Reflections

Soul-searching is hard. It is also unavoidable when you are out in the wilderness for over four months. Something about the peacefulness and enduring strength of a fragile ecosystem brings out the ponderer in all of us. I second Pat's comments on feeling a renewed relationship with yourself and not running on autopilot after such an experience as this hike. Here are a few more of my own reflections….

One of the most important things that I learned about myself is that my capacity is much greater than I imagined. I have a capacity for physical feats I had never considered. I have the capacity to climb mountains, ford rivers, and remain silent and still while the fog swirls around. I have a capacity for friendship that exceeds what I had known. I have the capacity to endure and thrive under that unusual strain that I had chosen for myself. And I have the capacity to keep going on a project that was so big and daunting that I couldn't understand the enormity of it before beginning it. I had to just start hiking without figuring out all the details.

Focus was a hot topic of discussion for Pat and me while on the trail. We are both the kind of people who meet deadlines and do it without asking for an extension. We like having defined goals and achieving them. There are some characteristics that you just can't leave behind and this turned out to be one of them. We met many hikers who were just out for a walk and would see how far they got. Some of them didn't even plan their resupply stops, but just hoped a town would come along about when they ran out of food. But, we had a goal and we kept going until we reached it. Now I have to make this trait an advantage.

On the other hand, I am much more comfortable with having unknowns. The trail is unpredictable. There are so many things that you cannot plan for and have to trust yourself to figure out as you move along. I am okay with not having all the answers beforehand. I am not sure how this fits together with the reflection above, but I have faith in myself and in the balance of the universe.

I also have faith in people. I often had to depend on the kindness of strangers to keep my hike going forward and they came through with everything I needed from the beginning to the end of the hike. The support from family, friends, and a few fans that I had never met was heart-warming. I had to leave a community to realize how much I was a part of it. Our networks and influence are larger than we think. Strange that going into the wilderness for several months, which seems like it would be isolating, actually gave me an amazing view of humanity and common cause.

One thing that is different about me: I am on-time all the time!

This will probably be the last message posted. We are both starting new chapters of our lives in new towns. Nothing will ever be the same for either of us. How could it possibly? We have changed and grown ourselves. Our worlds are different because we are different. The Appalachian Trail will forever be in our hearts and souls.

Many thanks to all of you for your encouragement, praise, and love. Your support was felt everyday.

Namaste,
Jess

More Pictures!!

Here are the two additional slideshows I promised - a peek at what our daily life was like. I also added a few photos to the three slideshows posted earlier. More funky mushrooms, cool snakes, and hitches!

Our campsites:
http://picasaweb.google.com/jessrunnels/ATCampsites?authkey=Gv1sRgCKq8oPKMtNCwRg&feat=directlink

What the AT actually looks like (in no particular order):
http://picasaweb.google.com/jessrunnels/ATFindTheTrail?feat=directlink

That white rectangle is called a "blaze" and is a trail marker. When it went up a pile of rocks or across a river, then that's where we went too.

Pictures!

I had over 2,500 pictures from the four and half months on the trail! That does not include the thousands of pictures that Pat has. So, here are three slide shows about the hike. There are two more slide shows to come and I will post links to those here as well. Captions also may be coming in the next few days, but I wanted to get some pictures out there now.

Hope you enjoy them as much as I did!!

Highlights from the hike:
http://picasaweb.google.com/jessrunnels/ATThruHike?feat=directlink

Wildlife along the AT:
http://picasaweb.google.com/jessrunnels/ATWildlife?feat=directlink

Flowers along the AT:
http://picasaweb.google.com/jessrunnels/ATFlowers?feat=directlink

Final Thoughts

It has been five weeks since I threw my hiking boots in the hotel trash can and caught a flight home to Chattanooga, TN. For the most part I have settled back into my life fairly well. The few residual effects of the hike... all seem positive. For one I finally understand what it means when people speak of living in the moment. Before the hike I believed I understood and practiced it daily. Wrong! It is as if life slows down and can be viewed with childlike curiosity. It is the ability to bear witness to your own life without preconceived ideas or expectations. I do wonder how long this will last. I would hate to have to walk another 2,000 miles to replenish this if it fades. I want to forever live fully awakened.

I have also overcome almost all inhibitions of approaching strangers or asking for what I want/need. On the trail we learned that we would never get anywhere if we didn't ask for help...so now I can simply ask literally anyone for what I need or want.

I still don't recognize the person staring back from the mirror. Not looking in the mirror for 4 1/2 months provides an interesting opportunity to get in touch with how your body feels instead of how it looks. I now hear the voice of my soul not the voice of the image in the mirror.

