by Jeff Alt
Hug-a-Bug and I assured Crockett that we would keep him in the loop on the mystery. We climbed into the Jeep, and just like that, we were on our way, headed towards Shenandoah. It felt like we were on a brand-new adventure because, well, we were!
CHAPTER 4
THE PEOPLE BEHIND THE TRAIL
The line of vehicles ahead of us moved swiftly towards the Rockfish Gap entrance to Shenandoah National Park. There are four entrances into the park. Rockfish Gap is the southernmost. We weren’t quite sure how or where we would meet with the relative that sent us the passcode and led us here, but Papa Lewis told us not to worry about that.
“Whoever sent us that letter will find us. They found us in the Smokies; they will find us in Shenandoah,” Papa Lewis assured us.
As we sped along, edging closer to the entrance, we passed a small parking lot on the right side of the road and Hug-a-Bug immediately took notice of three hikers. They were sitting under a small shelter, talking to tourists.
“Papa Lewis, can you pull over? Those are Appalachian Trail thru-hikers. I want to hike into the park, just like they are!” Hug-a-Bug shouted.
Papa Lewis pulled into the parking lot and shifted the Jeep into park.
“Are you sure they’re thru-hikers, honey?” Mom asked Hug-a-Bug.
“Do you see the A.T. patch on their packs? The Appalachian Trail thru-hikers we met in the Smokies had the same patch. And look at the beards on them! They’ve been out here awhile,” Hug-a-Bug pointed out.
Ever since Hug-a-Bug met Grandma Gatewood, the first woman to solo hike the Appalachian Trail, on one of our time travel adventures, Hug-a-Bug had wanted to be a thru-hiker. Grandma Gatewood had inspired her.
“If you’re right, Hug-a-Bug, those hikers have walked all the way from Georgia, through Tennessee, North Carolina, and most of Virginia to get here. That’s over 850 miles,” Papa Lewis stated.
“Wow! But, the real way to identify a thru-hiker is the ’smell test’. The other thru-hikers we met all had an awful smell from not showering or wearing deodorant, and their synthetic clothing seems to make them smell even worse,” I said.
Hug-a-Bug jumped out of the Jeep. She opened the tailgate, grabbed a sandwich from our cooler, and walked over to the hikers. Papa Lewis and I got out and followed her. Hug-a-Bug offered the hikers the sandwich, which they quickly accepted. One of the hikers tore the sandwich into three pieces and handed the other two hikers a piece, and all three inhaled it in a matter of seconds. As Hug-a-Bug chatted with them, the wind blew their scent towards where I stood and about knocked me off my feet, confirming their authenticity. I tried not to breathe through my nose. They were definitely thru-hikers! After chatting with us for a few minutes, the thru-hikers invited us to hike with them into Shenandoah National Park.
We returned to the car and Papa Lewis pulled out our hiking poles and daypacks. We hoisted our packs and reviewed a map with Dad to determine where he should meet up with us, and then we joined the thru-hikers. There are two ways adventure seekers enter Shenandoah National Park—by road or by trail— and we were about to do both. Dad pulled back out onto Skyline Drive with Mom and Grandma and drove on into the park. Papa Lewis, Hug-a-Bug, and I followed the thru-hikers along the Appalachian Trail. We officially entered the park, hiker-style. Our Shenandoah Adventure had begun!
Papa Lewis, Hug-a-Bug, and I followed the three thru-hikers northward. They were hard to keep up with. The Appalachian Trail, or A.T. for short, parallels Skyline Drive the entire length of the park for miles. Skyline Drive is 105 miles long and the A.T. has 101 miles inside the park. The thru-hikers had already covered over 800 miles of the A.T. to get to this point. They walked fast and kept in step with each other, like a finely-tuned machine. We couldn’t keep their pace, and the distance between us and them grew until they were out of sight.
It was easy to know where the trail was. The A.T. was wide enough to walk side by side most of the time and every few hundred yards, the trail was marked by a white rectangle painted on a tree, letting us know we were still on the right path. The three of us stopped for a water break. Beads of sweat rolled down my cheeks and dripped off my forehead.
“Those thru-hikers are amazing. They’ve walked all the way from Georgia, and they walk as fast as I jog!” Hug-a-Bug said.
