[at-l] What does it take to be a thru hiker

[greyowl at rcn.com (greyowl@rcn.com)]

Interesting question, interest responses.  My question is what 
are your priorities?  Why do you want to hike the AT in one 
hike?  A Vision Quest?  A rite of passage (I had mine in 
Vietnam, rest assured it is not all it is cracked up to be), cannot 
find yourself (which is just an excuss to be a slacker, I am sixty 
and I hope to never find myself).  A couple of years ago I 
decided that I would never finish the AT (I am a section hiker), 
my wife and familyt are way more important to me.  Six years 
from Dec 28th I will be walking out of the back door and never 
coming back.  I have been making plans for my retirement and 
consulting with my wife.  We have a pretty good plan which we 
tell everyone one of these days.  My wife noted that I really 
haven't made a lot of plans for the next six years.  She asked 
me about hiking and I said that there were plenty of shorter 
trails around and many miles of trails were I want to retire.  
She asked me about the AT and I told her that yes I wanted to 
hike it all, but it was not the most important thing in my life and 
no I was not going to hike it when I retired.  To make a long 
story short we figured I need to hike 266 mile per year for the 
next six years (4 weeks of hiking a year) and then she floors 
me and said I should try and do it.  So this coming year I am 
going to try and hike 250 miles.  I will stop however if the 
hiking interfers with my family life.  I don't worry about labels 
and quitter is not a term that I would ever use, especially if one 
found something more important to do with their life.

I also find it interesting about payback, what is the payback?  
There are thousands of people everyday who make sacrifices 
with expecting any payback.  The payback is a construct of the 
me generation.  You will know in your soul if you want to do a 
though hike and in the end it will be your own hike and your 
own vision quest.

Finally I should add that you will get the hike that you deserve 
and it may not be the one you want.  I am more impressed with 
the people who stop after 500 or 1000 or 1500 miles than I am 
with the people who make it all of the way.  Often times they 
learned a lesson that they had not expected to learn and leave 
the trail much wiser.  The old Zen saying goes it is not the 
destination, but the journey.

Peace to All

Bob Grey Owl Dudley