My five questions: the journey

Who is Hiker Jeff?

I was born and raised in Wilmington, Delaware, and also lived in Maryland for several years during elementary school. I am the oldest of four brothers; I have two brothers and a sister. My mother is still alive and lives a few miles from me, in the house I grew up in, but my father passed away in 2023. I went to college at East Carolina University, studying English and philosophy, and got my first jobs in North Carolina, so I was away from Delaware for almost ten years before returning in 1990 to start adulthood. In 1993 I decided to pursue education as a career and in 1994 I got married for the first time and had the first of my two daughters. Marriage No. 1 lasted seven years and ended largely amicably. In 2004 I remarried and by 2007 my second wife and I had added a couple more children (this time boys) to the crew. My career in education changed at this point when I moved from the classroom to the front office. I worked as dean of students and assistant principal until the end of my career. I spent twenty-two years working at the high school from which I graduated in 1981. I ended up retiring from education in 2023 and then worked as a maintenance technician at a retirement community for the next two years. Since last September, I’ve been doing odd jobs for friends and family and as a substitute teacher. If I had my druthers, I’d already be following a trail somewhere.

That?

Since you found my blog at The walkI guess you’ve already realized that next year I’ll be hiking the Appalachian Trail. However, that is not the extent of my journey. After listening to an episode of Backpacking Radio which included the Pinhoti Trail, I decided to make my hike a ‘Bama to Baxter* effort. (For those of you who know, please indulge me. Twenty months ago, when I started listening to the BPR podcast, I knew very little about America’s trails and backpacking culture, so I don’t want to leave out details for newbies who might be following my posts.) In short, the Pinhoti Trail runs from Flagg Mountain in central Alabama across the state to the Georgia border and then continues into Georgia to the Benton MacKaye Trail, which parallels the AT to Springer Mountain, the southern tip of the AT. In total, I’ll be looking at a hike of about 2,600 miles when I reach Mount Katahdin (*located in Baxter State Park), the northern tip of the AT.

When?

Since I don’t want to be in the Smokie Mountains too early in the season, I will start Pinhoti in early March with the intention of being on the AT in early April. I don’t have a definitive end date at this time. Since I don’t know what to expect from my aging body in terms of daily mileage, I don’t want to make a projection on a finish time. I know I will be pushing my limits and, if my body allows, I would prefer to complete the hike by the end of July to be home in time for a couple of birthdays.

Where? (for newbies)

Well, I’m not trying to stress the obvious here, but a year and a half ago, I knew very little about the AT and didn’t even know the Pinhoti Trail existed. So here it goes: The Pinoti begins on Flagg Mountain, the southernmost mountain in the Appalachian chain, about fifteen miles southwest of Sylacauga, Alabama. It winds its way northeast across the state for approximately 180 miles before crossing into northwest Georgia and continuing for another 170 miles to its northern terminus at the Benton MacKaye Trail. The BMT heads southeast for about seventy miles to its final intersection with the AT, just a couple of miles north of Springer Mountain. The AT then heads north for nearly 2,200 miles through fourteen states to reach Baxter State Park, where hikers climb Mount Katahdin to end their trip.

As? (Did I come back wanting to hike the AT?)

If you read my first post, you already know my OT origin story. Fifty years and a lot of life separate that moment from what I hope will be the first of many steps north along the way. Honestly, I had practically forgotten about doing the AT until five years ago. When I began my teaching career in the early ’90s, I thought I would have plenty of summer vacations to walk the trail. However, the first few years of my career took a lot of time. The year before I started teaching, I could run twenty miles in two hours on a Saturday morning and still come home to mow the lawn. However, for seven years I basically did nothing physical: not running, not cycling, not even walking. When my first marriage started to fall apart, I decided to start running again and within a year I was fit enough to run a marathon. But adventure racing caught my attention and the thought of being on a long distance trail never crossed my mind. I managed to maintain my fitness for the next ten years, but I was busy training for three seasons and starting my new family, so I never thought about the trail. When I became an administrator, I started having to work during the summers, so even more distance built up between me and the trail. Life was busy for us with two young children and two careers to manage; As a result, I became unfit again. Not as bad as before, but I definitely lost my edge. In 2015, I thought I would work until I was seventy (my second wife is ten years younger than me) and then retire to a world of leisurely travel. When Covid hit, things slowed down enough at school that I could start exercising again. By fall 2020, I was contemplating new adventures. In November 2020, I had a stroke. It didn’t cause much physical damage, but it definitely affected some of my cognitive functions. The deficits were not immediately evident because students had not yet returned to school. However, almost immediately, during the following school year, I realized that it was not functioning as it had before. Shortly after, I began to entertain the idea of ​​early retirement, not because I wanted to but because I feared I wouldn’t be able to stay at work. So, at the end of the school year in 2022, I retired from my state position and accepted a part-time position at a local parochial school to see if a transition into the classroom was still possible (turns out it wasn’t). Meanwhile, I discovered hikers posting videos on YouTube and the desire to hike the AT was alive within me once again.

Because?

I’d love to report that my reason for climbing the AT had a more noble intention, but if I’m honest with myself, my reason is very simplistic: I think I want to do it so I can say I did it. There is no healing in nature and no desire to communicate with other adventurous souls. I just want to work hard every day and be able to cross it off my to-do list. Look, I love the outdoors, and the lure of the backpacking community might win me over, but right now, it’s just another bucket list item I need to accomplish before I die. See also: zxc4. I know this revelation will put some readers off, but eventually you will have realized this about me, so it’s best to make the decision to not follow me now so that there are no hard feelings later. I promise I’ll still have fun and enjoy myself along the way and report all of that to the best of my ability. Just don’t be discouraged when I decide to keep hiking when the rest of my trail family decides to take a zero second at Hot Springs. Oh, and just to prove that I’m capable of having fun on the trail, I’m definitely going to Trail Days in Damascus, even if it means I have to backtrack to do it.

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