HYOH - "Hike Your Own Hike"

Supposedly there is a saying on the Appalachian Trail: "Hike your own hike," which encourages each person to hike the way that they want to, giving whatever they have for their own hike to complete their goal. I did not see this a lot on the AT, but I am slowly learning to take the sentiment to heart. I was given a backwards compliment one day when a thru-hiker (someone who is hiking the entire trail from Georgia to Maine) asked how far I had covered that day. I told him I started late and just hiked eight miles. He said, "That's why you look so put together," basically stating that I didn't do much. This was my first example that I was not on the same wavelength as other more "seasoned" hikers who had been there for more than three months.

The last week of my hiking experience confirmed that I would love to continue hiking the entire Appalachian Trail one day. However, I did see more “dangerous” wildlife than I would like to in the span of a couple days. I laid eyes on a black rattlesnake, as well as a baby bear cub and a small, mama black bear. Both of these encounters startled me, but it was fun to add another experience to my hiking moments.

There was a LOT of hiking uphill during my last week, as well as flat spots with rocks and beautiful river/creek areas. I have learned even when I am completely worn out, I can enjoy the beauty to be found in nature. I took several closeup pictures that I hope to use of bubbling streams, rocks, and also beautiful butterflies and insects as they obliviously went about their daily routines. Rain is something that I didn't look forward to (because it meant that I usually had to walk in it), but it led to the gorgeous scenery that I experienced every day, so it once again taught me to enjoy both the positive and negative parts of my experience.

I hung my first *official* bear hang; that was something that came in handy as I continued on the trail. It made me feel accomplished to learn something new and to be able to complete it successfully. At the same time, I hitchhiked a couple times, not as intimidating on the AT as it is in other parts of the States. According to locals and other hikers, seeing people walking on the side of the road with packs and poles is not unusual, and the people who picked me up explained that a hiker requesting a ride is a daily occurrence. I had several interesting conversations about travel, books, and work experiences, as well as a long conversation with my Uber driver when I caught a ride back to my grandparent's house from a tiny, remote town (one that didn’t have Uber).

One of my favorite experiences was finding a family-run pizza place called Scotto's near my last shelter in Glasgow. They have Italian and American food, so while I'm sure their burgers are delicious, I settled on the calzone, which was amazing! The food I craved the entire time on the trail was pizza! There were a couple times that I would pack up leftovers and have pizza for another meal (I got less picky as the days went on for how my food was cooked--or in this case, NOT cooked).

One of the things that I noticed among the hikers were the habits that each person picked up. This could be as simple as getting up early when they were not used to it, or starting to smoke again after having broken the habit. One camper explained that it was easy to fall into the habits of the people who were around them; that sometimes it was better to have a small community than to be in this alone. I understand. I enjoyed the solitary hiking throughout the day, no matter how hard the trail, but always looked forward to meeting new people each evening in the shelters. We would sit and compare gear or explain where we were from and what weird things we saw that day. Those who were NoBos, or northbound, gave me advice on what I might experience on the trail ahead of me (I was a SoBo section hiker, so headed in the opposite direction). I picked up on best tips to use whenever hiking many, many hours a day, like we all were.

It was a hard three weeks on my body, but I enjoyed it. There was so much to see in nature and there was always something new to anticipate on the path ahead of me. Some days were harder than others, but it was worth the pain to experience the beauty of the next "green tunnel" section. I will be writing one more section on my experiences, focusing on the things that I have learned from my summer adventure and what I hope to do differently. Until next time…