No Parents No Horses No Bedtime

By Tucker Atwood

In spring 2019, Tucker Atwood and his brother packed their lives into backpacks, found their way down to a far-away lonely Georgia mountaintop, and began walking to Maine. Over the next four months, they traversed the entire Appalachian Trail and had the absolute time of their lives. They met lifelong friends. They climbed over a zillion mountains. They ate dozens of jars' worth of peanut butter. They even hitched a ride on a dump truck with five of their new best friends, all sore and dirty and happy like never before. Join along as Tucker recounts the zany, exhilarating, eye-opening, life-changing trek up the historic spine of America's rugged east coast.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Tucker Atwood
• Release date: May 4, 2021
• ISBN: 9798201813208

Book preview

Are you gonna write a book about this?

Nah, probably not.

0

Sure, Survivor made a few questionable remarks to us, but we had no need to ask the questions. He was a decent enough guy, a middle-aged tattoo canvas who meets at train stations exactly when he says he’s gonna and eases back the nervousness of fresh new lives for weeks at a time every spring —

You wanna get your ass kicked on Day One, you go to Amicalola Falls; otherwise, we’re going to the top.

— and so we headed on up to the Springer summit before stopping for a quick snack. My brother and I caught each other’s peripherals and gulped as we silently understood we should’ve had like three days of food already on us. Instead we had one loaf of banana bread.

Survivor pretended not to be pissed off as we persuaded a resupply out of him — well, can’t call it that yet, I guess it’s just a supply for now. Our minds were on bulk, and so we walked out into the warm overcast Georgian afternoon with a bag of rice, a bag of quinoa, and a bag of oatmeal, all zipped up and ready to go. To provide some flavor as a guilty luxury we had snatched a cilantro lime spice that goes well with anything — except rice, quinoa, and oatmeal. God were we stupid with our food at the beginning.

A few offhanded ignored comments about vegans from Survivor later — my brother and I unsurprisingly unable to convert him — and there was Springer, the southern terminus, the hallowed unsuspecting beginning, a light drizzle greeting us with a mild middle finger to begin our journey. He gave us the go-ahead to call him if we quit, and we hoped to see him for the last time as we took our first steps on the big adventure.

First thing to do was backtrack. The summit was south of the parking lot, so our NOBO — northbound — trip began with irony. Right in that wet sloppy first mile I lost a piece of my trekking pole and made it the rest of the way with fraternal poles. Makes you wonder how many broken parts and loose gear casualties are left up on Springer each spring, lying dormant till September, jealous of their missed opportunities.

We walked eight miles through cold dead drizzly forest afternoon, trying not to think of the incredible distance we’d placed that morning between ourselves and our previous lives, leaves from last fall crumbling under our feet like hangovers put out of their rusty misery.

Early on, we met a tall lanky guy from New Hampshire — our first friend! — who had spent time hiking and scuba diving around islands off the coast of California. And now here we all were. Our new friend Scuba, my brother, and I — all asking each other why we were doing this... and deciding ultimately that the answers would come later.

I didn’t know. I tried to be confident in this big decision, these upcoming massive changes to every aspect of life, but that night as the three of us set up camp — with forty or fifty other hopeful souls beginning monumental transitions, from schools and offices and grocery stores — I looked through our tent’s coverless ceiling at the treetops, remarkably bare and sprinkled with stars, and all I could possibly think was —

What the fuck am I doing?

Whatever it was, we woke up to dewy chilled air, the echoes of owls ringing in our ears, and continued doing it. A certain rhythm developed rather quickly as my brother took the lead most of the morning. We established a brisk pace, passing many sleepy hikers just makin’ their coffees. The morning air was fresh and pure, easier to breathe than the stuff they offer in buildings, and though the mountains looked bleak in their crusty mudded post-winter pre-spring haze, it was all indescribably pretty. Earth’s graveyard was sprouting new lives, and damn were we ready to live them.

Early in the afternoon we met a young blonde kid who passed us as we huddled on the hillside of a muddy riverbank, shoveling banana bread into our mouths by the handful.

Fruitcake?

No, banana bread.

Ah, you should try fruitcake.

We also stopped and talked to a wildly bearded guy, Lionheart, who had two dogs strapped into hooks on the front of his pack. He told us he had a truck and was using it to shuttle people to and from towns while he wasn’t hiking. The next day we were all going to be at Neel Gap — everyone called it Neels Gap, though I have no idea why — so maybe we’d be wanting a ride somewhere by then.

As we rested with Lionheart and Fruitcake in an old parking lot, we attempted to get in contact with some long-lost relatives who happened to live nearby. We had never met them but imagined ourselves being showered with stories of our vague connections, and a nice hot meal — our dull bulk foods not proving tasteful enough. Really all we would want to be showered with, though, was actual showers. Boy were we getting dirty already.

