“Falling Leaves”

AT Day 136

Miles Today: 30.01

AT Mile: 2183.5

(Abol Pines Campground [tent])

Soon it will be fall again. Leaves are already beginning to fall from the trees. The seasons are starting to change.

It seems early for the process of molting (I know that isn’t the right word for it, but I don’t have internet access and can’t find the name for what it’s called when deciduous leaves turn yellow and shed to the ground). It seems early, but there’s no denying that it’s happening anymore. I did deny it for a bit there, when I saw the first few leaves scattered on the ground. My rationalization was that it must be leaves left over from last fall; there was no way this could be from this season’s growth. I’ve seen it a lot more in the last week though. And the leaves aren’t left over from last season like they were in Georgia at the beginning of the trail.

Soon it will be fall again.

Then it will be winter again.

In some far off future that somehow also feels like it won’t be long at all, there will be a new batch of thru hikers starting in Georgia next spring.

One thing that a long trail teaches is that seasons pass, though sometimes slowly, they pass like everything else. Nothing ever lasts.

—

I woke up early this morning, but snoozed my alarm until 5:30 because I was enjoying the comfort of sleep so thoroughly. It was one of the nights where I was sleeping so well that it felt a waste to end it and get back to trail early.

Worth noting, if I haven’t already said something about this–I’ve been without the melatonin now for about a month, and my dreams have been far more subdued than they had been before.

I needed to get to trail though. Sleeping in wasn’t an option if I was going to get to where I needed to get to tonight. So I rolled out of bed, made coffee, walked down to the lake shore to drink it, and then got back to trail just a little after six.

The elevation profile was relitively tame today, but the trail itself was often extremely rooted and rocky, making it impossible to gain stable footing sometimes, and thereby impossible to maintain momentum in the hike. With all the roots and the bit of climbing, the day turned out to be quite exhaustive. I found myself completely drenched through in all my clothes once again. Let it be known, I have *never* grown used to or comfortable with being drenched in sweat as I’ve been on this trail. I still f*cking hate it as much as ever. It’s terrible in all the ways that things can be terrible to be soaked through and be climbing up a mountain with a thousand feet and a mile to go. It sucks. And it’s continued for almost all of the AT since Virginia.

I want to say clearly and sternly, that I’ll be forever grateful for the experience that I’ve gained by hiking the AT. But I don’t want for that to be confused with my having any good feelings for the trail. At my heart, I’ve mostly hated this trail from start to finish. There have been good things within the experience of the hike, but the AT itself is a terrible trail. I know that there are readers who don’t want to hear that, and there was a part of me that wanted to fall in love with the hiking out here, but it just hasn’t happened. This trail f*cking sucks, and I can’t shake myself of that feeling. I actually feel uncomfortable with how I react when I learn that someone likes this trail or that they want to hike the AT. I can’t help but think less of them. That they’re either ill informed, unintelligent for not hiking somewhere more enjoyable, or just out to prove to someone that they can withstand a tremendous volume of suffering and torment with extremely little reward.

And so what does that make me, as someone who’s walked it? Well… mostly a jackass honestly. I had a suspicion that I’d finish this trail and have the same animosity for the AT that I had always held before coming out here–the same biases and the same discontent, only difference being that I’d have personal experience in how much it sucked rather than just speaking from second hand information. I didn’t want for that to happen. I wanted for the end of the trail to feel like ending a relationship with a close friend as we are forced to move away. I wanted to have longing for the trail that would make me want to stay. But no no no no no. I’m f*cking done with this trail. Sorry for all the profanity, but I guess it’s coming out tonight. Edit it out in the printed draft, I suppose.

—

With the changing of seasons, my relationship to the trail and the hike are changing too. At the beginning of a thru hike I always say that you can’t think about the ending, lest you’ll never make it. You’ll be driven mad if you let yourself think about the ending and how far you are to go still in the early miles. So you get through by not thinking about it and just taking things day by day. But I can’t “not think about it” anymore. It’s here now. This is the end of the trail. I am literally 17 miles away from the end. Barely more than half what I hiked today alone.

As I’ve allowed myself to think about the end, it’s made the miles feel longer. I still get that feeling that the ending is retreating off into the distance; like I’m chasing it but it keeps getting farther away. But it’s so close now that maybe only tonight do I feel like I’m about to catch up. I am about to catch up. I will catch up in two days from today.

—

Hiked 30 miles today.

Tomorrow I’ll hike around 12.

The following day I’ll hike around 5 to reach the summit.

From there I’ll hike about 10 miles down to meet Boots who is already driving up from Tennissee as I write this tonight.

—

I caught up with a hiker I met in Virginia today. His name is Boardwalk, and we had similar experiences with meeting girlfriends at Trail Days way back when. He asked me tonight, “What ever came with that girl you met who lives in Tennessee?” And I told him that I’ll be seeing her in two days.

It’s amazing how some of the stories have played out.

—

I need to be up early tomorrow to hike 1 mile from where I’m camped tonight. That’s the ranger station where they give out permits for Katahdin and The Birches campsites. I’m trying to camp at Birches tomorrow, making it a very short day, then summit the following day. But the process is first come first serve. So although the ranger office doesn’t open until 7:30, I want to arrive at 6:30 to get my place in line. I’ll sip coffee while I wait.

Then I’ll hike back to the camp store, which is basically where I’m camped tonight, to get breakfast and a few more supplies for my last day and half of the AT.

Details that are probably boring to you, but are much of what I’ve been thinking about much of today.

—

Here’s a wild ending: As I got to camp tonight I met another hiker whom I’ve met two other times on trail (I’ll withhold his name for privacy). Anyways, he ends up telling me that two days ago he was on 150 mics of LSD, and I’m like, “Are you fucking kidding me?! That was the same day that I was on 150 mics of LSD!”

Strange the ways the stories play out sometimes.

—

It’s growing late and I’m growing tired. Excited to rummage that store for breakfast junk food tomorrow. It’ll be some of the last junk food I get to indulge before finishing the trail and cleaning my diet up again.

—

Will hopefully have time to write more extensively tomorrow after I get to camp.

Wormwood.