[at-l] Merlin unlurks (and Justus Creek)

[ept@bellsouth.net (Merlin)]

Merlin unlurks, at least for the moment.

I have been watching this list for a while.  I have not had time to read
anywhere near all the messages, though.  I never have been attracted to
large group events, but I've visited around some really nice campfires.
This seems like a pretty nice campfire.

In August of 1974 I went on my first "real" day hike.  I thought it
would be neat to see the southern terminus of the Appalachian Trial, so
I started with my day pack (a cotton duck Boy Scout model) from
Amicalola Falls northbound.  I was a loner; I had no one to tell me that
there might be an easier introductory hike.  But I did survive to hike
again.  I started hiking sections of the A.T. northbound.

In March of 1975 - still in day hike mode because I could not afford
backpacking gear - I hiked from the Forest Service road at Hightower Gap
north on the A.T. and over Justus Mountain to Justus Creek.  Resting by
the footlog crossing of the creek I met a hiker with a large pack.  As
you will do upon meeting a traveler, I asked where he was headed, and he
responded, "Maine."

Maine.

Maine.

It had a ring to it.  Maine.  Like a whole sentence by itself.  I knew,
of course, that people hiked from Georgia to Maine.  It was part of the
reason that I had been attracted to the white blazes in the first
place.  But it was different meeting a live person who was actually
walking there.  Even though I knew it was done, it seemed unreal.  Just
to be sure it was not the name of some local gap or peak, I asked, "You
mean Maine, New England?"  And he did indeed.  All of a sudden I had a
thousands questions I had not thought of before.  I got only a few
answered.  He was from Portland, Oregon.  He was planning on staying at
Gooch Gap Shelter that night.  He was not carrying a tent.  He came all
the way across the country to hike on this trail instead of the Pacific
Crest near his home because this was THE Trail.  And he did not have
long to talk.  He waved his hand and started up away from the creek, and
I watched him go.

Maine.

I had never quite brought into focus the mental picture of that string
of white blazes, unbroken and nearly interminable, leading over 2000
miles north.  That's what meeting the thru-hiker did, brought it into
focus.  I knew I wanted to see all of those blazes.  For another year or
so I thought I wanted to see them a few miles, or a few dozen miles, at
a time, but I wanted to see them.  Backtracking on my day hike that day,
climbing southbound on Justus Mountain, I even thought for a while that
I had seen all I wanted to see on that particular day.  (It is amazing
to me how, even after all these years of hiking, I still sometimes
forget what climbing a steep slope is like until I am climbing a steep
slope.  It's kind of like trying to remember being too hot when you're
cold.)  When I got back to Hightower Gap, however, I thought some more
about Maine.

So, when I'm resting on a long hike and some of the well-washed and
uninitiated get too close to my pack and ask silly questions while I'm
treating the water, I try to remember the meeting at Justus Creek.
Somebody may be trying to see that last white blaze, far, far in the
distance.

Merlin