The Coloful World of the AT Hiker

It's such an interesting collection of people on the trail; there have been tales told to me of some of the more colorful characters that I have not yet shared.

There is the story of the homeless man who began his journey in Georgia and hiked to Harper's Ferry, West Virginia with $10. He had a kid's backpack and a life jacket and relied on the generosity of other hikers for his needs. He spoke of a portal in Maine that he had to go through. He weighed 130 pounds but had to loose 15 or 20 pounds in order to fit through the portal. Upon arriving in Harper's Ferry, he than turned around and headed south for there was also a portal in Georgia that he had to find. His soul was connected to a tree in California and his soul was immortal as long as the tree was alive. There was also something about soul swords and a dragon but I am a little fuzzy on the rest of the story. The story sounded much like the world my children inhabited when they were young.

There was the hiker who set out on the trail with a backpack, a duffle bag and a suitcase. He couldn't carry everything at once, so he was hiking laps. He would do half mile stretches at a time carrying a partial load. He would then put that load down, hike back to his other belongings and bring them ahead. So for every half a mile of ground, he traveled a mile and a half. That would make for a very long trail.

There was the young still green hiker who, at his first hostel, noticed a box with food in it labeled "hiker box". Thinking this was where you were supposed to store your food while at the hostel, he emptied his food supply from his backpack to the hiker box only to be very surprised to find it had all disappeared the following morning.

There was also the hiker who was hiking his hike carrying a tuba. Nobody knows if he successfully finished.

There is a cute story of how a south bounder, Sugar Red got his name. He was hiking the trail with his brother and Dad and off the trail in a donut shop, he pointed to the sugared donuts and asked the counter person for 3 suga reds; a shoe-in for a trail name.

Jonathan is still without one. Sweet Pea has been suggested but I don't know why. Madeline has had two names come to her in dreams for Jonathan - The Lorax and Toto. He has not wanted to carry on with any of those either. Madeline and I feel like for Jonathan to take a name, it will have to sit perfectly with him. He will not settle for just any name.

Fancy Pants (is anything but) and is with this group of hikers on this last stretch to Katahdin. He is hiking on a super low budget. He has made it from Georgia with a Jansport school backpack. He relies heavily on whatever he can find in hiker boxes for food with very limited purchases from the grocery store. The only staples he purchases and carries are flour, sugar, oil and peanuts. I can't help but wonder what he prepares.

Lastly, here is a partial top ten list from a hiker named Wolf Pack on re-entry into civilization after Katahdin:

1. remembering not to introduce myself as Wolf Pack
2. table manners
3. portion control
4. driving instead of hitch hiking
5. not having a guide book to tell me what's next in life

I'd love to know the other five; there's a lot of wisdom there.

Tomorrow should be the climb up Katahdin. More on that later. ~ Amy