We continued hiking up a gradual incline. The occasional sound of a vehicle reminded us how close we were to Skyline Drive. We had made plans to meet Dad, Mom, and Grandma at Beagle Gap, a little over five miles from where they left us at Rockfish Gap. While we hiked, they drove ahead to set up our camp for the night. After a few miles, the trail came out of the woods and led us across Skyline Drive and then back onto the trail again and up a slight grade into a thicket of pine trees. I heard the sound of an axe cracking into wood. Soon we heard voices and then, rounding a bend in the trail, found the source. Six people—four men and two women—were hard at work cutting up a tree that had fallen across the trail. They all had on green t-shirts with a logo that read PATC.
“Hello, hikers! There are three hikers about twenty minutes ahead of you. They were concerned that you might be upset that they were moving faster than you,” a man holding a saw called out to us.
“Hello PATC crew, thanks for all the work you’re doing on the trail. We’re not upset about falling behind. Those thru-hikers move like machines. We’re having a nice, leisurely hike,” Papa Lewis said.
“Are you the group that paints the white trail blaze marks on the trees?” Hug-a-Bug asked.
“Yep, we do that, but right now we’re clearing trees that fell across the trail during the last storm. We call them blowdowns. They make it difficult for the hikers. You have to either crawl under or over them. This is nothing compared to the re-route we did last month, though. We had to move a mile of trail and move big rocks into place to prevent erosion. That took a crew of forty PATC volunteers an entire week,” the PATC volunteer answered.
“What I find equally amazing as the thru-hikers who walk from Georgia to Maine are the people that built this trail and continue to take care of it. Bubba Jones and Hug-a-Bug, these folks are volunteers for the Potomac Appalachian Trail Club, or PATC. Without them, this trail might never have been made. Thank you again for all your hard work,” Papa Lewis said as he continued hiking down the trail.
“Yeah, thanks,” Hug-a-Bug and I said in unison and we continued on down the trail behind Papa Lewis.
“Happy trails!” the PATC volunteer hollered as the crew returned to their work.
Hug-a-Bug called out to Papa Lewis as we walked along, “I didn’t realize the A.T. was man-made. I thought someone just marked a bunch of old paths that deer and Native Americans had used, and connected them all together.”
“The A.T. was constructed along the spine of the Appalachian Mountain chain by people. They used existing paths when possible, but the work was very hard. They had to clear trees, move stone, build shelters, construct bridges, and post trail markers. Benton MacKaye wrote an article in 1921 that inspired the creation of the Appalachian Trail, and the man that organized the workers to build it was Myron Avery, the first president of the PATC and seven-term chairperson of the Appalachian Trail Conservancy. Only back then they called it the Appalachian Trail Conference,” Papa Lewis explained.
The trail led us out of the woods at Beagle Gap, the location where we were supposed to meet back up with Grandma, Dad, and Mom. We had hiked almost six miles, a respectable distance for anyone in mountain terrain. The Jeep wasn’t there yet to pick us up, so we all took off our packs and sat down to wait in the parking area.
“Guess who the first person was to become an official Appalachian Trail 2,000- miler?” Papa Lewis asked.
“That’s easy, it was Earl Shaffer in 1948,” I stated confidently.
“Yes, Earl Shaffer was the first thru-hiker and Grandma Gatewood was the first female solo thru-hiker. They both walked continuously from Georgia to Maine, in one season. But Myron Avery was the first person to walk the entire tr
ail. He did it in sections over a number of years. He completed it in 1936, before the A.T. was officially completed and twelve years before Earl Shaffer’s thru-hike. Avery hiked the trail and worked with the trail crews to build it as he went,” Papa Lewis explained.
“You can do that? You can walk the A.T. in sections and still be considered a 2,000-miler?” I asked.
“There is no right or wrong way to become a 2,000-miler. You just have to walk the entire A.T. You can do it in parts, or all at once. You can go from Georgia to Maine or from Maine to Georgia. You can even do a flip flop and start midway in Harpers Ferry, hike north to Maine, then catch a ride back to Harpers Ferry and hike south,” Papa Lewis replied.
“Mr. Avery hiked the trail in a very cool way. I think Mr. Avery deserved to be the first 2,000-miler for all the work he did to make the trail. Maybe that’s how I’ll hike the A.T.: in sections,” Hug-a-Bug said excitedly.
