Speaker 1: I guess what, Mango, what's that? Will? So I was
Speaker 1: looking at a map of the Appalachian Trail and trying
Speaker 1: to remind myself of exactly where it goes. And did
Speaker 1: you know the Appalachian Trail might actually expand into Morocco,
Speaker 1: of all places? How is that even possible? Well? I
Speaker 1: thought this sounded ridiculous too, but it's actually pretty cool.
Speaker 1: So let me let me explain this. So there's this
Speaker 1: vision area. His name is Dick Anderson, and this was
Speaker 1: according to NPR. But he has this idea to turn
Speaker 1: the A T into this international trail. I mean, I
Speaker 1: guess I can see that from like a branding perspective,
Speaker 1: But why would you do that? You're gonna remember this
Speaker 1: from your school age, Mango. You remember the word Pangaea
Speaker 1: when all of the continents were together, So they were
Speaker 1: connected some two hundred million years ago, And so he
Speaker 1: noticed that when the landmass broke up, so did this
Speaker 1: giant mountain range. And you know other pieces of the
Speaker 1: range that are in Morocco and Greenland, Norway, Spain, a
Speaker 1: bunch of other countries. So the Appalachians kind of continue
Speaker 1: around the world, and you look at what other countries
Speaker 1: are doing. Canada's already does ignated eighteen hundred miles from
Speaker 1: Maine to Newfoundland, and the British Geological Survey has done
Speaker 1: the same thing with this nineties six mile portion of
Speaker 1: a trail that runs through the UK. But all this
Speaker 1: excitement over the International Appalachian Trail it made us want
Speaker 1: to take a closer look at how the original Appalachian
Speaker 1: Trail got its start. Why did some people start hiking
Speaker 1: the eight in the first place, what are some of
Speaker 1: the crazy stories from those early hikes, and what's the
Speaker 1: real reason park rangers don't want people hiking naked? Because,
Speaker 1: believe it or not, there is a good one. So
Speaker 1: let's dig in yea. Hey there, podcast listeners, Welcome to
Speaker 1: Part Time Genius. I'm Will Pearson and as always I'm
Speaker 1: joined by my good friend man Guess Ticketer and the
Speaker 1: other side of the soundproof glass, steam rolling his way
Speaker 1: through a tub of rocky road. It is rocky road,
Speaker 1: definitely rocky rocky road ice cream. That's our friend and
Speaker 1: producer Tristan mcnailo. I get it. Rocky roads stupid well anyway,
Speaker 1: believe it or not, Trista is actually trying to pass
Speaker 1: this off is part of his training for hiking the
Speaker 1: Appalachian Trail. I don't know if he's going to hike
Speaker 1: the whole thing or what, but he claims there's a
Speaker 1: tradition that began around the nineteen eighties where hikers would
Speaker 1: down a ton of ice cream. I'm just not so
Speaker 1: sure about this sum It actually is a real thing.
Speaker 1: It's called Gallon Challenge and hundreds of eight hikers take
Speaker 1: it on every single year. And Tristan is getting a
Speaker 1: little ahead of himself though, as he always does. The
Speaker 1: challenges something hikers do once they reached the official halfway
Speaker 1: point of the truck. It's actually in this town called
Speaker 1: Pine Grove Furnace in Pennsylvania, and the idea is to
Speaker 1: celebrate the milestone by wolfing down a half gallon of
Speaker 1: ice cream in under an hour. There's like a time
Speaker 1: limit on it. There's actually this general store there that's
Speaker 1: been hosting the for about forty years now and the
Speaker 1: owner says that the all time record for a half
Speaker 1: gallon challenges under five minutes. Oh gross, that is Uh well,
Speaker 1: we'll have to put our our friend Yas or the
Speaker 1: competitive eater up to the challenge to see if you
Speaker 1: can beat that. But that sounds disgusting, and I'm curious.
Speaker 1: Do the challengers get anything for pulling this off besides
Speaker 1: brain freeze? Of course, I mean you get bragging rights,
Speaker 1: of course. But there are these little prizes. They call
Speaker 1: them victory spoons, and it's basically one of those little
Speaker 1: wooden spoons that comes with an ice cream cover, except
Speaker 1: this one has the words member of the Half Gallon
Speaker 1: Club printed on it. What a fancy priz. I mean,
Speaker 1: I actually love hearing about all the Appalachian Trail traditions
Speaker 1: that have sprung up over the years, because you knows,
Speaker 1: the trail really is its own little world, and at
Speaker 1: this point, it feels like the trail's unique social life
Speaker 1: is it's really as much of a draw as the
Speaker 1: beautiful scenery or the sense of the challenge. And if
Speaker 1: you think about it, there's this entire community spread across
Speaker 1: fourteen different states and now, as we've learned in Morocco
Speaker 1: as well, maybe one day. But the only thing that
Speaker 1: ties them together is that pull they feel towards this trail.
Speaker 1: So you've got this team of trail maintenance volunteers who
Speaker 1: keep the route clear and safer hikers and supportive residents
Speaker 1: along the way and these adjacent towns, and they come
Speaker 1: in to cheer on the hikers or give them food
Speaker 1: or often even a place to crash for the night.
Speaker 1: And then there are the hikers themselves, and so they'll
Speaker 1: often meet as strangers from all walks of life, but
Speaker 1: you know, a few shared hardships a couple of thousand
Speaker 1: miles later, and they form these lifelong friendships. Yeah. I mean,
Speaker 1: I have a few friends who have done this, and
Speaker 1: there's clearly no question that hiking the a T is
Speaker 1: this life changing experience for tons of people. Yeah, well,
Speaker 1: you hear that over and over, and so today we
Speaker 1: thought we'd take a closer look at why that is.