We leapfrogged Fruitcake here and there throughout the afternoon. As the sun ran for the exits, we almost collapsed on an old dead log and removed our packs to give our shoulders a rest. Felt like we’d been lugging concrete.

Ugh, can’t we just set up right here?

The campsite we’re headed to is like a mile away.

— and as we would come to find out, you can always do one more mile.

We made it, triumphantly, and set up our tent between Fruitcake and a couple brothers from Vermont. Ah, friends. Later in the afternoon a group of bloggers settled down right smack in the middle of the walkway. You know, where people walk. That walkway. They were cool enough, but people wanna walk, y’know?

It was that night that I received my Trail name; these are names taken on to protect anonymity on Trail — they become a real sense of identity for hikers, a sort of escape from whoever they were in their past real-world life. And besides, the Trail was so obviously not a place for names like Brandons or Tiffanys or Jessies. This was a wild fairytale land, half-removed from standard customs. And so from then on I became known as Rosebud — one of the bloggers having noticed my hard-not-to-notice warm floral leggings and giving me a name that, I felt, represented a connection with beautiful Earth and also relentless youth. Rosebud, huh? Alright. Call me Rose or Rosie B or something along those lines, and I’ll be happy.

We saw Scuba again on the other side of the site and reminisced on all our memories together... Oh how time passes... His feet were already giving him problems, a bad sign on Day Two — and needless to say, that was the last time we saw his face.

We put the cover on the tent that night to avoid the condensation we’d dealt with the previous night. There we lay, on ¾ inch foam pads, already in routine, sore shoulders and sore legs from a 16-mile day — a big day at that point — of meeting new people and digging the cold southern air. We hadn’t spent this much uninterrupted time together since I’d moved out five years ago, and had used the day to get a little caught up — though we’d have plenty of opportunities for that in the next few months.

The next morning presented Blood Mountain, our biggest Georgia climb, and we stupidly went up without breakfast. No, I don’t know why. Our rapidly changing bodies had thought it safe to burn all possible calories during the night, not realizing we’d ask them to climb Blood on an empty promise. At the summit, we collapsed on the stone floor of the chilly wind-whipped shelter and immediately began shoving crunchy rice into our mouths.

Well that was fucking stupid of us.

Yeah, tomorrow let’s actually eat breakfast.

The bloggers showed up while we were summit-bumming and took pictures of the dreary day. We also met Aloha, a goofy kid with awesome shirts and awful feet. His wide smile was something new, refreshing, and distinct, that kind of smile that makes you remember you chose to be out here crunching rice in the mid-morning foggy mountain air. Oh yeah, this is fun! Right! Thanks Aloha!

On our way down Blood we were given our first piece of Trail Magic — up and down the Trail there are Trail Angels who sympathize with self-torturous hikers by providing snacks and encouragement in exchange for nothing at all, except maybe a promise to do the same for someone else someday. Often hikers would be given sandwiches, cheap processed treats, and even fresh fruit — just, y’know, because.

This Magic was relatively small: a single Jolly Rancher, cherry, a tiny burst of sugar to help us get down the mountain. The woman who gave them out told us that a quarter of all wannabe thru-hikers quit at Neel Gap — maybe she thought we’d been considering it and wanted to give us hope in continuing. The gesture was so kind, so utterly good-natured, that it reassured us this is the place to be.

Free food? I’ll never say no to that.

— and on down to Neel Gap we went, where a large outfitter and resupply store was our first sign of civilization in two days. Ah yes, that’s what traffic sounds like.

Those relatives of ours came in clutch and picked us up there, and for the next 24 hours or so we were treated like kings in the bright green valleys of Georgian horse farms — showers and iced tea and entire lives to catch up on. They were a nice older couple who had both lost their previous partners and had been spending the last few years keeping each other’s lonely company. He was a bit older than her, hard of hearing and a bit forgetful, but he was a cousin of our grandfather’s and had plenty of stories still tucked away. He was content, cheerful, and let her do most of the talking —

Y’all don’t have pistols on ya?? Here, y’all can take one of mine, you need it more than me.

I think we’re all set, thanks, but we will take some of that cold iced tea.

We spent the sweet spring afternoon petting horses and playing fetch with their dog Trek. My brother and I talked up our Trail experiences as if we had a clue what we were doing — in truth, we were only about 30 miles in and had almost everything left to figure out, but we ignored the reality of the situation and played the part rather well.

