I had never met Pathfinder, although I’d followed his hike on the Trail Journals website before I began my own journey. He had started a thru-hike in January, in the dead of winter. When he reached Damascus, he abruptly left the AT, but promised to return later to resume his hike. Pathfinder had done numerous thru-hikes and was quite knowledgeable about the trail. I’d been intrigued by his journals and had wished that our paths would cross sometime on the AT. But what were the odds of such a meeting, with hikers strung out over two thousand miles and five months?
Now the well-known trail figure walked into The Mill Restaurant where we sat at supper. I recognized him from photos I’d seen, and Sailor invited him to join us. Pathfinder accepted our invitation, and we fell into the easy and quick fellowship of the AT community. I couldn’t wait long to ask my question: “Pathfinder, you hike the AT year after year. Why?”
“Well, Apostle, my wife died of cancer about five years ago—”
I interrupted. “Say no more. I know exactly why you’re here.”
The conversation that followed was one I would have many times with other men on the trail. The stories were deeply personal yet all possessed universal threads. We had lost a spouse and thus had lost our lives; we came seeking peace, harmony, and restoration. Pathfinder’s story of losing his wife to cancer was uncannily similar to mine. As he told his story, every detail resonated with my own pain and loss.
He and his wife had been athletic people, both marathon runners. The Big C had robbed them of many activities they had once shared as it slowly drained his wife’s strength and energy. Returning home one evening, they drove through Dicks Creek Gap, close to Hiawassee, Georgia. Pathfinder never even knew the Appalachian Trail passed through this gap and had never hiked on the AT, but that night he saw the trail sign and pulled over.
He told his wife he wanted to walk up the trail a bit. He walked a short time, lost in thoughts about the cancer and what it had done to their lives. When he finally turned to go back to the car, he saw that his wife had followed him a short way up the trail. From a distance, he caught sight of her, a frail shadow leaning weakly against a tree, breathless and too exhausted to go farther. Overwhelmed by what they had lost and filled with compassion for her, he gently picked her up and carried her back to the car. She said to him, “You’re going to hike this trail after I’m gone, aren’t you?”
“Shortly after that, she did pass away. I sold my construction company and came to the trail,” he told me. “And I’ve come back every year since to thru-hike. Apostle, I sold my company at the height of the building boom. If I’d kept my business and not done that hike, I’d be a rich man today. Instead, I’m happy.”
Pathfinder’s story sounded so familiar, so like my own—but there was one thing I could not comprehend. He had never finished that first thru-hike. As he approached the sign at the top of Mt. Katahdin, marking the end of the trail, he stopped ten feet away and could not go on. He broke down in tears, turned away and never reached that sign on his first hike.
I could not understand how one could stop short of such a hard-won goal. I had only been on the trail for a month, but already I knew something of the price any thru-hiker pays to reach Katahdin’s summit. Right now, that was all that mattered to me. I wanted to finish this hike, kiss that sign, and go home.
Later that night, I stopped at a Dollar General store and bought a bottle of Vitamin I. More commonly known as ibuprofen, this is a hiker’s best friend. Several weeks before, I’d started taking one tablet each morning to ease the pain in my aching feet and legs. A box of Little Debbie snacks also seemed like a necessary purchase; I flipped it over and found that each cake had almost 270 calories I could not pass up.
Back at the house, Sailor and I packed our bags for an early morning departure. We had hiked 461 miles, and the next day would begin our second month on the trail.
Before leaving in the morning, we checked the weather channel and the report promised an 80 percent chance of storms by the afternoon. “What are the chances those words have meaning?” I asked Sailor as we headed outdoors.
“Oh, probably about an 80 percent chance.”
We headed north. For almost a mile, we shared the trail with horses and bicycles. The AT was blazed along the Virginia Creeper Trail, a converted railroad bed that runs thirty-four miles from Abingdon, Virginia, to the North Carolina state line. It was Saturday morning, and already there was much activity on the bike path. After more than four hundred miles of hiking in lonely woods on a narrow dirt path, it was a strange sensation to have bicycles whizzing past us.