I have a renewed faith in humanity. It took a combined effort of so many people beyond Jess and I to complete our journey. From the trail magic left by anonymous sources to the individuals that leant us their water filters and gave us rides, they all contributed in their own way and without asking us for anything in return. Their hearts were pure in their intent.

I have a renewed spirituality and belief in what exists beyond our basic senses.

I learned to be more in tune with where my body needs attention or how it needs it instead of running on autopilot. Suffering, striving, enduring heat/cold/hunger/thirst/insect bites/sore muscles/strained tendons/exhaustion/sleepiness.
The culmination of all this...a renewed relationship with myself. I am more powerful woman. Oh yes! My parents are now the wind and the trail. I hear another trip calling me...

Finally, a genuine THANK YOU goes to all of you that followed our journey and and were with us in spirit and thought!

Peace,
Doubleshot

No Longer Bald!

Here is a picture of us on the very last day of the hike and you can see how much our hair has grown since April 4. We have both gotten haircuts since then so things are styled better and don't look quite as wild anymore.

I loved taking the clippers to my head and I loved the feel of my hair super short, but I seriously doubt that I will ever shave my head again (I looked completely bald!). Glad to be able to say that I did it once, but that will be enough for me. Pat is keeping her hair a little longer for now, but time will tell if she reverts back to her old habits.

Oh! That's the summit of Mt. Katahdin in the background. We were so close!

Police escort

From the back seat of the police car...

I am going to bail Jess out on this one (pun intended)! Contrary to common sense the wildest parts of hiking the AT were usually times of leaving the trail and hitching rides into town for food or other practical things like laundry. Every town visit was different, crazy and often unpredictable. Our most notorious hitch began at Franconia Notch in the White Mountains of New Hampshire. We had hiked all day (over South Kinsman Mtn, which we agreed neither of us would ever climb again and would not recommend to friends) and arrived in late afternoon at a major Interstate. Well, we thought, we are out of food and have to make this work. So we stuck our thumbs out and sure enough a nice middle aged man on his way from Vermont picked us up and delivered us directly to the front doorstep of a grocery store 7.4 miles away in Franconia, NH. There we bought groceries and ate dinner and headed back to the interstate. On the way I took a picture of the sign that said "Pedestrians Prohibited" then we walked right past it and up the entrance ramp. Sometimes life's guiding signs are hidden but sometimes they are right in front of us!

It was nearly 8 pm on a Saturday with hardly any traffic. Jess & I were discussing options for camping in a wooded area near the freeway and trying again in the morning if we couldn't catch a ride that night (because 6 am on a Sunday would be sooooo much better!) Just then an SUV slowed down and stopped on the side of the road just before reaching us. We were excited to have a vehicle stop but cautious because he stopped so slowly and deliberately. We both had to swallow hard when the blue emergency light came on and a local police officer got out of the vehicle. Uh Oh! (What I was really thinking was officer, "it was Jess' idea!" Ha!

He approached us in a stern fashion and said hitchhiking is not permitted on the freeway, only in town and on the entrance ramp...blah, blah, blah and we were in dark clothes and it was dangerous for us to be there. Yes we knew that... we had the pictures of the sign on our camera. Ooooh this is not good! We had literally said nothing so far and stood motionless on the side of the road with our packs on and hiking poles in our hands wondering where this was all going. And I really can't recall everything he said after that but he asked us what we were doing? "Hiking the Appalachian Trail." "Did you get lost?" he asked "The trail is several miles from here." "No" we replied "We resupplied and ate dinner in town and are just needing to get back to the trail."

What I do distinctly remember him saying was "It is getting late in the evening and I am going to give you a courtesy ride back to the trail." My ears perked up, did I hear correctly. We were catching a hitched ride from a police officer. All the fear and trepidation faded as we loaded into the back of his patrol vehicle. Maybe we should have been nervous or something but we were just glad to have a ride back to the trail!! Anything to keep us moving northward on the AT!!

The officer (we didn't even get his name) was unbelievably understanding and spent the entire 7.4 mile drive talking about the wildlife in the White Mtns, his growing up in the area, why he moved back there from Montana and lots of other hiking-related things. He never even asked us our names. After dropping us off on the side of the interstate where we had left the trail earlier that afternoon and wished us luck and humored my request to take a picture of the police vehicle.

We chuckled to ourselves as we set our tent up that night. Could have been our first night in a bed since our hike began - I thought to myself. It was the only time we had to set up the tent in the dark using headlamps but at least it was our tent. The whole evening was quite an adrenaline rush, but after a long day of hiking we still fell asleep quickly.