Speaker 1: So we'll talk about how the trail got it, start
Speaker 1: about some of the most notable folks who have hiked it,
Speaker 1: also dig a little bit deeper into life on the trail,
Speaker 1: and check out a few of the clever ways that
Speaker 1: intrepid hikers have found to keep things interesting. So there's
Speaker 1: a lot to talk about, But where where do you
Speaker 1: want to start? Manga, Well, how about running through some
Speaker 1: quick stats about the a T just for those who
Speaker 1: aren't familiar with it. So for starters, the a T
Speaker 1: is the longest hiking only footpath, not just in the
Speaker 1: US but in the entire world. It's official length fluctuates
Speaker 1: every year. It's um because miles are added or removed
Speaker 1: as they perform various upgrades and repairs along the passes,
Speaker 1: but in general the trail runs just under miles. It
Speaker 1: stretches from Springer Mountain in Georgia all the way up
Speaker 1: to Mount Cataden in Maine, and along the way the
Speaker 1: trail cuts through the mountainous regions of twelve other states.
Speaker 1: And while millions of day hikers visit some portion of
Speaker 1: the trail every year, the a T is probably most
Speaker 1: famous where it's so called two thousand miles Club. And
Speaker 1: these are those super determined folks who covered the trails
Speaker 1: entire length from one end to the other. And there
Speaker 1: are a bunch of different ways you can do this.
Speaker 1: You can take the trail and segments over the course
Speaker 1: of multiple years. They're called segment hikers. The people who
Speaker 1: do this UM You can hike straight through and that
Speaker 1: often takes five to seven months. Those people are called
Speaker 1: through hikers. Or you can complete half the trail and
Speaker 1: one direction before switching to the opposite end to complete
Speaker 1: the other half of the trail later that year, and
Speaker 1: those are called flip flop hikers. But you know, no
Speaker 1: matter how you do it, hiking the a T is
Speaker 1: this grueling challenge and it takes about five million footsteps
Speaker 1: if you had a predometer on to complete. Wow, I
Speaker 1: mean that is just so long, two thousand miles. I'm
Speaker 1: not sure if I've actually walked that long in my
Speaker 1: entire life, and I'm sure I have, but that is
Speaker 1: so long, and obviously it's why so few people make it.
Speaker 1: I was actually just looking at the stats from the
Speaker 1: a T Conservancy and it looks like about forty people
Speaker 1: have attempted the through Hike trail over the past twelve months.
Speaker 1: Yet of those more than four thousand people, only forty
Speaker 1: nine people actually completed it. And in fact, if you
Speaker 1: count from when the trail was created back in nineteen
Speaker 1: thirty seven all the way to today, only around nineteen
Speaker 1: thousand high completions have ever been recorded. You think about
Speaker 1: the number of people that have been out there over
Speaker 1: the years. So it's a pretty elite club to be
Speaker 1: part of, definitely, But I do want to talk a
Speaker 1: little bit about how the trail came to be in
Speaker 1: the first place. So you already mentioned the a T
Speaker 1: was officially completed in nineteen thirty seven, but the initial
Speaker 1: idea for the trail actually dates back to and that
Speaker 1: was the year this man named Benton McKay graduated from
Speaker 1: Harvard and he hiked into the green mountains of Vermont
Speaker 1: to celebrate. And as the story goes, McKay climbed to
Speaker 1: this tree atop of Strandon Mountain and he saw this
Speaker 1: gorgeous view there and it just gave him this idea
Speaker 1: for a dedicated trail following the Appalachian Mountains all the
Speaker 1: way from Maine to Georgia. And twenty one years later,
Speaker 1: McKay was an established lend use planner and that's when
Speaker 1: he finally took his first steps to making his dream
Speaker 1: of reality. He published this article in an architectural journal
Speaker 1: and it outlined his vision for a nature trail that
Speaker 1: anyone on the East Coast could escape to as needed,
Speaker 1: whereas he put it a place to walk, to see
Speaker 1: and to see what you see. So if McKay's plan
Speaker 1: was published in nineteen twenty one, but it didn't open
Speaker 1: for another sixteen years. Yes, so mackay was a great
Speaker 1: idea man, but he kind of lacked followed through, and
Speaker 1: thankfully there was this maritime lawyer. His name was Meyron Avery,
Speaker 1: and he heard about the project and he was really
Speaker 1: the one who pushed it along. So he started mapping
Speaker 1: the trail's route on his own. He took this rolling
Speaker 1: measuring wheel, uh, and he went mile after mile, just
Speaker 1: taking notes for future guidebooks. And he started the process.
Speaker 1: And then about ten years into the process, he started
Speaker 1: organizing these crews of volunteers to build a whole thing.
Speaker 1: So it took him a full decade to map out
Speaker 1: the trail. It actually took him sixteen years. He kept
Speaker 1: mapping even as construction had started, and he didn't finish
Speaker 1: the project until nineteen thirty six, which is one year
Speaker 1: before the final portion of the trail was cleared. The
Speaker 1: task was probably worth it though, in the long run,
Speaker 1: because technically it made Avery the first person to walk
Speaker 1: the entire a t at least as a segment hiker.
Speaker 1: So actually I was looking at the first through hiker
Speaker 1: in the world. Would have to wait until nineteen for
Speaker 1: that to happen. Do you think about the timing of this,
Speaker 1: You know, you had World War Two that it curtailed
Speaker 1: most people's interest in the trail for the better part
Speaker 1: of its first decade or so of existence. But then
Speaker 1: once the war was over and servicemen were which earning
Speaker 1: home the A T LRD, a new batch of challengers.
Speaker 1: Now among them was a guy named Earl Shaffer. He
Speaker 1: was a twenty nine year old World War Two veteran.