We hiked over Feathercamp Ridge and Straight Mountain, the AT never straying far from the Virginia Creeper. Early in the afternoon, we stopped at Lost Mountain Shelter for a break. We had walked in light rain several times that morning, but it looked as if we would avoid the nasty weather that had been predicted. We had already hiked over fifteen miles, and we could probably still get in another ten before quitting for the day.
Before we could hoist our packs again, however, the 80 percent hit us. Lightning shot through the sky, thunder shook the shelter, and rain came in torrents. Sailor and I looked at each other wordlessly, grateful that we were safe and dry. We unrolled sleeping bags, and at two in the afternoon our hiking day was done. We spent the rest of the day in the shelter, relaxing and watching the storm.
The storm brought another person seeking shelter and gave us a new hiking partner. Litefoot had just graduated from high school and was hiking the AT as a graduation present to himself. He had been homeschooled, raised with strict religious training, and still carried an innocence not found in many of today’s high school graduates. Skinny, soft-spoken, and serious, he reminded me of myself at that age.
Litefoot had convinced his worried parents to let him do this hike to explore the world. But already he had found the world not much to his liking. The buddies he had been hiking with were drinking and partying, and he’d separated himself from them. We three were all trapped in the shelter for the afternoon and night, so our introductions were lengthy and thorough. Sailor and I liked the young man, and when Litefoot asked politely if we would mind if he hiked with us, we assured him we would be happy to have him join us.
We were three again. By six in the morning, we were on our way to Mt. Rogers. On Buzzard Rock, a slope of Whitetop Mountain, a fog bank engulfed the mountainside. Sailor was barely visible several feet in front of me, and shrubs and bushes appeared and disappeared eerily in foggy mist as we wound around Whitetop.
Then the breeze picked up and nature astonished me once again. That huge bank of fog became a living entity that gathered itself and took flight, swiftly and silently retreating. It moved from my left to my right, like a huge cloud scudding across a clear sky. The entire hillside on which I stood came into view as the cloud of fog rolled down the slope, up another hillside beyond us, and then disappeared in the distance. No fog in Ohio has ever done that. I stood and watched in awe. The air was now crystal clear.
“Can you believe what you just saw?” I yelled ahead to Sailor, who had also stopped to watch the show. Wow, God, You’re on the job early today. That was a treat. With an opening act like that, this will be a great day.
We crossed Virginia Rt. 600 at Elk Garden and hiked through open pastures on our way to the summit of Mt. Rogers. The world was increasingly green, and I was finding more and more wildflowers to sample; I munched all kinds and colors of offerings from my salad bar in the wild.
It was a pleasant surprise to find that the Appalachian Trail did not go directly over the 5,729-foot summit. Rather, the trail traversed the shoulder of the mountain, a half mile below the peak. A blue-blazed trail led to the top, but a sign also told us, “No Views.”
Soon after squeezing through a natural rock tunnel called Fat Man’s Squeeze, we arrived at one of the prettiest spots in Virginia. The Wilburn Ridge and the Grayson Highlands are dotted with pink and red rock outcroppings, with clusters of evergreens scattered throughout o
pen fields on the rolling hillsides.
Herds of wild ponies graze these highlands. Although hikers are encouraged not to feed the ponies, many of the animals were so tame that they nuzzled us, looking for a handout. The ponies roam everywhere in Grayson Highlands State Park, including shelters and camping areas. We passed the Thomas Knob Shelter and spotted three of them at the picnic table, scrounging for food like park chipmunks or squirrels.
The three of us set up camp that night on a grassy bald, next to a large rock outcropping below the ridge crest of Pine Mountain. That day had been a wonderful twenty-two-mile hike. Our second day in Virginia gave us a rogue fog bank, the three highest mountains in the state, scenic hikes through unique rock formations, and those wild keepers of the hinterlands, the ponies.
As dusk settled over the highlands, I summoned enough energy to scramble up one of the rock formations and watch the last glimmers of the setting sun fade behind the rolling peaks. From my roost on the rock, I looked over our three tents arranged on the green grass of the bald, and found myself smiling at the absurdity of this moment of my life.
