Please provide a link to his trail journal when you update it!
Please provide a link to his trail journal when you update it!
You know I am guilty of giving MS a bit if a hard time in the first thread last year about his hike but I have got to say he is a class act and I admire the guy. He is welcomed to stay here when he comes thru town and I will make damn sure he eats good!
I have to let you all in on a bit of info...
MS & FW, you all missed the first section of trail. You started at the wrong location.
As for meeting and making contact with all the 'locals'... are you aware of the number of registered sex offenders that live in the vicinity of the trail? How about burglars and thieves?
Also, your info on the trail being closed north of I 20 is outdated. The trail was reopened in the fall.
Oh, and one more thing... you have taken the wrong road walks on the southern portion of the trail. Not sure how much of a purist you are, but you didnt really hike the southern end of the Pinhoti trail.
good luck on your hike, and if you need the correct info on re-hiking the trail in Alabama, dont hesitate to contact me!
~If you cant do it with one bullet, dont do it at all.
~Well behaved women rarely make history.
1) The official signs saying the Pinhoti in the section between I-20 and AL 281 was closed were still in place there as of when I hiked to the southern end of it at roughly 4:00 PM yesterday, Tuesday Jan. 20th. I think that is rather current information, as since the gov't body overseeing that part of the Trail wanted them down (and not in force), they'd be down.
2) There was a cryptic, unclear note at the northern end of that section that seemed to indicate that some trail work on "the northern end" of the Trail had been completed. As I had followed what any reasonable person would have interpreted as an official relocation, I hold to my position I hiked the current (not past or future) Pinhoti in that area yesterday.
3) Yes, we did do some miles on the Alabama Trail at the beginning, but we first started as close to the summit of Flagg Mountain as we could legally access. If you think that the Pinhoti Trail Alliance guidebook and (not "or") maps Mr. Parkay (WB's top resident Pinhoti Trail map guru IMO) we went by were in error, perhaps you should convince them of it, as currently they don't appear to agree with you.
4) There are numerous registered sex offenders, burglars, etc., in almost any populated area. However, their distribution is not even, with Coosa County in Alabama a low-risk area. If someone is really interested in figuring out such offenders are most and least likely to be located, I recommend Jared Taylor's 1999 reference book about crime. (PM me for where to get it for free if desired.) [Since a moderator brought this subject up, responding directly to it is reasonable.]
Most people we saw living near the Pinhoti gave every indication of being honest and self-supporting, and have been kind towards us in all our interactions. The only negativity I have encountered related to this trail has been on the Internet.
5) The people that have offered or given help to us during our journey (yes, Faithwalker is still fully a part of it, just in a different way right now) have largely volunteered it, and been happy to do so. For every person I have asked anything of (the current weather forecast or some water from their outside spigot has generally been the limit), far more has been freely offered to us. We graciously refused over a dozen offers of rides during our road walking between Flagg Mtn. and Bull Gap, getting such offers practically daily at least. Of the three families who offered to put one or both of us up in their home/camp on the inir property (two of which we took them up on), it was totally their idea 75% of the time, we paid cash to one over their objections, and were repeatedly refused in doing so with the latter. Both want to see us again, have us stay in touch with them, etc. That hardly sounds like panhandling our way across E. Alabama.
Anyway, we will continue on with our journey, hiking our hike, not anyone else's hike, or nonhike, as the case may be.
I mean this with all sincerity and earnestness, I don't believe it was ever "your" hike.
Hiking is such an individual thing, and you were being pressured/influenced/whatever you want to call it into wearing the same shoes and the same crazy gaiters, and eating dried cuttlefish, and carrying a heavy-ass log with foam wrapped around it. Think about that for a minute, is that how YOU would have preferred to hike if planning it yourself? I would have been resentful as hell.
I respect MS because he finished the AT and I haven't, but that doesn't mean that when I get the chance to hike it that I am going to buy 65 pounds of cod jerky and wear a dishrag on my head.
You gotta hike your hike, and MS has found the way that works for him, so I say go, man, go, but don't make others hike in your own Smithian style.
Inquiring minds want to know how much toilet paper MS has with him. That Backpacker article about Mountain Crossings has made him a TP-toting legend with the armchair backpacker at my public library and the guy reading Backpacker looked at me with awe when I said, "He's back out on the trail."
"How much toilet paper does he have this time?" he asked.
So I figured I'd pass along the question.
I give this thread about 20-1 odds of not being shut down.