Beginnings: Oats, Legs, and The Appalachian Trail
Hi yall! For those of you unfamiliar with the Thru Crew, let me give you a bit of background.
After saving up through college, I started my thru hike of the A.T. on Feb 24, 2019. Legs started on Feb 19, 2019. I ran too quickly out of the gate and after two weeks was grounded with achilles tendinitis. After a few weeks of rest and rehab, I skipped a few hundred miles up the Trail with the intention of coming back in the fall and picking up the section I had missed. It was close to my hometown of Asheville, NC and I wanted to stay ahead of the bubble of hikers who started in March and April, so it worked out well for me.
Legs and I met at the half way point of the Trail, in Harpers Ferry, WV. After a night of merriment with my tramily (slang for family made on trail) at a bar close to the hostel we were all staying at, I knew I wanted this guy to hike on with me. Or, at least let me mooch off the stove he was carrying, a gear choice I had opted out of. But man, that boy had some great freeze dried meals.
Legs and I started hiking together in New York a few weeks later. Our first day together we had one of the most enjoyable days of my trip. Starting with the “Stairway to Heaven”, a climb whose difficult was vastly overestimated by our fellow hikers who had hiked on the day before, we made it about 15 miles and crossed the border from New Jersey to New York, one state closer to the end of our trip. I remember non-stop talking, even through the hard panting I was intentionally trying to cover up to impress my much faster and stronger hiking partner.
We looked up at the sky and saw storm clouds approaching. I asked Legs how the radar looked, and his eyes grew wide as he checked his phone. “Oats, there is a huge thunderstorm coming in. We are a mile from a road with an ICE CREAMERY. Think we can make it?” Knowing full well how much we both loved (were obsessed with?) that delicious frozen treat, and how much we could use one after hiking 15 miles, I announced “LET’S GO!” And we took off, well, as much as anyone can with 25 lbs on their back.
A few minutes later, the sky opened up. Needless to say we didn’t make it to the ice creamery in time. It did make for quite a scene though, the two of us half naked, running past hikers in full rain gear, giggling like kids at the sheer absurdity of the situation. We had no car to go to with fresh water waiting, no house to dry off at. But we sure didn’t care about the rain, thats for sure. We had our minds set on ice cream and the butterflies in our stomachs.
Once we got to the ice creamery, some kids about my age got incredibly excited at our arrival (even though I’m positive we couldn’t have smelled better than two wet squirrels). “We hiked last year!!! You’ve got to let us get your ice cream! But we have a bus to catch!!!” They quickly shoved their hands in their pockets and threw some cash on the table. They shouted “TRAIL MAGIC!” then took off towards the waiting bus.
Legs and I crushed a couple of milkshakes in the gloom of the clouds and quickly decided to go into town for the night. We found in the small town of Warwick, NY a bowling alley, a rustic cidery and restaurant, and a drive in movie theater that allowed campers for free!!
As we watched the double feature in his tent, the thought occurred to me how nice it would be to split the weight of a tent and have hot meals every night. Oh, and I guess I liked him quite a bit on top of all that.
A few months later on July 20, we found ourselves atop Mount Katahdin with Woodchips, a small stuffed beaver we had carried for a few hundred miles after an impulse purchase in the White Mountains in New Hampshire. Oh, and splitting the weight of the tent was definitely worth it..