I am sitting on a rock somewhere in Virginia. I quit my job. All I do is walk all day. I should be lonely—and often I am—but something is very different. Something that has been eluding me for years has finally overtaken me. Contentment. I’ve been living life too fast. But now that I’m traveling at two miles per hour, contentment has caught up with me. God, why do we make our lives so difficult, trying to find contentment?
I scrambled back down from my rocky perch, back across the grassy bald to my tent. Inside, I relaxed, leaving the tent flap open; the vista of sky and peaks was too good to block out. Only after darkness set in did I reach out and zip up the tent flap. Couldn’t have those wild ponies sneaking in and stealing my food.
And I heard Pathfinder’s voice in my head. I could have been rich. Instead, I’m happy.
By six the next morning, our grassy bald was fully lit with morning sun and we were ready for another day of adventure. An hour into our hike, we stopped at Old Orchard Shelter to filter water and have a celebratory snack. We had reached the 500-mile point of our trek. Trail conditions were easy and the miles slipped by quickly. Litefoot’s company was pleasant and companionable; I looked forward to many days of conversation with him.
By eleven o’clock, we had hiked twelve miles and were in Dickey Gap. Virginia Rt. 650 crosses here, and a car was just dropping off a hiker as we arrived at the highway. It was good timing. The driver was the owner of Jerry’s Kitchen and Goods, a small grocery store and restaurant several miles away in Troutdale, Virginia. He offered to drive us there for a hot meal and then return us to the trail. It was almost as amazing as trail magic—we stumbled out of the woods onto a little country road, and within one hour we had a hot meal at a restaurant and were back on the trail again.
That hot meal seemed to cast its magic on the afternoon. Sun soaked our path, log bridges took us over beautiful streams, and wildflowers bloomed in abundance. Good conversation and easygoing humor flowed like the many waterfalls we passed, and even our mountain climb seemed as gentle as its name: Brushy Mountain.
Our goal was to reach Partnership Shelter by that evening. That would require our longest day yet on the trail, but we felt energetic and optimistic. Our determination was undoubtedly bolstered by the incentive of pizza. Yes, pizza on the Appalachian Trail. The shelter was close to the Mt. Rogers National Recreation Area headquarters building, where a local pizza place had taped a menu to the outdoor pay phone, promising delivery. The imagined taste of cheese and spicy sauce kept us hiking at a good clip.
At six o’clock, we arrived at the shelter. Another great day. We’d hiked 26.4 miles in twelve hours, passed our five-hundred-mile mark, enjoyed a hot meal for lunch, and would possibly have pizza for supper. Could life get any better?
Partnership Shelter is one of the most comfortable shelters on the entire trail, a two-story log building that can easily sleep sixteen. It boasts a solar shower and piped water to a washbasin behind the shelter. Just down the trail, we found the headquarters, the pay phone, and the pizza menu. Things were looking good. Sailor and I ordered two pizzas and went back to the shelter to await delivery.
And then it happened. A goddess of stunning beauty sashayed from the shelter and took a seat at the picnic table in front of the building. Life could get better, it turned out. She had just emerged from the shower and was attired in her evening wear. Of course, being sociable folks, Litefoot and I sat down with the beauty.
On a whim, Bubbles had decided she wanted to do a section hike. She bought new equipment and headed down the trail. Five days later, she still had not figured out how to set up her tent. Every night in camp, men had offered to set it up for her, and of course she was happy to let them do it. I’ll just say it: men can be stupid and gullible at times.
When God created Bubbles, He must have taken extra time, because it was a job well done. Every curve was in its proper place, and Litefoot was entranced by the whole package. No, no, no, Litefoot! It’s a trap! You must resist the spell!
Our pizzas arrived, and later as Sailor and I headed for our tents, he speculated that Litefoot probably would not be hiking with us on the morrow. Come on, Sailor, I thought, have some faith in our innocent young hiking partner.
Early the next morning, Sailor and I were getting ready to leave. All was quiet in Litefoot’s tent. “Hey, Litefoot, wake up!” My call got no response, and I grabbed one of my hiking poles and gave his tent a good rap. “You coming with us today?”
After a moment of silence, a hesitant voice came through the canvas.
