1026.4 Miles: Harpers Ferry, WV
Nearing the halfway point!
Hey y’all! Sending out this newsletter a bit after my goal of one every ~300 miles, just after passing what’s usually called the “spiritual halfway mark of the trail”, Harpers Ferry, West Virginia. While it’s a bit short of the actual halfway mark I’ll hit later this week, since it used to be the official mark of halfway (due to re-routes the trail has actually gotten longer over time!), many hikers view it still as a meaningful milestone. It also finally means that the long, long slog of the state of Virginia has finally concluded and the pace of the trail seems to kick up a notch as I’ll soon start to weave in and out of different states.
I officially registered for making it to the “halfway” mark at the Appalachian Trail Conservancy Headquarters (see my below photo in the hiker album for 2022!) and was the 391st hiker to make it there from Springer Mountain. Given I was the 1,141st hiker to register in Georgia, either around 750 hikers that started before me have either quit the trail or I’ve managed to pass them. Certainly not racing to Katahdin (and have to remind myself of this often!), but nevertheless the competitive side of me was quite happy to get my halfway number!
In this past stretch of trail, I continued to cross through pastures that Virginia is known for, passed the 1,000 miles mark, weathered quite a few rain storms (after a few days of downpours I’ve learned that just keeping your rain jacket off is the better move), officially entered my fourth of fourteen states, hiked through the gentle ridge lines of Shenandoah National Park, and have inched my way closer to the D.C. area where I’ve spent the last few years living, getting into more familiar terrain.
In addition to being known for the infamous “The Virginia Blues” which I covered in the last newsletter (and managed to avoid for the most part), compared to the earlier states of North Carolina, Tennessee, and Georgia, Virginia is allegedly much flatter. While I certainly didn’t feel an elevation change immediately, the last portion of the state was indeed easier terrain leading to me to beat my previous mileage record and pull a 26.2 mile day (entirely made possible by two milkshakes that I had in the middle of the day at a store in Shenandoah!).
For some of this stretch, I was revisiting previous segments of the A.T. I’ve been on during day hikes or during 3-day backpacking trips in the past few years, re-walking through the map of memories I’ve made over the trail and building an additional layer onto it.
Other parts of Virginia that are traditions on the A.T., like visiting the towns of Glasgow and Waynesboro, staying in a hostel in an old 1800s castle-like building in the mountains, or hiking a section of the A.T. labeled the “rollercoaster” due to 18 ups and downs in rapid succession, were new. In wackier traditions— at the top of Priest mountain in Virginia, there’s a logbook (a book where hikers usually sign with trail names and notes to communicate on trail) where everyone confesses their “trail sins”, a perfect place to spend hours hiding out from the rain reading through hilarious entries from hikers across the years. Next up in fun A.T. traditions is the “Half Gallon Challenge” where at the actual halfway point of the trail, hikers are challenged to eat a half gallon of ice cream. Honestly, I’ve been training for this one my whole life!
Finally, getting to Harpers Ferry was often a moment that I dreamed about— a real sign that I’d have the capacity and grit to make it to the end in Maine, and I’m excited to be here and spend a day off trail just relaxing. As always, luck plays a large role in getting to the end, but I’m excited to pass through states at a faster clip and do some of my first hiking in many of the remaining states ahead!
Notable High Points:
With spring finally in high gear, this last section was covered with wildflowers of all sizes and colors!
In the middle of Virginia section, there’s the famous “Virginia Triple Crown” comprising McAfee Knob, Dragon’s Tooth, and Tinker Cliffs— all boasting exceptional views and unique rock structures. The first two I tackled on the same day and spent a few hours on McAfee Knob with a group of thru-hikers soaking in the view. On the following day, the views at Tinker Cliffs were entirely invisible through a sheet of rain and fog that we hiked through all day. Regardless, getting to 2/3 of the views in good weather and with good people was a certain highlight!
On McAfee Knob
A huge highlight in this past stretch was Henry hopping on trail with me for a day and taking a zero together (lingo for when thru-hikers have a day with no hiking) for our anniversary when I was snaking my way through Shenandoah. In addition to accompanying me for the day, he also brought to the trail my favorite pizza in D.C. (Wiseguy’s tikka masala pizza) and cupcakes (carrot cake from Baked & Wired). While he joined on one of the hottest days of the trail so far, I loved being able to hike together again!
People often make the A.T. what it is and fortunately in this last section after roughly a 1,000 miles of hiking, the hikers around me became more consistent day after day. In Glasgow re-supplying before hopping back on trail, a huge group of us took on a local restaurant’s All-You-Can-Eat-Spaghetti Tuesday. Needless to say that the miles of hiking ensured that we took full advantage of this offer.
