My Next Adventure

I gotta get back on the trail. Follow me at wolverineshoretoshore.blogspot.com

Closing Credits

As I've said in the past, no one completes a 2,600 mile trail without a ton of love and support. The purpose of this post is to try to give props to all those who made it possible for me to hike the PCT. The list will be incomplete - there were actually hundreds of people who helped me. Some may have just given me a ride or a piece of fresh fruit or just some advice about the trail ahead of me but all of them deserve my thanks. Please forgive me for an incomplete list.

Camp Champaign: Martha Rogers was my Re-Supply Coordinator, my Research Technician, my Social Media Director and the backbone of the entire project. Had she known what a huge undertaking it was, had she known how much time and money it would cost her, had she known what a huge pain in the ass I could be, there is NO WAY she would have agreed to help me.  Lucky for me, she was there from the very inception of the idea. You think she would have learned her lesson after helping me with the AT! Sandy Lowe keeps us both grounded. Not only does she keep us sane but she came through for me when I really needed her. I love them both.

The Sisters: Patti has been helping me since I first started on the AT. She's done everything from filling and mailing re-supply boxes to dehydrating food. Now her charity, Sox For Soles, is a major sponsor of mine. Carol buys me tons of food, knits and sews custom gear for me and helps me think through some of the challenges of long distance hiking. Pat helps me all the way from Massachusetts and Mary generously contributes from Nebraska. Couldn't do it without you, ladies.

Trail Angels: Almost every hiker I know has a story about how Donna Saulfly saved their ass or the great time they had at the Anderson's. The Braatens, Piper's Mom, Shrek, the Dinsmores, and Kellie OnlyaTest Morrel, who brought maps to me out of White Pass! - it floors me to think about how many thousands of hikers these folks have helped. Every one of us drank water that Mary Barrow puts out every day. And those are just the big names. There are countless others who gave me a ride or let me stay at their place for a night . Heaven holds a special place for all of them.

My Friends: Susie, Drew and Marlyss - I love you guys. John, Susie and Amelia Cassidy, Dave and Nicole, Beaker and Dragonfly, Kristo and his family, Scallywag and his family, Hee Haw and Emily, Typo and his mom, Astro and the Gosselins, my nephew Brian, my nieces Dana, Chelsea and Laura. Plus Rambo, Schrody, Noelle Mercado, Traci Rink and her daughter Katie ... Thank you for all the love and support.

I'd also like to thank Moosejaw - especially Tom, Lola and Perry. Randy and Miranda at Ripcord, Sox For Soles and Granite Gear.

Scott Williamson's Socks

What follows is absolutely a true story. The main characters in this story are myself, my buddy Astro and PCT Legend, Scott Williamson. Me, you don't need to know much about except that I thru-hiked the PCT this year and that I have an unhealthy man-crush on Scott Williamson. As a kid, I wanted to throw a baseball like Mark Fidrych of the Detroit Tigers. As a teen, I wanted to play guitar like Eddie Van Halen but as an adult, I want to hike like Scott Williamson. I read everything I can find about the guy. I got my hopes up that I might actually meet him on the trail this year but he abandoned his SOBO hike, I understand, because of all the fires. And I'm not the only one obsessed with all-things Scott Williamson. When I confessed that I took a picture of his re-supply box at Big Lake Youth Camp, my buddy Hee Haw admitted that he did the same thing. 

You need to know about Astro. The kid was two semesters into a physics degree at Berkley when life tapped him on the shoulder and said "Congratulations. You have stage 4 Hodgkin's Lymphoma." Astro bravely underwent a stem cell transplant but the cancer persisted. When his oncologist wanted to go with more chemotherapy, Astro declined and started looking into alternative therapies. In order to make his mind and his body more receptive to healing, he decided to hike the PCT. The kid's out here fighting cancer and I'm bitching about blisters. He puts things into perspective and it was my honor to hike with him. Learn more about Astro here.

Astro, it turns out, also stayed at the Big Lake Youth Camp. As he picked out his re-supply box off the shelf, he also saw Scott Williamson's abandoned box and he noticed the ETA written on it was 8/21/12. This was mid-September. Scott was definitely off the trail. That was a shame because Astro, too, is a big fan.  Astro opened his own re-supply box and was shocked to see too little food. A miscommunication had lead to this box having only a couple days of food in it when Astro's next stop was more like five to seven days away.

You also need to know that, at this point in his life, Astro believes in signs. He believes that sometimes things are the way they are for a reason. Sometimes things are where they are for a reason. Like Scott Williamson's box, full of food, sitting on the shelf when Scott himself was clearly off the trail. Astro badly needed food - there was the food of our hero! Astro opened Scott Williamson's box! I assure you that as Astro was telling me this I yelled "You what!?" Followed immediately by "What was in it?!" Astro gave me a detailed account of all that was in the box. I listened closely, amazed and fascinated. Astro did indeed help himself to Scott Williamson's food as well as something else that was in the box... A pair of Scott Williamson's socks. They seemed to be just regular men's nylon dress socks but when Astro wore them he hiked the most miles he's ever hiked in a day: 29.6.

