Epilogue

October 3, 2004
We've spent three days in Vancouver with my parents, visiting the library, Museum of Anthropology, UBC Botanical Garden, Vancouver Aquarium, four brewpubs, a bunch of galleries, and several good restaurants. Sitting in a car, going from place to place, is simultaneously dizzyingly fast and agitatingly sedentary. The pace of the city feels all wrong. For months, fast has meant extreme physical exertion, and now all it requires is sitting down. We try to make the best of it, for Vancouver seems like a nice city. Drivers are relatively sane and the streets are reasonable for biking. We look for moments of peace and quiet all the time, resting our complaining feet at the museum, or sharing divine truffles in the corner of a fancy chocolate shop called "sen5es". (No, that's not a typo, just big city language.)

This afternoon we met Eliza Whiteman at the enormously gargantuan IKEA in Redmond, Washington. It really seemed like every little grocery store that we visited along our entire hike would fit into this place. After all that we have been through, searching for just the right lamp doesn't seem quite relevant. We shared dinner Denny's, surrounded by despondent AARP members, and settled in for the night at the most disreputable motel of the trip. The elevator was so musty it was impossible to breathe. Dim light in the hallway made us half expect an overdosed gangster to kick down one of the doors.

Tomorrow we enter the air traffic control system, eat a few crackers (we're flying Southwest), and suddenly appear in Massachusetts, where we'll stay for a couple of days with Pete, my brother. We're so used to traveling at walking speed, mechanized transport doesn't feel fast, we're no longer calibrated for these speeds, but like a sedative. If we moved hundreds of miles in one day, surely I was unconscious or hallucinating, it just doesn't feel possible.

-Dave

October 8, 2004
At Pete's house in Rowley, Massachusetts, we made our peace, removed the license plates, and bid adieu to our friendly dead white Toyota Corolla. Shopping for a replacement car, the chauvinistic used Honda salesman thought that our Ziploc bag wallets were, "unusual". Further awkwardness came while test driving a Civic, and on the spot relearning the ordinary task of driving. While we hunt for a replacement car, we're borrowing Pete's Tahoe, which should be a big help in moving home some of our stuff currently in storage.

Pulling into our driveway was dismally anticlimactic. The place was familiar and yet distant. Before long, we walked to Hubbard Park, and climbed the tower. Camel's Hump, the Worcester Range, and the peaks of Groton State Forest called out to us, "We're here. Its okay." Back in our own kitchen, we roasted potatoes, beets, and parsnips.

-Dave

October 9, 2004
Our first full day in our Montpelier apartment. I hesitate to call it home, because it still feels incredibly foreign. At least we slept well. During our week of travel and tourism, there was no respite from the din of civilization, strange schedules, and unfamiliar beds. We were exhausted. Our bodies are definitely on the mend and my sharply aching foot hurts no more, but our minds are still rather hike-lagged. The operations of laundry and mail come easily, but we're haunted by discontent. Abandoning so quickly the ingrained rituals of camping and walking has left a void that no amount of Lazy Lady goat cheese, homebrew, homemade apple pie, and Red Hen rustic bread can fill. Sometimes I just want to sit and watch the yellow leaves fall off the maple tree across the street, and sometimes I want to latch onto some new mission, just to occupy my reeling brain.

It is strange how life in the "off-trail" world has carried on in our absence: people have moved, changed careers, had kids, bought houses, traveled, watched TV, and gained weight. Gardens unsprouted in April now wither. So many things here are different since last we were around, it is as if we just traveled through time, and that our amazing journey was just a dream.

From the Stehekin register, Fritz's words of wisdom on re-entry:

Have a plan, at least for the first few weeks
Be patient with yourself
Stay physically fit
Don't listen to the news
Go for a walk
Do not expect family and friends to understand
Keep moving
Nothing is permanent
Make new plans
Life is an adventure
Live your dreams now
Smile

-Dave

October 18, 2004
We've been back at our home in Vermont just a little over a week now. This world feels simultaneously very familiar and very alien. It is almost as if our entire journey were a dream. I can scarcely wrap my brain around the fact that we actually spent 5 months walking.

The first few days back, I felt completely overwhelmed by STUFF. Our small apartment seemed full of things that just seemed so unnecessary. What do I need a closet full of clothing for when I've worn the same t-shirt, long underwear, jacket, and shorts for the last five months. The radio blares meaningless noise from deceitful politicians, and I have to turn it off.

Hiking seems so easy to me now. Every day I woke up knowing exactly what I had to do: walk. Now that I have accomplished such a long held dream, I feel totally aimless. I have never in my life felt so goalless. I feel paralyzed by lack of vision and swamped with choices that I must make. A part of me just wants to leave everything and keep walking, but I know that would really just be running away. I keep myself going with lists of tasks that I must complete every day: phone calls to make, letters to write, computer problems to solve, projects to finish, food to cook; but all these actions seem so empty.

This is much harder than I thought it would be.

-Lexi

October 29, 2004
"You cannot travel the path until you have become the path."
Guatama Buddha (563-483 B.C.E.)

We thought that we were just going for a long walk. I expected to have an amazing journey. I didn't expect to meet so many friendly people and to become so close to some of them. Sorting through our thousands of pictures reminds me of these friends, and I miss their companionship. I also didn't expect to feel so passionately moved by the trip. We discovered an entirely new lifestyle, one filled with the magic of the wilderness and empowered with freedom. Now that I'm back in civilization, I miss the magic. I'm homesick. I might be a bit disillusioned with life off trail, but I am heartened by the confidence that I have more control over my life than I imagined. Now we're being a bit more picky about what we do with our lives. We'd be foolish not to.

Some of the other hikers we met this summer live completely for hiking. They have transient lives at "home", and stay there only long enough to sort out their pictures, make a couple thousand bucks, and plan for the next trip. But we need a different kind of balance. While the trail provides a rich community, it is hard to find intellectual challenge, it is impossible to maintain close relationships with friends, and the food is lousy. We need to create a fulfilling life with one foot in wilderness and one foot in civilization. I am sure that this hike has been a life changing experience, it will just take 20 years to understand its full effect.

A few days ago we climbed Mt. Hunger, a short local hike that is steep and scrambly by PCT standards. The physical effort was surprisingly minimal. The cool alpine air was comforting. It just seemed strange that instead of descending west to climb Mount Mansfield and hills beyond, we would simply be walking back down the way we came and going home. It is nice to be home. Fall in Vermont is gorgeous, and there's nothing quite like homemade apple pie and hot chocolate.

-Dave

celebrating at the Yaletown Brewing Company in Vancouver

Bill Reid sculpture at the Museum of Anthropology

Sea otter at the Vancouver Aquarium