We heard an approaching vehicle on Skyline Drive and sure enough, it was our Jeep. Dad pulled into the parking lot.
“Hey guys, how was the hike?” Dad hollered from the driver’s window.
“Great, Dad. We couldn’t keep up with the thru-hikers, but we met a trail crew working on the A.T.,” I replied.
We told him all about the PATC crew and what we learned about Myron Avery.
“Where are Grandma and Mom?” Hug-a-Bug asked.
“They’re back at Loft Mountain Campground making dinner.”
“Before we go, do you all mind if we time-travel back and meet Myron Avery?” I asked. “Let’s do it!” Dad said.
“Bubba Jones, take us back to the spring of 1928,” Papa Lewis suggested.
Everyone circled around me as I placed my hand on the family journal and said “Take us back to the spring of 1928,”
A gust of wind smacked us and seconds later, Skyline Drive and our Jeep disappeared. Our modern synthetic clothing and hiking gear was replaced with cotton long sleeve shirts and pants, and we found ourselves carrying canvas military rucksacks like the one Papa Lewis hikes with.
“Where’s Skyline Drive?” Hug-a-Bug asked.
“Skyline Drive doesn’t exist yet. The Appalachian Trail in Shenandoah National Park was completed before the road was built. As a matter of fact, right now in 1928, they still don’t know exactly where they will put Skyline Drive. Look around for a group of trail builders. They are working under Myron Avery’s supervision. In fact, I think this is Myron Avery coming up the trail right now,” Papa Lewis said, pointing into the woods.
A middle-aged man with short brown hair, dressed in a tank top, long pants, and hiking boots appeared from around a bend in the trail. He walked fast and approached our position quickly as he pushed a one-wheeled device that looked like a unicycle without a seat.
“You must be my PATC reinforcements. Glad to have you,” Myron Avery said to us.
“Glad to help, sir. What would you like us to do?” I asked.
Before Mr. Avery could respond, Hug-a-Bug asked, “Did your unicycle break?”
Mr. Avery laughed and responded, “It may look like a unicycle, but actually, this is a survey wheel. You hold this handle and push it along to measures distance. Here, let me show you how to use it, and you can measure the next section of trail with me.”
“Awesome! I would be glad to help,” Hug-a-Bug replied.
And so it went. We spent the next hour helping Mr. Avery’s trail crew cut trees, move rocks, and mark the trail. Hug-a-Bug learned how to use a survey wheel and rolled it along to measure the trail, then she joined the rest of us to help move a tree that we had cut down off the trail. This was hard work. I had blisters on the palms of my hands from using the shovel, pick axe, and saw. Papa Lewis suggested we take a break, which was my cue to take us back to the present. We gathered together out of view of Myron Avery and the PATC crew and I said, “Take us back to the present.”
Seconds later, a warm gust of wind blasted us and we were back in the parking lot next to our Jeep, parked along Skyline Drive.
“Wow, building the A.T. was hard work. We helped build a measly twenty-yard section. I can’t imagine doing that work for 2,000-miles. We definitely earned our dinner,” I said.
“You got that right,” Hug-a-Bug said.
We climbed into the Jeep, buckled our seatbelts, and pulled out onto Skyline Drive northbound towards Loft Mountain Campground, our Shenandoah home for the night. The two-lane road took us around gentle curves with thick forest and wildflowers on either side and every so often, we would pass by a paved pull-off, lined with knee-high stone walls, with spectacular views of the Shenandoah Valley and the mountains in the distance.
“Guess where the park service ended up building Skyline Drive?” Papa Lewis asked.
“That’s easy, right here alongside the Appalachian Trail,” I answered.
“Not quite. Skyline Drive was built right on top of the original Appalachian Trail,” Papa Lewis answered.
“I’m confused. Right now we’re driving on Skyline Drive and the Appalachian Trail runs alongside the road,” I stated.
“The A.T. was moved over when the road was built,” Papa Lewis replied.
“You mean we just did all that work with Mr. Avery and the PATC crew for nothing?!” Hug-a-Bug asked exas-peratedly. “Those poor hard-working trail crew members must have been quite upset when they learned their work was going to be covered by a road.”