Speaker 1: He was from Yorkshire, Pennsylvania. He'd read about the trail
Speaker 1: in this Outdoor Living magazine, and Schaefer decided to through
Speaker 1: hike the A T because it was a way, as
Speaker 1: he said, to walk the army out of his system.
Speaker 1: So he set out from Georgia on April four, and
Speaker 1: he made it to the end of the trail in
Speaker 1: Maine just a hundred and twenty four days later. If
Speaker 1: you do the math on this, this means he averaged
Speaker 1: about sixteen and a half miles a day. That is
Speaker 1: so long. Now along the way, Schaefer kept a journal
Speaker 1: to document his thoughts and to really service proof that
Speaker 1: he had truly done what he claimed. And what's interesting
Speaker 1: is that he sort of unintentionally kicked off a new
Speaker 1: literary genre. Today, the Internet is full of these online
Speaker 1: hiking sites that catalog entries from people's Appealachian trail journals,
Speaker 1: and occasionally these accounts even make their way onto the
Speaker 1: store shelves as they do. You know, if you think
Speaker 1: about the most famous one, probably Bill Bryson's A Walk
Speaker 1: in the Woods. Yeah, I mean, that is cool that
Speaker 1: he kicked off this genre. But what's weird is that
Speaker 1: Schaeffer's legacy is even bigger than that. So he hiked
Speaker 1: the trail twice more in his lifetime. Uh. The second
Speaker 1: time was in nineteen sixty five, and then again he
Speaker 1: did it in at the age of seventy nine. And
Speaker 1: that second time Schaefer hike from Main to Georgia, which
Speaker 1: actually made him the first person to throw hike in
Speaker 1: both directions. That is amazing that he did this at
Speaker 1: seventy nine, and it should offer some encouragement to Tristan.
Speaker 1: He's in his seventies right right, so he can still
Speaker 1: he's got time. Well, I mean, even though Earl Shaffer
Speaker 1: passed away in two thousand two, you'll be happy to
Speaker 1: know that before his death he donated both the backpack
Speaker 1: and the boots that he wore on that nineteen forty
Speaker 1: eight hike to the Smith Zone. So you can go
Speaker 1: see and keep in mind that Schaeffer wore the same
Speaker 1: pair of boots for all two thousand miles of his trip.
Speaker 1: That you can't imagine how torn up these things were.
Speaker 1: And he'd often walk days without socks for some reason.
Speaker 1: And so rather than replaced the boots a few times
Speaker 1: along the way, you know, like most hikers do, Shaefer
Speaker 1: would simply patch them up himself, or he then resold
Speaker 1: in towns along his route. And you know, as you
Speaker 1: can imagine, these things were very much worse for the wear.
Speaker 1: In fact, one of the museum curators once confessed, quote,
Speaker 1: the boots are smelly, and those cabinets are opened as
Speaker 1: little as possible. Shaffer was the first man that through
Speaker 1: hike the eighteen But do you know much about the
Speaker 1: first woman to do this? I do, And this was
Speaker 1: a really interesting read. That was Emma Gatewood, or Grandma
Speaker 1: Gatewood as she later became known. Now her story is
Speaker 1: a pretty amazing one. She was the mother of eleven
Speaker 1: children and something like twenty three grandchildren, and after thirty
Speaker 1: years of being in an abusive marriage, she divorced her
Speaker 1: husband and started her life all over and was sometime
Speaker 1: in the nineteen fifties. She read this nat GEO article
Speaker 1: about the Appalachian Trail and how Earl Schaefer was the
Speaker 1: first man to throw hike it, and she told her daughter, quote,
Speaker 1: if those men can do it, I can do it.
Speaker 1: So then in nineteen fifty five she proved she was
Speaker 1: right by walking the entire trail. It only took her
Speaker 1: a hundred and forty six days. Now, this was impressive
Speaker 1: for all kinds of reasons. For one thing, Gatewood was
Speaker 1: sixty seven years old when she completed her hike, and
Speaker 1: she did the whole thing by herself, without any support.
Speaker 1: I mean, it's just unbelievable. In fact, she was kind
Speaker 1: of a pioneer of what we call ultra light hiking today.
Speaker 1: Gatewood wore a pair of ked sneakers the entire trip.
Speaker 1: She traveled without the usual staples like a sleeping bag,
Speaker 1: a tent, or even accomplished I mean, some of this
Speaker 1: just seems way too crazy to attempt it. She did
Speaker 1: carry an umbrella with her, which she used to chase
Speaker 1: off a black bear at one point, apparently, but that
Speaker 1: was pretty much the extent of her quote unquote luxuries
Speaker 1: as you might see them. In fact, Grandma Gatewood gave
Speaker 1: this great quote to Sports Illustrated. So I'll just read this.
Speaker 1: Here's what she said. I thought it would be a
Speaker 1: nice lark. It wasn't. There were terrible blowdowns, burnt over
Speaker 1: areas that were never remarked, gravel, sand, wash outs, weeds
Speaker 1: and brush to your neck, and most of the shelters
Speaker 1: were blown down, burned down, or so filthy. I chose
Speaker 1: the sleep out of doors. This is no trail. This
Speaker 1: is a nightmare. I mean, of course it's the night's
Speaker 1: using an umbrella. Yeah, I think she could have made
Speaker 1: it a little bit easier on herself, but we still
Speaker 1: would have been impressed. I know, it really is impressive.
Speaker 1: But you know, I did set you off there a
Speaker 1: little bit. I do want to point out that Emma
Speaker 1: Gatewood was not the first woman to throw hike the
Speaker 1: Appoliation Trail. You let me tell this whole story that way.