Finally, Shenandoah has some of the gentlest terrain on the A.T.— none of the long uphills and downhills that dot seemingly every other mile of the trail. I enjoyed the change in slope, gave my legs a rest, and had a blast running into day-hikers who eyed me as if I was an alien when they heard I’d started in Georgia.
Notable Low Points:
Hiking into Waynesboro, VA I was already imagining the milkshake in my future only 5-miles away. With great cell service in the valley, I decided to call Henry while hiking the remaining way to town. Over the course of our call and a meager 5-miles, I somehow ran into 4 different snakes, including two rattlesnakes, and a small bear running down the hill (fortunately a safe 25 or so feet away). For the fourth snake, the rattlesnake was so incredibly irritated that Henry could hear the rattle when I was nearby through our phone call! While in general, I’m very okay with snakes, running into 4 within such a short of period of time had me exceptionally paranoid that nearly every branch, root, and moving plant was a snake. For the days afterwards, I felt my heart rate struggled to get out of fight-or-flight mode every time a stick looked snake-like which made hiking on the whole much more stressful of an experience.
The second low of this stretch isn’t necessarily a specific story or moment but the reality that hiking long days, day after day, sometimes results in me waking up and honestly not wanting to hike an additional mile that day. Of just feeling physically exhausted or wanting to be on a couch somewhere drinking coffee (ironically what I’m doing right now as I write this). I talked to a big group of thru-hikers in the middle of Virginia, who all agreed that the inevitable outcome of hiking constantly is sometimes just wanting not to hike to rest your feet and legs. That being said, to help keep me motivated I downloaded a few audiobooks (most recently listening to Ready Player One which the future-oriented part of me is obsessed with!) and I’m looking forward to the natural motivation of moving through additional states!
Something I’ve Been Thinking About:
Finally, rounding out the newsletter with some thoughts I’ve had recently.
On the A.T., every turn and stretch is designated by white blazes painted on trees, giving rise to a variety of blaze color related trail jargon and slang. When someone “yellow-blazes” they cheat and take a shuttle to the next town instead of hiking. When someone “aqua blazes”, they kayak or canoe along the trail in a river to bypass hiking miles. And then, most frequently used, when someone “blue blazes” they either take a side trail off the A.T. for a view (seen positively) or take a shortcut on another trail to evade some miles (seen as threatening the integrity of the thru-hike).
While this slang is quite entertaining on it’s own, I’ve been thinking specifically about the concept of blue-blazing (with the more positive meaning of the word to take a side trail to a view). On trail, if an offshoot is 0.6 miles to a gorgeous view, I’ll almost always split off the A.T. and venture on the blue blaze, happy to add the 1.2 miles to the day. On the other hand, if it’s 3 miles (so 6 miles round trip), I begin to see it as detracting from my ability to keep moving forward and make it to my goal campsite for the night.
In other words, the process of assessing a “blue-blaze” takes into account the round trip additional mileage that the venture will add and essentially assesses the worth of the additional miles. I’ve created a mental framework to make these decisions easier— under a mile one-way, absolutely yes. Over a mile, see what other hikers say about the reward and then decide.
The white blaze/blue blaze concept therefore makes quite an astute metaphor for focus. Taking side journeys and ventures from an eventual longer term goal and target aren’t forbidden, but the cost is calculated of getting both there and back and then a decision is made.
I believe we all have narratives about who we are and aren’t as individuals that both serve and limit us. For me, a serving narrative that I’ve had for most of my life about myself is that I am inherently curious. On the other hand, a limiting narrative that I hold is that with that incessant curiosity I cannot focus well for extended stretches on a single goal, I’m distracted by the next shiny object of an idea (I’m sure many of you have witnessed this in conversations with me!).
So the idea that for the last few months I’ve actually been able to practice intensive focus, that I haven’t taken every blue blaze and continue to walk on the same trail to Maine, is one of those limiting narrative-cracking realizations. Taking from the process of judging the “cost” of taking a blue-blaze, I hope to build off-trail a simple decision-making framework to evaluate the cons and benefits of chasing after a new idea or activity, ensuring that I’m able to focus long-term on more than just hiking along the A.T.
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Well folks, thank you again for reading and I appreciate all of the podcast recs/replies that I received after the last email!
Until next time,
Tierney, trailname: BeastMode
Additional Photos— with the first few shots highlights of some of the critters I’ve seen on trail recently!
LET'S GOOOOO!!!! Congrats on (almost) hitting the halfway point Tierney, and safe hiking!! I love reading these updates :) (and I can't stop telling everyone I meet about you and this newsletter)
You go girl!