“I’m sure there were some upset PATC workers, but they literally had an ARMY to help them move the trail— more on that later! The man I mentioned earlier who inspired the A.T., Benton MacKaye, was very upset when he learned that the trail was going to parallel a road. Roads weren’t part of his vision of a wilderness path. He was so upset that he removed himself from any involvement with the A.T. Meanwhile, Avery was determined to follow through and make sure the A.T. was built. Avery accepted the idea of Skyline Drive. This difference of opinion about the road caused a deep division between Avery and MacKaye. But Avery continued to build the A.T. and organized volunteers to help. Today, Skyline Drive remains the single greatest feature of Shenandoah National Park, and the A.T. is considered one of the world’s most famous footpaths,” Papa Lewis explained.
When we drove along Skyline Drive earlier, it had felt instead as if we were driving along the Appalachian Trail. Now it made sense, because we actually were driving along parts of the original footpath. Whitetail deer were everywhere. We had to stop suddenly when a young fawn speckled with white spots, still learning to run, clumsily stumbled into the road in pursuit of its mom.
“Hey Clark, pull into the next overlook,” Papa Lewis requested.
Minutes later, Dad pulled off of Skyline Drive following a sign that read “Crimora Lake Overlook, elevation 2,975 ft.” We all stepped out of the vehicle to enjoy the view. We could see far down into the valley, dotted with farmhouses, barns, patches of forest, and farm fields all the way across to distant mountains. I spotted Crimora Lake, a small body of water sandwiched between some mountains below us. A large black bird circled above us. I felt like a hawk, perched above the Shenandoah Valley and able to see far off into the distance.
“I stopped here with Cousin Nick many moons ago while we were exploring Shenandoah,” Papa Lewis said with a bright gleam in his eyes.
“It sure is beautiful,” commented Hug-a-Bug.
“It definitely is, Hug-a-Bug. The park name ’Shenandoah’ is a Native American word that means ’beautiful daughter of the stars.’”
“That’s a perfect name for the park,” Hug-a-Bug commented.
“Your mom and grandma are expecting us back at camp for supper. We should probably head there now,” Dad said as he hopped back in the Jeep.
“We’ll continue to explore tomorrow. Right now, dinner sounds good,” Papa Lewis replied as the rest of us hopped in the Jeep, pulled out onto Skyline Drive and headed towards Loft Mountain Campground.
CHAPTER 5
A NIGHT ON THE MOUNTAIN
Ashort while late
r, a brown National Park Service sign alerted us that we had arrived at Loft Mountain Campground. It was late in the day and the sun was slowly sinking behind a distant mountain. Dad pulled off of Skyline Drive and into the campground. We passed another sign that read “Bear Country. Protect your property and food. Proper food storage is required.”
Hug-a-Bug’s eyes were glued to the bear warning sign as we drove by. “You mean we are going to sleep outside with bears that can destroy our property and take our food?” Hug-a-Bug asked.
“Don’t you worry, Hug-a-Bug. You already have experience camping and hiking in areas with bears. The sign is meant to remind you that you’re in bear country. We will store all our food and scented items, like deodorant, toothpaste, and soap, in the vehicle and away from our tent. You will be just fine,” Papa Lewis replied.
It’s always nice to get some reassurance from Papa Lewis, and Hug-a-Bug seemed to feel more at ease. I did, too.
“After we dropped you guys on the Appalachian Trail back at Rockfish Gap, the park ranger at the entrance station went over all the bear issues with us. Shenandoah has a large black bear population,” Dad added.
Dad weaved the Jeep through the campground which was bustling with RVs, tents, and people of all ages. Smoke puffed up from fire rings while people sat at picnic tables eating and enjoying the mountaintop views.
“Shenandoah National Park has four campgrounds, and this is the largest of them,” Papa Lewis explained.
Dad pulled into our campsite. I could see Mom and Grandma seated at the picnic table under our dining canopy, and it looked like they had dinner all ready to go. The table had an array of food placed assembly-line style at one end. I got excited as I noticed the ingredients: a jar of pizza sauce, a bag of shredded mozzarella cheese, chopped vegetables, pepperoni, a loaf of bread, and campfire pie irons. A small stream of smoke emanated from red-hot coals in the fire pit. My stomach growled. We were about to have one of my favorite camping meals.