Hiking Log – Post Script 1-4-24
Back in 2017-2019 I wrote a series of excerpts from the trail log which was located on a New York portion of the Appalachian trail. Each new edition included a quote from a hiker, along with my insight into what the person might have meant. I have cause to add one more update, as you will see below. Happy reading!
Last night we had the pleasure to have a couple over for dinner. Somewhere among all the other conversation with both of them, we started discussing our female guest’s past adventures. We knew she had walked the entire Pacific Crest National Scenic Trail a few years ago, solo. What we did not know was that she had also walked the entire Appalachian Trail which is located on the east coast. She said while doing that hike, she often wrote in trail logs because that’s how the hikers who knew each other could keep track of where their friends were, and/or what kinds of things were happening on the trail that they needed to know about. I jumped up from the dinner table and ran to my office to collect the trail logs, which I still have in my possession.
After flipping pages for a while, she highlighted one entry, and I highlighted another. They are:
5-11-17
Fjord, NOBO, walking on a bit!
5-14-17
Xena was here again, enjoying Mother’s Day
So what was the significance of these two quotes?
Our guest’s trail name was Fjord. She was “NOBO” or northbound, and she was letting fellow hikers know that she was still on the trail walking north and wasn’t planning on stopping yet.
My trail name was Xena. On Mother’s Day in 2017, my husband and I were out for a walk on the trail and we stopped by the log book to just check in.
So here I am, sitting in Montana in my dining room, with a hiker who also lives in Montana. We just found out that we were both at the exact same spot on a trail in New York State only three days apart back in 2017. The odds of that happening are astronomical. Our entries are only a page apart. Talk about a coincidence.
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P.S. She also found an entry from a fellow hiker and she sent it to him while we were still together. He was tickled to see it.
P.P.S. I am keeping the log books. Who knows what else I will find?
Until next time, happy trails!
For the post which explains this series, click here. You can read all the previous hiking posts by clicking here.