Speaker 1: She was the first person that threw hike it solo though. Okay, yeah,
Speaker 1: why why Everything I read said that Gatewood holds the title. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean, it's probably the biggest misconception about the trail's history.
Speaker 1: You know, even Grahama Gatewood thought she was the first
Speaker 1: woman to do this. But in reality, a woman named
Speaker 1: Mildred Norman beat her to it three years earlier, that
Speaker 1: her accomplishment largely went unnoticed. I mean, can you imagine
Speaker 1: what a bummer that was. I'm sure she didn't just
Speaker 1: do it for that recognition, but for Grandma Gatewood to
Speaker 1: get to the end and be like, yes, I'm the first,
Speaker 1: and then find out it's Mildred. But I'm curious, what
Speaker 1: why is this? I mean, it was huge news when
Speaker 1: Gatewood finished her hike, So why had Mildred Norman been
Speaker 1: overlooked for so long for doing the same thing first?
Speaker 1: I mean, it's hard to say for certain, but the
Speaker 1: likeliest explanation is it's because she didn't complete it alone.
Speaker 1: She actually traveled the whole way with a companion who
Speaker 1: was a male companion who is not her husband. Oh
Speaker 1: that last part is probably key. There is not her husband.
Speaker 1: I mean, that sounds a lot less scandalous than it
Speaker 1: probably was in the nineteen Is that it? I mean?
Speaker 1: Is that why her name isn't in more history books?
Speaker 1: I think so. I mean it's also amazing that, like,
Speaker 1: Mildred really didn't mind being slighted, uh so on our
Speaker 1: hike in two she had this life changing vision. She
Speaker 1: was sitting on a hill overlooking New England and she
Speaker 1: renamed herself Peace Pilgrim, and then she set out on
Speaker 1: this cross country activism walking to her It lasted the
Speaker 1: next twenty three years and took her over. Well, I'm
Speaker 1: glad she got something out of the experience. And you know,
Speaker 1: since we're on the subject of a t record holders,
Speaker 1: I do want to tell you a little bit about
Speaker 1: Joe McConaughey. So last year he broke the all time
Speaker 1: speed record for a through hike and you won't believe
Speaker 1: how fast he did it. So I definitely want to
Speaker 1: hear the details about this. But first let's take a
Speaker 1: quick break. You're listening to Part Time Genius and we're
Speaker 1: talking about what it's like to hike the Appalachian Trail,
Speaker 1: all right, Mago. So this isn't something I thought of before,
Speaker 1: but apparently there's this whole subcommunity of people who try
Speaker 1: to hike the entire a t as fast as they
Speaker 1: possibly can, you know, because leisurely hiking isn't challenging enough,
Speaker 1: I guess, And so the speed hiking practice caught on
Speaker 1: in the early nineties and ever since then it's been
Speaker 1: this constant tug of war of records, and I say
Speaker 1: records plural because they're actually separate records depending on whether
Speaker 1: you do as supported or a self supported run. So
Speaker 1: on a supported round, the hiker has a companion or
Speaker 1: a crew that kind of shadows them along the trail.
Speaker 1: They might provide water or food or fresh supply, is
Speaker 1: even moral support, which of course is incredibly helpful on
Speaker 1: such a long hike. And then on the flip side,
Speaker 1: a self supported run means the hiker takes care of
Speaker 1: all these things themselves, So every five days or so,
Speaker 1: the hiker would have to leave the trail and then
Speaker 1: head into a nearby town to restock on food supplies.
Speaker 1: I mean, that might sound like a burden, but those
Speaker 1: self support runs are really the kind that most regular
Speaker 1: hikers make, since you know, there's only so much weight
Speaker 1: you can carry in a backpack. And thankfully, restocking actually
Speaker 1: isn't that difficult, because the a t intersects with the
Speaker 1: road every four miles on average, which is way more
Speaker 1: than I'd expected that. I wouldn't have guessed that the
Speaker 1: trail brought you into civilization that often, but it obviously
Speaker 1: always hasn't been that way. Yeah, and it's kind of surprising.
Speaker 1: But even with stores and towns just a few miles
Speaker 1: off the trail, that's still more time than some speed
Speaker 1: hikers want to spend. But the record holder I want
Speaker 1: to talk about today is a self supported hiker. His name,
Speaker 1: as I mentioned, is Joe McConaughey, and when he broke
Speaker 1: the through Hike speed record last August, he was just
Speaker 1: twenty six years old. But get this, he averaged forty
Speaker 1: eight miles per day for most of his room and finished.
Speaker 1: When he finished this thing, it was with a stunning
Speaker 1: one and ten point eight mile push over the course
Speaker 1: of the last thirty seven sleepless hours. I mean this,
Speaker 1: that sounds like a real nightmare to me. The guy
Speaker 1: is just the machine and it was that final push
Speaker 1: that helped him just destroy the previous record by a
Speaker 1: full nine days. In fact, he even beat the current
Speaker 1: supported record by ten hours. And in the end, McConney
Speaker 1: he hiked the entire Appalachian Trail in the fastest time
Speaker 1: ever reported forty five days, twelve hours, and fifteen minutes. Wait,
Speaker 1: so he basically hiked the whole Appelaian Trail in like
Speaker 1: a month and a half. I can't even imagine that.
Speaker 1: It's unbelievable. I mean, after setting up camp for the
Speaker 1: night mcconnae, he says, he ate like nine'mores, and then
Speaker 1: the next morning he and his girlfriend drove straight to
Speaker 1: a diner where he ordered the Hungry Person special and
Speaker 1: he ate half of his girlfriend's breakfast for good measure.
