[at-l] Re: Pennsylvania Pointed Rocks - brown blazing

[michaelh@ospreypacks.com (Michael Henderson)]

"...So...is there anyway you can blue blaze (or yellow blaze??) PA and
still be considered a thruhiker??" asks Hummingbird.

There are certain portions that you can "brown-blaze"  with perhaps less
guilt that blue- or yellow-blazing.  Brown blazing is hiking a route
that the trail used to take, where the old white blazes have been
painted over with brown paint.  I, too, got tired of the pointy PA rocks
one afternoon heading N into Port Clinton.  Big Ben and I pulled out our
maps and found a dirt road, straight as an arrow, which the trail
intersected numerous times.  We thought we might hike that instead, but
both of us weren't too sure of the ethics.  That is until, at the first
crossing, we saw the brown blaze a little ways down this road.  That's
when I first uttered those immortal words used to justify subsequent
brown blazing: "If it's good enough for Grandma Gatewood, it's good
enough for me."  It was hot, dusty, with no shade, for about 3 miles.

One of my favorite experiences on my entire trip was a brown blaze in
Vermont, the day before reaching Hanover, that involved some serious
bushwacking because the old trail had virtually reverted to forest.
Still, every once and a while, you'd see a brown blaze, and if you were
lucky, the brown paint was weathering off, revealing the original white
blaze.  That was cool.  Eventually, the "trail" bottomed out at the end
of a dirt road.  As we headed down that, we passed an old red farmhouse
with a covered stoop.  On that stoop was a white plastic chair, the kind
that stack together so conveniently, and on that chair was an old
farmer, maybe 75.  We smiled and waved, and he shouted out "You folks
lost, or just tired of hiking the new trail?"  I will never forget that,
never.

I may not be a purist, but I am guilt-free, despite Felix' incessant
heckling.

Ke Kaahawe

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