Astro ate Scott's food, wore his socks and even tried to mix up and drink some kind of green powder that was in the box. Ended up making him really sick. I think Astro took these things half out of necessity and half out of hero worship.  We all wanted to look inside the box but Astro was the only one with enough guts to do it.  He also had the guts to write Scott a letter explaining who he is and why he took the food. He put the letter in the box and re-sealed it, hoping it would make its way back to the world record holder.

I'd like to think that if Scott was there and he knew who Astro was and what he was dealing with out here, he would offer up anything in that box and more. Scott Williamson is a hero of mine and so is Astro. Now, if I can just get him to loan me those socks!

This Dog Is Dirty!

Wanna know how to kill a Wolverine? Take him out of the mountains, where he naturally belongs and trap him in a giant metal tube. His free spirit will fade away and eventually, he'll die.

Actually, I'm just really glad for a way to get home. Thanks so much to Sandy Lowe for the ticket. Can't wait to see my family and the members of Camp Champaign. Can't wait to sleep in my own bed. In fact, I can't wait to get back on the trail! I've got itchy feet already and those hills are calling my name. I'm being honest when I say that, as bad as Cutthroat Pass was, I'd rather be there right now than here...in Tube Hell.

I may be FROM Detroit, but my HOME is on the trail.

The French Smile

I met a woman in Vancouver, BC who had just completed the King of All Trails, the Continental Divide Trail (CDT) on a mule! She rode one mule and used a second mule to carry all her gear. Amazing! She came all the way from France, trained for a month on using and riding pack stock and then she rode from Mexico to Canada. Check out her blog here . Enjoy the pictures and scroll down a bit to see the English translation.

Not only does she ride horses and mules but she also rented a full-size Harley Davidson Low Rider and rode from San Francisco to Seattle! She is 100% BA! I'm so glad to have met her, to have shared my BC experience with her and to have had a chance to ask her a million questions about the CDT, thus further whetting my appetite to hike that trail. She even gave me her memory cards that have all the maps on them for a GPS system. I thank her kindly for that.

Her name is Krystele Marie Bodet but they call her 'The French Smile' on the trail.

Krystele and me in Vancouver, BC

The Kiwi

Did everyone know it's that it's Christchurch and not Crosschurch? I didn't know that til I met this hairy hippie. We call him Typo cause he carried that fold up keyboard the whole damn hike. Even when it was broken!

Typo is the kinda guy who would come back for ya in a rock slide. In fact, HE DID come back for me in a rock slide! I had car-sized boulders with incredible momentum barreling down from above me. Had to book it out of there double time! Luckily, it stopped before it even reached the trail but Typo heard it. He saw it was a mile or so behind him and he knew that's right where I was! When he didn't see me at camp that night, he took off SOBO to find me by headlamp in the pouring rain. Luckily I was camped just across the river. He sure was glad to see me.

Talk about 'glad to see' - when a frozen, snow-covered Typo stumbled up to cabin 21 at the Manning Park Resort (thanks Gosselins!), the dude was wrecked. One of the most joyous reunions in my life. He was so glad to be done and to see me alive, frankly, and I was so glad to see him. He answered all my questions about what happened to him as he peeled off his frozen pack. We got him warmed up as soon as possible with quilts and blankets. He ditched his wet clothes - including that black wool vest from his mom that he loves - and tried to get feeling back in his feet. After we both calmed down a bit we went next door to celebrate with Astro, his wonderful mom Betsy and his step-dad/my hiking buddy, Michael. Even Astro's grandfather, his sister and his best friend were there for a monster feast. So much good food!  We ate and swapped stories and ate again. Typo said that the very idea of this feast is what kept him going!

I guess I should forgive Typo for scaring the shit out of me when I camped a quarter-mile inside the restricted Mt. Adam's burn area. I thought he was a ranger for sure.

Gotta say one more really cool thing about this well travelled, well spoken, articulate young man: he is what we call 'quietly pure'. Dude didn't take a ride once. Not once. He stuck purely to the trail and HIKED every detour, re-route, hurdle and obstacle put in his way. He's too humble to say it about himself so I'm here to bare witness: he is as pure as the driven snow. Me? Not so much... I took two rides. One for 12 miles and one for 8 miles. Both shitty roadwalks around forest fires. That's not an excuse. Just sayin...

My friend Randy makes all kinds of cool stuff out of paracord.  Belts, bracelets, watch bands... he's pretty talented.  Check out more of his stuff here: Ripcord
His ripcord was invaluable to me on the trail.  I used to hang my food, tie my tent down, tie my boots...so many things.
Check out his site and see what he can do for you!