Their real treat to us was dinner, which we helped cook and which was overflowing in every direction — pasta, stir fry, bread, corn, and everything else they had found in their kitchen. We gobbled it up like nothing, laughing at the previous night’s bland quinoa — we were so naive back then — and thanking, blessing our new best friends every chance we got. She couldn’t believe we were attempting to do this vegan, and questioned us with that funny southern charm —

Y’all sure?? Vagan?? You won’t get the calories with a vagan diet! Here, lemme get you some jerky.

After dinner we called our parents for the first time — no, we didn’t have much to catch up on — and watched some old NCIS or SVU or LSU or whatever it is. He fell asleep in the recliner while her monologue on wine died down, and what a strange situation to be in, I thought. What a beautiful network of people we all are, huh? We had just met these people today, yet they treated us as sons or grandsons returning back home for love and cookies. I don’t care what they say about people; people are great, man.

He brought us back on Trail the next morning —

It sure was nice havin’ you boys over. Maybe we can meet up with you later on too.

Yes, and bring Trek!

— and dropped us back off at Neel Gap as we set forward into another drizzly day. Hours passed quickly as we became more confident in our hiking, our durability, and our new food choices — peanut butter, tortillas, ramen, Oreos, Clif Bars, and Pop-tarts — as we were realizing that fast cheap calories were more important than anything else. We had also just passed our first significant checkpoint — Neel Gap was a common quitting point, where a towering tree by the side of the road held hundreds of pairs of shoes filled with second thoughts. This brand of life was not meant for everyone, but we were too stubborn to consider whether that included us, and on we went further into the great big Everything.

We covered 17 miles by the early evening and found ourselves hopscotching and ducking through a terrible side trail to check out Enota Mountain Resort. This place had everything: goats, broken windows, a waterfall, new management... and most importantly, a warm dry couple of bunks to protect us from an incoming thunderstorm. We shared a 16-bunk room with just one other guy, a sciency dude from Vermont named Opus who had lived in Antarctica for a year but was now preparing to go back to school.

So, was it cold?

Yeah, but everything’s getting warmer.

Enota was a bit of a strange place, the empty off-season vibe of abandonment — combined with new management asking us what they should be doing — giving the impression that there were no real rules around here. We ran free with goats and pigs in the wide open old baseball fields. We walked barefoot up to the waterfall, discovering broken glass on the side trail only on our way back. While we cooked and spilled pasta in a gazebo with Opus — ducks quacking at a salmon pond ten feet away — a tiny dog approached us without an owner and allowed us to pet it for a few minutes before sauntering away in the other direction, still ownerless.

Should we ask around, try to find its owner?

Ask who?

...Opus, is that your dog?

We applauded the dog for its independent nature and wondered aloud what the hell kind of place this was, and why we loved it so much.

Opus decided to zero — an off day aka zero miles — at Enota the following day, which surprised us, but we figured we might see him again someday. We waited out a morning storm munching on Skittles before taking back to the mountains where we belonged.

We spent the next night around our first campfire, lost in clichés and stories with some friends we’d met in our first nervous cold days. The bloggers were there, and it turns out they’re cool and know a lot of shit about Trail life, a lot more than us. Aloha sat there with his torn up feet warming up to the fire clinging to Band-Aids — I mean, they were awful, the worst feet you’ve ever seen — and yet his unbreakable big goofy smile never left —

Yeah, it looks bad, but I’m having a blast!!!

Aloha was a true inspiration to the essential fuck-it-let’s-have-fun mentality that every hiker needs to develop if they’re ever gonna have a good time. We secretly doubted he’d make it to Maine, but we found out later that he did. With those same feet that were falling apart 70 miles in. What a champ.

The next few days, my brother and I developed our new lifestyles swiftly, learning everything from hanging food away from bears to sleeping without numbing our asses. We wore the same clothes every day like cartoon characters — never quite getting over the wretched smell of yesterday’s dirt and sweat, but accepting its inevitability — and started to build our endurance levels up to superathlete heights. We were HIKERS, damn it!

We discussed water sources, privies, and campsites as what they were — the most important pieces of information we’d ever get. Each upcoming summit garnered a Shgettit! — as in, let’s get it! — from my brother, some strange slang I didn’t understand but decided to pick up for the hell of it. We were submerging ourselves into this beautiful forgotten world, following white blazes like GPS directions, conquering PUDs — pointless ups and downs — crushing miles, eating like madmen, and having an absolute blast. We had figured out the little details of living this new beautiful life, and now —

Damn, all we gotta do is walk.

100

The end of our first 20-mile day took us up Albert Mountain — a straight-the-hell-up-the-mountain climb providing a wide contrast to the switchbacks we’d been weaving through — and past Mile 100. It felt like a real big accomplishment until it was put into perspective of the miles left ahead. Then it all