Appalachian Trail Quotes

“Every twenty minutes on the Appalachian Trail, Katz and I walked farther than the average American walks in a week. For 93 percent of all trips outside the home, for whatever distance or whatever purpose, Americans now get in a car. On average, the total walking of an American these days - that's walking of all types: from car to office, from office to car, around the supermarket and shopping malls - adds up to 1.4 miles a week...That's ridiculous.”
― Bill Bryson, A Walk in the Woods: Rediscovering America on the Appalachian Trail

“She introduced people to the A.T., and at the same time she made the thru-hike achievable. It didn’t take fancy equipment, guidebooks, training, or youthfulness. It took putting one foot in front of the other—five million times.”
― Ben Montgomery, Grandma Gatewood's Walk: The Inspiring Story of the Woman Who Saved the Appalachian Trail

“There is redemption in sadness. It tells me that for nearly five months in 2003, I lived life with the open, raw, refreshing outlook of the young. The payoff, though difficult to quantify, is much greater than I expected. I have no regrets about having gone -- it was the right thing to do. I think about it every day. Sometimes I can hardly believe it happened. I just quit -- and I was on a monumental trip. I didn't suffer financial ruin, my wife didn't leave me, the world didn't stop spinning. I do think of how regrettable it would have been had I ignored the pull that I felt to hike the trail. A wealth of memories could have been lost before they had even occurred if I had dismissed as a whim my inkling to hike. It is disturbing how tenuous our potential is due to our fervent defense of the comfortable norm.”
― David Miller, AWOL on the Appalachian Trail

“...observers, by nature, had to create a story to understand why one would set out on foot, leaving the shelters we build to plant us in civilization and set us apart from the world, the cars and houses and offices. To follow a path great distances, to open oneself to the world and a multitude of unexpected experiences, to voluntarily face the wrath of nature unprotected, was difficult to understand.”
― Ben Montgomery, Grandma Gatewood's Walk: The Inspiring Story of the Woman Who Saved the Appalachian Trail

“If you face the rest of your life with the spirit you show on the trail, it will have no choice but to yield the same kind of memories and dreams.”
― Adrienne Hall, A Journey North: One Woman's Story of Hiking the Appalachian Trail

“Now here's a thought to consider. Every twenty minutes on the Appalachian Trail, Katz and I walked further than the average American walks in a week. For 93 percent of all trips outside the home, for whatever distance or whatever purpose, Americans now get in a car. On average the total walking of an American these days--that's walking of all types: from car to office, from office to car, around the supermarket and shopping malls--adds up to 1.4 miles a week, barely 350 yards a day, That's ridiculous.”
― Bill Bryson, A Walk in the Woods: Rediscovering America on the Appalachian Trail

“The trail was designed to have no end, a wild place on which to be comfortably lost for as long as one desired. In those early days nobody fathomed walking the thing from beginning to end in one go. Section hikes, yes. Day hikes, too. But losing yourself for five months, measuring your body against the earth, fingering the edge of mental and physical endurance, wasn’t the point. The trail was to be considered in sections, like a cow is divided into cuts of beef. Even if you sample every slice, to eat the entire beast in a single sitting was not the point. Before 1948, it wasn’t even considered possible.”
― ben montgomery, Grandma Gatewood's Walk: The Inspiring Story of the Woman Who Saved the Appalachian Trail

“If you turn left at the next logging road, he said, and walk a quarter of a mile, you come to a dock on a lake, with an air horn hanging off it. You honk the air horn, and someone comes and picks you up in a boat, and they take you to this place where there's pizza and showers and cold beer!”
― Lucy Letcher, Southbound

“There really is no correct way to hike the trail, and anyone who insists that there is ought not to worry so much about other people's experiences. Hikers need to hike the trail that's right for them...”
― Adrienne Hall, A Journey North: One Woman's Story of Hiking the Appalachian Trail

“There were times when I cursed the trail and the weather for hours. But after you sulk and consider your options, you eventually realize that you can sit there and cry, or you can walk... It doesn't matter so much if you cry or walk -- I did a lot of both -- but if you turn on your partner, you'll never make it together.”
― Adrienne Hall, A Journey North: One Woman's Story of Hiking the Appalachian Trail

“All kinds of people have completed thru-hikes. One man hiked it in his eighties. Another did it on crutches. A blind man named Bill Irwin hiked the trail with a seeing-eye dog, falling down an estimated 5,000 times in the process. Probably the most famous, certainly the most written about, of all thru-hikers was Emma "Grandma" Gatewood, who successfully hiked the trail twice in her late sixties despite being eccentric, poorly equipped, and a danger to herself. (She was forever getting lost.)”
― Bill Bryson, A Walk in the Woods: Rediscovering America on the Appalachian Trail

“Have you ever dreamt about doing something totally foolish, something so absurd that perhaps you were afraid to tell anyone except possibly those closest to you? I harbored such a secret for most of my adult life — I secretly wanted to hike the Appalachian Trail [A.T.] from Georgia to Maine.”
― Dennis R. Blanchard, Three Hundred Zeroes: Lessons of the Heart on the Appalachian Trail

“AT legend has it that Pennsylvania hiking clubs and trail crews are proud of their state's nickname of Rocksylvania and don't remove rocks from the trail. In fact, some people claim they actually dump wheelbarrows full of rocks onto the trail.”
― Scott Jurek, North: Finding My Way While Running the Appalachian Trail

“...she offered an assortment of reasons about why she was walking. The kids were finally out of the house. She heard that no woman had yet thru-hiked in one direction. She liked nature. She thought it would be a lark. I want to see what’s on the other side of the hill, then what’s beyond that, she told a reported in Ohio. Any one of the answers could stand on its own, but viewed collectively, the diversity of responses left her motivation open to interpretation, as though she wanted people to seek out their own conclusions, if there were any to be made. Maybe each answer was honest. Maybe she was trying to articulate that exploring the world was a good way to explore her own mind.”
― Ben Montgomery, Grandma Gatewood's Walk: The Inspiring Story of the Woman Who Saved the Appalachian Trail

“In the spring of 2015, Warren started the Appalachian Trail in Georgia. At age sixty-five, he was a walking contradiction. His white beard clashed with his youthful eyes, his soft, round stomach opposed his rectangular rack-solid calves, and his welcoming smile conflicted with his focused gaze. A finish in Maine would mark his eighteenth thru hike of the 2,189 mile footpath. The circumference of the earth is 24,903 miles; Warren had recorded over 36,000 miles between Springer Mountain and Katahdin.”
― Jennifer Pharr Davis, The Pursuit of Endurance: Harnessing the Record-Breaking Power of Strength and Resilience

“She was simple in her intentions; she embraced the challenge of seeing the thing through.”
― D. Dauphinee, When You Find My Body: The Disappearance of Geraldine Largay on the Appalachian Trail