Speaker 1: I mean, I just can't even imagine what this guy
Speaker 1: felt like at the end of this thing. I know,
Speaker 1: being up for thirty seven hours, you know, is it
Speaker 1: self difficult for some people, and to be running the
Speaker 1: whole time just seems insane and over mountains. Yeah. Well,
Speaker 1: Gay pointed me to this interview and Runners World where
Speaker 1: he talked about some of the struggles he faced along
Speaker 1: the way, and so I thought I'd just read a
Speaker 1: quick excerpt from it. It was a constant battle, he says,
Speaker 1: describing sprained ankles, extreme chafing, wasps things, painful blisters, a
Speaker 1: sore on his lower back, swollen quads, and a case
Speaker 1: of ramdom eliasis, which is when muscle tissue breaks down
Speaker 1: and releases damaging protein into the blood and it can
Speaker 1: be very dangerous. Actually, easy days on the a t
Speaker 1: were few and far between, but there is one thing
Speaker 1: that made those rough days a little bit more bearable
Speaker 1: for Joe. And that's something that hikers referred to as
Speaker 1: trail magic. Have you ever heard of trail magic. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I've read a little bit about it. It's like those
Speaker 1: small acts of kindness from strangers, right, Like you'll be
Speaker 1: hiking along suddenly you'll find like a cooler full of
Speaker 1: sodas that someone's left as a pick me up for
Speaker 1: an hikers you're going by. Yeah, that's right. And you
Speaker 1: know people who produced this trail magic. They're known as
Speaker 1: trail angels. So I've got to say this bothers me
Speaker 1: a little because I feel like trail magic should be
Speaker 1: produced by trail magicians. But I guess we'll go with
Speaker 1: us that way. That's the trail angels. I don't know.
Speaker 1: That feels pretty sweet, but whatever you want to call them.
Speaker 1: These are mostly local residents who live near the trail
Speaker 1: and kind of take it upon themselves to lift the
Speaker 1: hikers spirits with these small and unexpected forms of aid.
Speaker 1: So you know, for instance, Joe mcconneughe he met a
Speaker 1: trail angel and Vermont who cooked him a delicious omelet
Speaker 1: one morning. So I guess you could call this person
Speaker 1: an omelet angel. But you know, a day hiker once
Speaker 1: gave him some extra batteries so Joe could power his
Speaker 1: head lamp and keep running through the night. So it
Speaker 1: could really be anything I ride into town or back
Speaker 1: to the trail, a hot shower, a night on a couch,
Speaker 1: some spare food, band aids, whatever it might be. Trail
Speaker 1: magic definitely comes in many forms, but all of these
Speaker 1: are very much appreciated by these hikers. Yeah, so I
Speaker 1: was reading about this one legendary trail angel. His name's
Speaker 1: him Tabor, and he lives near a section of the
Speaker 1: trail in rural Pennsylvania, and for the past few years
Speaker 1: he's been placing hundreds of these hand carved wooden spoons
Speaker 1: all along the route. And the spoon's obviously come in
Speaker 1: handy for any hiker who needs one, but maybe more importantly,
Speaker 1: they provide this little emotional boost because the word of
Speaker 1: the spoons have spread all to the hiking community. And
Speaker 1: there's this legend now that if you're lucky enough to
Speaker 1: find one of Jim spoons, then you're supposedly like guaranteed
Speaker 1: to finish your through hike. I mean, these are the
Speaker 1: kinds of stories that I love about the Appalachian Trail.
Speaker 1: It's so cool, and that he found this one way
Speaker 1: that he could contribute is pretty neat. It's that sense
Speaker 1: of community and there's all the shared lore and in
Speaker 1: jokes that most people outside the bubble have no idea about. Yeah,
Speaker 1: so I I know what you mean, but I heard
Speaker 1: one through hiker described the a D community as kind
Speaker 1: of a mobile small town and one that steadily moves
Speaker 1: north as the weeks go by. And one thing that
Speaker 1: helps promote that sense of connectedness is the use of
Speaker 1: trail names. And we haven't really talked about this yet,
Speaker 1: but the majority of those two thousand miles shed their
Speaker 1: identity while they're on the trail and they take on
Speaker 1: a new one in the form of a trail name.
Speaker 1: And this can be helpful in a few different ways. So,
Speaker 1: for one thing, it helps strengthen the feeling that you've
Speaker 1: really stepped away from the modern world and are engaged
Speaker 1: in something totally different from your normal day to day life.
Speaker 1: I mean, you literally aren't the same person on the
Speaker 1: trail as you are at home. But another way trail
Speaker 1: names are helpful is that they help you keep track
Speaker 1: of your fellow hikers like you might run to ten
Speaker 1: days or fifteen Emily's on the trail and they all
Speaker 1: start to blur together. But you'll probably only meet one
Speaker 1: brother Buzz or snot Rag in your lifetime, So connecting
Speaker 1: that face with the name, it just ends up being
Speaker 1: a whole lot easier. Man, somebody already took snot Are
Speaker 1: those made up names? No, they're actually real names. But
Speaker 1: I don't know the stories behind those. But I did
Speaker 1: come across this one hikers account of trail names and
Speaker 1: how important they are to the community, and she gave
Speaker 1: this great example of her name's Hannah Stores. She wrote
Speaker 1: about it on this website called the Truck, and I'm
Speaker 1: going to read from her story quote. The stories that
Speaker 1: build up around names can be really great and travel
Speaker 1: up and down the trail faster than the person can walk.
Speaker 1: For instance, we heard about bear Spray probably a week
Speaker 1: before we met him. We got his name from when
Speaker 1: he was staying at the top of the Georgia Hostel
Speaker 1: and was trying to get something from inside his bag.
