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Musing

The Appalachians’ Pull: The Part I’ve Had Trouble Putting My Finger On

One of the things I like best about the Appalachian Mountains is how much history they’ve seen. In the scheme of what humans can observe directly, without technological aid, they’re about as close to immortal as it gets.   Born nearly 500 million years ago in an intercontinental crash, the Appalachians are not just older than […]

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Halftime in the Smokies: Playground and Proving Ground of the AT

My and Rachel’s stories from the Smokies fall along two surprisingly complementary lines. One is that the Smokies have been hard, despite our having hiked them before. We accidentally planned three days of food for a four-day hike, forcing us to either go quickly or go hungry (we chose “quickly”). We experienced temperatures warm enough […]

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4 Bad Decisions (and 5 Good Ones) We’ve Made So Far

Hiking the trail is humbling. To someone, and probably to a lot of people, you’re going to look like a noob. You’re going to slip, spill your dinner (more on that in a bit), and break your stuff, and maybe even do all three at once. Rachel and I have made some wrong moves, but […]