“Ah . . . you guys go ahead without me. I’ll catch up with you later.”
Sailor gave me an I-told-you-so grin over the tent as we hoisted our packs for another day. I clung to the hope that Litefoot would escape the spell cast at the picnic table and rejoin us later in the day. Alas, we never saw him again. Several days later, we met a hiker who had also stayed at the shelter that night.
“Do you know what happened to Litefoot?” I asked, hoping we might still reconnect with our young friend.
“Sure do. He left the shelter that morning, hiking away with Bubbles.”
As surely as Bubble rhymes with Trouble, Litefoot was now on a trail fraught with danger. After only a few days with us mature, sensible adults, he had jettisoned us for the first fair maiden to cross his path.
However, now that I think about it, we should have been forewarned. It was, after all, Partnership Shelter.
Sailor and I had once again lost a hiking partner, but it was a splendid day in Virginia. We rolled through open fields fresh with spring green. Weathered farm buildings were scattered here and there, and we passed cattle grazing near our path. After hiking in the woods for most of our first five hundred miles, we felt a new sense of freedom in the open pastures.
We rounded a hilltop and saw I-81 in the distance, with a cluster of buildings huddling along its outline. We were nearing Atkins, Virginia, and our guidebook promised a country-style restaurant ahead. Back and forth we wound, across the rolling pasture land, through a grove of apple trees, descending the easy hillsides until we bottomed out at railroad tracks. A white blaze painted on the side of the rail assured us we were on the right track. We left the trail and headed up Highway 11 to The Barn Restaurant, where I sampled the salad bar—delicious, but lacking flowers.
Leaving the restaurant, I took a few steps down a small grassy incline and felt a muscle pop in the back of my leg. After all those steep, rocky climbs, my first injury came from just one small misstep.
As we walked back along Rt. 11, we met a lone hiker. My first meeting with Einstein was brief, but I knew I wanted to meet him again, somewhere, sometime. About my age and obviously a deep thinker, he seemed the embodiment of a Southern gentleman. Einstein was headed to the restaurant we had just left, and we went back to looking for our white blazes to get back on the trail.
The afternoon flew by, with id
eal hiking weather and easy walking through fields and an occasional wooded area.
As afternoon faded to evening, we hiked a narrow corridor of the trail, surrounded by private property. We had long ago passed all available campsites, and the properties here were posted with signs prohibiting camping. But the evening light was quickly ebbing away and we had only two choices, both undesirable: either hike in the dark or find an illegal stealth campsite.
Being the fine, upstanding citizens we were, we opted to camp illegally. Both daylight and options were limited, so we scrambled down a bank and set up our tents beside a small stream at the edge of a meadow. The consistency of the cow patties told us cattle had recently passed through and probably used the stream as a watering hole. We would be sure to leave early in the morning, before they returned.
I cooked a gourmet dinner that night, dried beef stew enhanced by morel mushrooms. That afternoon, while hiking down Little Brushy Mountain, I had found several along the path. I could resist no longer; I dropped my pack and searched the surrounding area. Finding a patch of those succulent spring morsels, I triumphantly packed them away for dinner. I may have been encircled by cow patties, but I was king of my castle, dining on delicacies on my thirty-seventh night on the trail.
Randall Lee Smith was a troubled young man who lived near Pearisburg, Virginia. In May of 1981, he murdered two AT hikers at the Wapiti Shelter, not far from the home he shared with his mother. Smith pled guilty to second degree murder and was given thirty years in prison. After serving only fifteen years, he was released with ten years of probation. According to reports, during his incarceration he had only one visitor, one time. His mother visited him once in fifteen years, and it seemed there was no other friend or family who cared about him.
Released in 1996, he went back to live with his mother until she died in 2000. Then Randall Smith lived alone in a small shanty near the Appalachian Trail in Pearisburg. Law officials and several local residents tried to keep watchful eyes on him, but in April of 2008 Smith went missing. His mail had last been picked up in March, and no one had seen the man since. Some theorized he was camping in the woods, but he could not be located, so a missing persons report was filed.
Hiking Through: One Man's Journey to Peace and Freedom on the Appalachian Trail Page 11