Speaker 1: He had a bottle of bear spray, and something caught
Speaker 1: on the safety and released it. He accidentally sprayed bear
Speaker 1: spray all over the top floor of the hospital. They
Speaker 1: had to close the whole floor and he had to
Speaker 1: be washed up and aided. When everyone else at the
Speaker 1: hostel heard what happened, they dubbed him Bear Spray. Instantly,
Speaker 1: the story in the name circulated pretty quickly, and because
Speaker 1: it was so good, when Sean and I finally met him,
Speaker 1: it was like meeting an old friend. We were already
Speaker 1: fond of him, and it was a great conversation starter.
Speaker 1: That's pretty cool, And you know, it reminds me these
Speaker 1: accounts you read from ancient times or even like the
Speaker 1: Middle Ages, where travelers on a road would introduce themselves
Speaker 1: with this whole spiel about their family and lineage and
Speaker 1: their life story, and more often than not, a perfect
Speaker 1: stranger would recognize who the person was just because they
Speaker 1: had heard some story of that family exactly. And this
Speaker 1: practice of using trail names actually goes way back, like
Speaker 1: that guy Earl Schaeffer, the first person that threw Hike
Speaker 1: the a t. He called himself the crazy one because
Speaker 1: no one thought he'd actually be able to make the
Speaker 1: whole trail. And then there's Mildren Norman who became Peace
Speaker 1: program h and the Gatewood was Grahama Gatewood. So the
Speaker 1: names have actually been there from the start, but they
Speaker 1: didn't catch on until the eighties. And so, according to
Speaker 1: the conservancy's records, less than ten percent of hikers reported
Speaker 1: using a trail name in three but by seven more
Speaker 1: than fifty of the hikers were using them, and by
Speaker 1: percent of all segment hikers had adopted the tradition to
Speaker 1: While we're on that subject of life on the trail,
Speaker 1: I want to talk about something that every a t
Speaker 1: hiker comes to rely on, and that's the white blaze
Speaker 1: system that's used to guide hikers along the full length
Speaker 1: of the trail. So, as you might imagine, the woods
Speaker 1: and the mountains start to look the same after a
Speaker 1: few hundred miles, and so it could be all too
Speaker 1: easy to wander off the course on to one of
Speaker 1: these many unconnected trails, because there are obviously a ton
Speaker 1: of them, and they run adjacent to the Appalachian Trail.
Speaker 1: And so to prevent this, there's this army of trail
Speaker 1: maintenance volunteers that have marked the way with approximately a
Speaker 1: hundred and sixty five thousand white blazes. Now these are
Speaker 1: these two inch by six inch vertical rectangles. They're painted
Speaker 1: on white rocks, trees, and signposts all along the Appalachian Trail.
Speaker 1: I mean, can you imagine how much upkeep that takes. Like,
Speaker 1: I'm guessing the blazes must get worn away over time
Speaker 1: and you probably need someone to repeat them constantly. Right.
Speaker 1: It's a staggering amount of work when you read about this,
Speaker 1: especially when you consider that the white blazes aren't the
Speaker 1: only ones that are out there. They're also blue blazes,
Speaker 1: which are used to mark many of the trails that
Speaker 1: branch off from the Appalachian Trail but aren't technically part
Speaker 1: of it. So if you follow a blue blaze trail,
Speaker 1: it will likely take you too, maybe like a beautiful
Speaker 1: view or a water source or a campground, or you know,
Speaker 1: something else that's just off the beaten path but maybe
Speaker 1: worth a look to mostly as really hikers. But the
Speaker 1: only catch is that most of these blue blaze trails
Speaker 1: are dead ends, so you do have to double back
Speaker 1: once you reach the end of one. I do love
Speaker 1: the idea of that that there are these surprises just
Speaker 1: waiting for you at the end of these blue blazes.
Speaker 1: It's really kind of magical. You know. Gabe was telling
Speaker 1: me about this too, and uh, he almost likened it
Speaker 1: to a video game, where you know, it's almost like
Speaker 1: a side quest where it's not your main goal, but
Speaker 1: they're fun and rewarding if you have the time for it. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean that analogy for hiking the Appalachian Trail being
Speaker 1: like a video game. I mean, it kind of feels
Speaker 1: far removed from the experience, but you could think of
Speaker 1: it like that. And actually, aside from the physical white
Speaker 1: and blue markers, there are also all of these more
Speaker 1: conceptual kinds. For example, yellow blazing is slang for walking,
Speaker 1: hitch hiking, or driving the highways that run alongside the
Speaker 1: a T. I mean, the idea is that the yellow
Speaker 1: blazes are they're kind of like the yellow dashes that
Speaker 1: run down the center of the highway. So, I mean,
Speaker 1: I think that's kind of funny, but I'm guessing it's
Speaker 1: a little derogatory, right, Like hiker is probably frowned upon
Speaker 1: those yellow blazers a little bit. Yeah, I mean, the
Speaker 1: yellow blazing is pretty much a short on, so hiking
Speaker 1: purists kind of turned their noses up at it. And
Speaker 1: the same goes for aqua blazing. I'm sure you can
Speaker 1: guess what this one is. But this is when you're
Speaker 1: using maybe kayaks or rafts or boats or something to
Speaker 1: skip a part of the trail rather than cars. I
Speaker 1: so I love that there's this like whole rainbow of
Speaker 1: conceptual blazes, Like are there any others? Yeah, I'm not
Speaker 1: done yet. There's there's You're probably gonna guess what this
Speaker 1: one is. But there's brown blazing, which refers to a
Speaker 1: hiker going off the trail to relieve themselves. It's, you know,
Speaker 1: often used to refer to a hiker who's dealing with
Speaker 1: some stomach issues. I guess. There's also pink blazing, which
Speaker 1: is used to describe hikers who have hooked up on
Speaker 1: the trail and started traveling. That's it's it's real love.
