are talking a whole lot of stuff in a sack on my back up many hills and then sitting on the ground in sweaty cloths to cook a pot of noodles for dinner. How crazy is this and why do I like it so much? Who knows? I sure don’t.

Anyway, to the story at hand. There is a trail you may have heard of—The Appalachian Trial. It threads its way through the Appalachian Mountain Chain some 2100 miles from northern Georgia to Maine. That trail is calling my name. Gene and I have, over the years, often talked of doing a thru-hike—hiking from end to end in one season. That would take about 6 months and we couldn’t see our way clear to do that. However, that is not the only way to hike that trail so we started doing large sections. One September we started at Springer Mountain in Georgia and hiked to Clingman’s Dome in the Great Smoky Mountains National Park in Tennessee. It was 250 miles and took 4 weeks. The next year we started out for another month leaving Clingman’s Dome and arriving in Hot Springs, NC in about 10 days. We had to return to Nashville due to a family emergency and we didn’t get back to the trail that year. The next year, we planned to start at Hot Springs and just go to Maine. We weren’t getting any younger and if we didn’t do this trail soon, we’d be too old. So off we went and got in 450 miles before we had to stop due to my knees. We haven’t done another section in a couple years, but the trail is still calling my name.

Gene is not as obsessed with this hike as I am, plus he has this pesky little job that gets in his way. Soooo, I am out for another section this spring with a hiking buddy from Nashville. We haven’t done much backpacking in a couple of years, so you can imagine how out of shape I am. Some say the trail will get you in shape. That is true, but it hurts. I’ve done that—gone out cold so to speak—and just started hiking. The risk of injury is too great unless you go really slowly at first and I don’t have that luxury this trip. Diane, my hiking buddy, is a super athlete. She has a limited time for the trip and we want to cover as many miles as possible. I’ve gotta get in shape.

There really is no better place to prepare for the Appalachian Trail (AT) than on the AT. So here we are in Erwin, TN, a small trail town about 20 miles from Johnson City.