What’s in a trail name?

On my first day after the approach trail, as I was leaving Springer Shelter, I opened my phone and saw that I had a good signal. I sent a selfie to a group text with my wife, mom, and kids, and sent a message saying I planned to hike to Hawk Mountain Shelter that day.

Nor’Easter Meeting

After I’d been on the trail for a while, I ran into another hiker: a tall, thin, older man with a white beard. We struck up a conversation and hit it off immediately, talking about our backgrounds and our military service. He had hiked the AT in 2012 and had a lot of wisdom to share. He introduced himself as Nor’Easter, which sounded familiar, but I couldn’t explain why.

I offered him my name, «Just Tony, for now,» and he said he’d surely get a route name before too long. As I was telling him a few things about myself, he noted, “With your background, you might get something like “Spy” or “Spook” or “General Tso,” to which I said, “Oh, please, no.” But he continued, “You can shape it and choose something you like.”

We ended up walking together for a while and he set a strong pace. We arrived at Hawk Mountain Shelter, my destination for the day, and he stopped to have lunch with me and some guys who were already there.

It occurred to me that I was blogging about my trek on The Trek and he said he did too. That’s when I realized I knew who he was – I’d read some of his posts! While at the picnic table next to Hawk Mountain Shelter, we followed each other’s blogs and then he wished me luck before leaving for his destination at Gooch Mountain Shelter; his quiet afternoon was going to be a whole day of walking for me.

From call signs to trail names

As I set up my tent, I thought about what I had said about trail names. In my Air Force circles, we occasionally had naming ceremonies to give a call sign to members of the unit who had been in the position long enough and had distinguished themselves. These names usually sounded rude but had an embarrassing history, or were cool acronyms that ended in something ridiculous.

During my entire career, I never received a callsign like that. One of my crewmates asked me if I’d ever had a nickname, and when I told him that my friends at school called me «T Bird,» that’s what stuck, and I was happy with it.

Now, along the way, however, it seemed that the most important changes in my life also deserved a name change.

Once I set up my tent, I checked my phone signal. It bounced between one and two bars, but it was enough. I sent another text to let my family know I had arrived at Hawk Mountain. By the end of the afternoon, I had finished my camp chores and the campers were gathered at the shelter, so I went to socialize.

A night on Gooch Mountain

The next day I packed my bags and sent a selfie to the family telling them I was hiking at Gooch Mountain Shelter.

The hike had some steep climbs and I was nursing some sore calves, probably from acclimating to zero-drop Altras. Although the mileage was modest, I made it to Gooch in good time, arriving before noon. At the site, I found that I couldn’t get any phone signal. After setting up camp, I hiked and even tried to climb the trail a little to get some elevation, but nothing. I let a few text messages queue up for sending and decided to give it a try from a ridge during the next day’s hike.

The group at camp was an even mix of veterans and recent high school graduates. I met a gregarious older man with a thick white beard who walked around in a gray kilt who called himself «The General,» and I liked him immediately. While we were talking, a young woman dressed in professional hiking gear approached and was very excited to see him.

He sat down with us to eat a snack and filter water, and we all chatted for a while. I found out that she was The deranged hiker and was going for a border-to-border Triple Crown in a calendar year plus a few more trails to break the record for miles traveled in a year to raise awareness for CPTSD.

Later I had dinner with the older ones, while the younger ones improvised chess pieces from strange pieces of sandwiches on the chess board that someone had marked with a marker on the shelter’s picnic table. When it got dark, I took it as a sign to go to bed.

To the rescue

The next morning I packed my bags and added my usual selfie and my destination to the queued messages, still waiting for a signal to send. I usually walk with my phone on airplane mode to save battery, but I left my phone on while I walked, hoping that when I hit a ridge, everything would send.

I walked for over a mile until I finally felt a buzz in my pocket. My phone exploded. I pulled over to the side and pulled it out. It was still full of chat messages, missed calls, voicemails, all creating a huge wall of notifications.

After piecing together the story, I discovered that they had started to panic after 12 hours, and between my wife, my mother and my daughter, each of them called a different emergency line or agency to report me missing.

«Oh my God, guys. I just had no signal at camp. I’m fine.»

My wife had texted me to call her, so I did. She was enormously relieved to hear from me and told me that I’m going to buy a Garmin whether I like it or not. I hung up the phone.

I then had to return calls to the county fire marshal, report my location to a tracing agency, and then assure my brother and a few other people that I was okay.

I told them, «I feel loved. It’s inconvenient and embarrassing, but it’s nice anyway.»

The general walked by while I was on the phone and I caught up with him after talking to everyone on the phone and gave him a quick summary of what had happened.

“My wife may not hear from me for five days,” the general said with a smile.

«I just know I’m going to get a stupid name out of this,» I said.

We arrived at a crossroads with several parked vehicles and people in uniforms and Carhartts standing at the intersection.

“It looks like a party,” I said.

«We’re looking for a hiker,» one of the men said.

«It’s probably me.» I explained the situation to them and they laughed.

The uniformed lady who was next to them gave me her phone and told me: “You have to call your daughter.”

“It’s five in the morning where she is,” I said in protest, but the call was already ringing.

After calming my daughter down, assuring her that I was okay, and promising to buy a Garmin InReach, she let me go. I handed the phone back and chatted with the rescue team for a few more minutes before continuing to the General, where we ran into some guys handing out donuts to hikers. I chatted for a few minutes and they asked me if I had seen the missing hiker.

«Yes, that’s me.» I told him the story and one of the guys said, “They should call you ‘Lost and Found.’” Thinking about what Nor’Easter had said, I really hoped he wouldn’t stay dfsd.

I later ran into one of my fellow Springer Shelter hikers who I had camped with several times, sitting in his lightweight chair and filtering water. “Did they find you?” asked.

«Yes,» I said. «Guess I’ll end up getting a route name out of this.»

“You can be ‘Rescue,’” he said. «They are already calling me President.»

To be fair, he was the only person I saw carrying a camp chair.

I left it there and continued walking, considering the name. It has the important elements: it was easy to say and sounded great, but it had an embarrassing story. Completely different from any name I had in my past life. It was perfect.

That’s how I got the name of my trail: Rescue.