Speaker 1: And then there's green blazing, which is when a hiker
Speaker 1: spokes pot on the trail. And lastly, there is gold
Speaker 1: or platinum blazing, which is in reference to those big
Speaker 1: spending hikers who have all the fanciest gear and tend
Speaker 1: to live it up whenever they're headed into town. Well,
Speaker 1: now that we've color coded the trail for everyone, would
Speaker 1: you say we take a look at the state of
Speaker 1: the a T today. But first we should take a
Speaker 1: quick break. Welcome back to Part time Genius where we're
Speaker 1: talking about the Appalachian Trail so well, one of the
Speaker 1: ways the a T has changed over the years is
Speaker 1: that it's a lot more crowded than it used to be.
Speaker 1: And public awareness of the trail has grown over the years,
Speaker 1: and that's largely thanks to some books. Um. The first
Speaker 1: was edgarves one hit. It was called Appalachian Hiker Adventure
Speaker 1: of a Lifetime. The book boosted public awareness of the
Speaker 1: eighties so much that nearly eight hundred people went on
Speaker 1: to complete the trail in the nineteen seventies. And just
Speaker 1: to give you an idea of just how big a
Speaker 1: boost that was, in the thirty three years between and
Speaker 1: nine sixty nine, only fifty nine completions had been logged
Speaker 1: in total. Wow, that is a huge increase, and I
Speaker 1: would have to imagine that would be a similar, if
Speaker 1: not a bigger rise. When Bill Brison released A Walk
Speaker 1: in the Woods. We talked about that earlier, but that
Speaker 1: was in the I guess the eight nineties, right, yeah,
Speaker 1: And and then again in two thousand fifteen when the
Speaker 1: movie came out. It's actually called the Bryson Bump in
Speaker 1: his honor, you know, the increase in hikers has also
Speaker 1: led to some negative environmental impact on the trail. There's
Speaker 1: this species of butterfly called the catatan butterfly, and they
Speaker 1: used to be all over the trail's terminus in Maine,
Speaker 1: but now the butterfly is considered endangered, and that's because
Speaker 1: so many people have sort of trampled through the meadows
Speaker 1: where the butterflies once thrived. Yeah, and I've also read
Speaker 1: about how the influx of visitors has kind of lowered
Speaker 1: the bar in terms of trail etiquette. Like, you know,
Speaker 1: you read these reports of hikers not picking up after themselves,
Speaker 1: even doing reckless stuff like chucking dead batteries into their campfires,
Speaker 1: and it's just it's so irritating when you hear that
Speaker 1: people do this. I don't know why people would do this.
Speaker 1: And then even some of the less serious hiking groups
Speaker 1: that kind of devolve into these roving frat parties where
Speaker 1: everybody does way more drinking than they do hiking. And
Speaker 1: you want people to have a good time, but at
Speaker 1: the same time, this kind of stuff tends to damp
Speaker 1: in that experience for those who are actually trying to
Speaker 1: hike the entire trail. I mean that's definitely true. But
Speaker 1: there is a bright side to sort of this uptake
Speaker 1: and exposure for the a T. And what would you
Speaker 1: say that is so the demographics of who hikes the
Speaker 1: trail are actually beginning to broaden. So in the trails
Speaker 1: first few decades, female hikers only accounted for about fifteen
Speaker 1: percent of hikers who completed the a T. But in
Speaker 1: recent years that's actually doubled to nearly And while the
Speaker 1: vast majority of two thousand miles continue to be white,
Speaker 1: the number of people of color who hike the trailer
Speaker 1: is also on the rise. Um you might have seen this,
Speaker 1: but there's a story of this woman, Rahawa Hale, and
Speaker 1: in two thousand sixteen, she became one of the first
Speaker 1: few black women to ever through hike the a T.
Speaker 1: And one of the reasons she wanted to do it
Speaker 1: was just to inspire more people of color to head
Speaker 1: for the trail. And apparently it was really a struggle
Speaker 1: for her to even find resources for black hikers, Like
Speaker 1: she said that when she googled black hikers, the first
Speaker 1: thing that pops up is a listing for a pair
Speaker 1: of black timberland boots. But you know, by documenting her
Speaker 1: journey for others to read about how it really hopes
Speaker 1: to change all of the legacy. Well, on that more
Speaker 1: optimistic note, why don't we do today's fact off a
Speaker 1: little bit differently and let's just reel off some tips
Speaker 1: for any listeners who might be thinking of tackling the
Speaker 1: a T themselves. What do you think I'm downe with that?
Speaker 1: M all right? Well, the first piece of advice I
Speaker 1: want to give is to know which way you plan
Speaker 1: to go. How smart is that advice? And that might
Speaker 1: seem pretty obvious, but choosing whether to hike southbound or
Speaker 1: as people refer to it as SOBO or northbound NOBO,
Speaker 1: is actually really important decision because it also dictates what
Speaker 1: time of year you should plan to head out. So
Speaker 1: think about this for a second. Like, if you want
Speaker 1: to start in Georgia, then you should plan to head
Speaker 1: out in the late winter or early spring, and that
Speaker 1: will help you avoid the heavy snows and those super
Speaker 1: cold temperatures that dominate the North at that time of year. Now,
Speaker 1: on the other hand, if you plan to strike out
Speaker 1: during the summer, you probably want to start up in
Speaker 1: Maine in order to dodge some of that southern heat
Speaker 1: that we experience here. It's ridiculous that I hadn't even
Speaker 1: considered that. Um, I am curious though, like do most
Speaker 1: hikers tend to hike in one direction over the other
Speaker 1: or is it kind of evenly split? You know, It's
Speaker 1: funny because I had never thought about this before, probably
Speaker 1: because of the region I've lived in all my life.
Speaker 1: But I always just in my mind assumed the only
Speaker 1: way you could possibly hike this was from south to north.
Speaker 1: And it's true, like, there are definitely way more north
Speaker 1: bounders than there are south bounders. I think, so south
Speaker 1: bounders make up just ten percent of all the completed
Speaker 1: through hikes on record, and compare that to sixty five
Speaker 1: for north bounders. And then the others are segment hikers
Speaker 1: and those flip floppers. Of course, I just like saying
Speaker 1: flip floppers. So no matter which way you plan to go,
Speaker 1: prospective hikers should know that there are a lot of
Speaker 1: changes in elevation along the way. So this also sounds obvious,
Speaker 1: but because the trail more or less follows the spine
Speaker 1: of the Appalachian Mountains, you end up going up and
Speaker 1: down a whole lot. In fact, there's roughly five fifteen
Speaker 1: thousand feet of climbing spread across the mile trip, and
Speaker 1: that's actually the equivalent of climbing to the summit of
Speaker 1: Mount Everest over seventeen times. WHOA I would be using
Speaker 1: that fact so much if I were to hike this,
Speaker 1: I do have to ask before I get to my
Speaker 1: next fact, do you think you'll ever hike the entire
Speaker 1: Appellation Trail even as a segment hiker? No, I don't
Speaker 1: even know why I asked that. There's no chance either
Speaker 1: one of us are ever going to do this, but
Speaker 1: it's fun to hike parts of it. Well, there's another
Speaker 1: word of warning for would be hikers, and that's be
Speaker 1: where the Virginia blues, because more than a quarter of
Speaker 1: the trail's length is in Virginia alone. And this is
Speaker 1: really hard to wrap my hiker. More than a quarter
Speaker 1: of the trail is in the state of Virginia, which
Speaker 1: doesn't seem like that big of a trail, but some
Speaker 1: five dred and forty four miles of it are in
Speaker 1: the state of Virginia. So hikers crossed into Virginia and
Speaker 1: then it's a good long while before they'll see the
Speaker 1: state line of West Virginia. And I can make it
Speaker 1: feel like hikers aren't progressing, and a good many of
Speaker 1: them get so bored or frustrated that that stretch has
Speaker 1: become a notorious burnout zone. So for the hikers who
Speaker 1: do manage to stay the course and make it to
Speaker 1: West Virginia, a T has the headquarters located in Harper's Ferry,
Speaker 1: and any hikers who stopped by their can get all
Speaker 1: they can drink, cold water, internet access, and a chance
Speaker 1: to pamper their tired feet with these electric massagers. Hikers
Speaker 1: also get their picture taken and gets added to the wall,
Speaker 1: you know, for all those people who are tough enough
Speaker 1: to make it to the not quite halfway point. Yeah, alright,
Speaker 1: so this isn't exactly surprising advice, but you should probably
Speaker 1: wear shoes when you're on your hike. I'm giving some
Speaker 1: kind of no brainer advice today. But I say that
Speaker 1: because have you heard of the barefoot Sisters. I haven't. Apparently,
Speaker 1: these two sisters from Maine traveled both ways on the
Speaker 1: a T and for about two thirds of their hike
Speaker 1: they weren't wearing shoot can bananas. But anyway, this is
Speaker 1: how they put it. We have decided to try hiking
Speaker 1: barefoot because it was the way we had always walked
Speaker 1: since we were kids, and in the mountains near our
Speaker 1: home or on the coast of Maine. We love the
Speaker 1: connection to the ground that barefoot hiking gave us. Every
Speaker 1: surface felt different underfoot, granite, shale, high needles, thick mud.
Speaker 1: It felt good, which does have a certain romance to it.
Speaker 1: But it also sounds like they grew up feral. It
Speaker 1: totally sounds like they grew up fairl None of those
Speaker 1: surfaces sound like things I want to walk on. This
Speaker 1: is all the more. I mean, maybe the mud that
Speaker 1: might feel kind of nice and squishy after a long walk,
Speaker 1: but still so. I know you alluded to this in
Speaker 1: the intro, but I'm going to steal your thundering because
Speaker 1: I'm just fascinated by this fact. But did you know
Speaker 1: that June one is National Hike Naked Day. I mean,
Speaker 1: not to be a wet blanket on this, but isn't
Speaker 1: this even legal? So yes, and no nudity within national
Speaker 1: parks actually is legal so long as you're not doing
Speaker 1: anything sexual. But forest and park rangers tend to discourage
Speaker 1: naked hiking in general because the risk of sunburn is
Speaker 1: so much greater with I mean some burn and other
Speaker 1: kinds of But if you ever wanted to hike the
Speaker 1: A T and the Buff for some reason, than June
Speaker 1: one is your day to hit the trail, and that
Speaker 1: would be my day to not be hiking on the
Speaker 1: Appalachian Trail. That is excellent advice, as you usual, Mango.
Speaker 1: I mean, this is truly the kind of content that
Speaker 1: I think our listeners tune in for, which is why
Speaker 1: I'm going to hand you today's trump. Well, thank you
Speaker 1: so much, well, and thanks so much for tuning in. Hey,
Speaker 1: if there are any listeners out there who have hiked
Speaker 1: a T we'd love to hear your stories. You can
Speaker 1: always send them into Part Time Genius at how stuff
Speaker 1: Works dot com. And if you have time and want
Speaker 1: to write a review for the show, please do reviews
Speaker 1: help get the word out about our little show. From Gabe, Will,
Speaker 1: Tristan and the rest of the gang here, thanks so
Speaker 1: much for listening. Thanks again for listening. Part Time Genius
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Speaker 1: for us. Do we do? We forget Jason? Jason who