_* Featured image source is www.homemadewanderlust.com

The first part of the title is pretty self-explanatory. The second half may need a little explanation. For that, I am going to post an excerpt from my book, The Last Hike, and let Paul (Suicide Squad) explain it to you since he already did so with such eloquence.

So, yeah, pooping in the woods, it’s a bit of an art form. There are several ways to accomplish this task. I’ll talk about my top two preferred methods. The first one is the log method. I find a fallen tree in the woods that will provide an ample surface to plant my ass. I take my knife (some people bring trowels but I found on previous hikes that my knife worked just as well) and dig a six inch hole behind the tree. Then I hang my ass out and let the load drop. If you are lucky, the payload comes down fully contained in the hole. If not, then there is the unpleasant task of finding a stick to make, ahem, some adjustments until it’s all in the hole. Once that goal is achieved you cover it up with the dirt. Oh wait, I forgot about the toilet paper, something you would never want to do on the trail (or anywhere else for that mater) or things would get quite uncomfortable as you walked. I put my used TP into the hole also, and cover it all up. Now I already told you I follow the Leave No Trace policy, but there are some ultra devoted hikers that will pack out their used TP. Uh huh, no way is this happy hiker doing that. I did make a concentrated effort to pack out marine TP which breaks down quickly. It’s more expensive and sometimes hard to find, but that is far as my dedication goes when dealing with shit paper. If there are no fallen trees about then I shift over to my alternate mode, the tree huger method. I find a sturdy tree that I am able to get my arms all the way around, squat, and hug the tree. The rest of the steps are the same as the log method with one slight modification. I highly recommend totally removing your hiking pants/shorts and underwear before releasing the payload. If you are good you can just drop them and avoid the mess, but why take the chance?

Paul “Suicide Squad” Jackson in The Last Hike

Now you are all edjumencated up on Cat Holes. That information will be useful a little further down this yarn.

It had been over two years since the last time Finn and I went out on an overnight backpacking trip on the Appalachian Trail. We had been back in the mountains of Virginia for almost three months to get the last of my post-transplant work done. In that time we had been out doing day hikes trying to get back in shape for hiking. They were tough but doable. With only two weeks left to go until we left Virginia heading west, the Juneteenth long weekend was the only chance left to do a backpacking trip. So I scheduled it for that Friday through Monday. Four days and three nights out on the trail! It was going to be fantastic and it was; and wasn’t. This is me, what did you expect?

My plan was to start from a trailhead called Hog Pen Gap in Amherst County Virginia and head north. I had a tentative plan but knew I was not in peak form yet, so went into it knowing my mileage could vary. I had no idea how much it would vary when I started. After I got Finn’s backpack on and hoisted my monster on my back, we walked away from the jeep and hit the trail, heading north. The trail immediately began climbing and so did we. Finn bounded up with ease. Me? Not so much. I was huffing and puffing my ass off. It didn’t take me long to realize I was far below the fitness level I thought I had returned to. So, the miles would definitely be low. I was only shooting for four miles that day anyway. Now I was thinking it wouldn’t even be that. It wouldn’t be. Half that in fact, but the worst part is that wasn’t two miles forward movement. Nope. I had to backtrack. Why? Well that’s where those cat holes come in.

I trudged my way up 300 feet (not even that bad) to the top of the first climb when it hit me. An urge. A bad urge! I unbuckled my pack, let it fall, and began to frantically search for a suitable tree off the trail out of view of any other hikers that might be coming along. I found one and headed that way. Halfway there I realized I forgot one very valuable item in my pack. TP! After returning to the abandoned pack, retrieving the item, and back to the tree, I was about to explode! I pulled the knife out of the scabbard that hung around my neck and dug a hole. Was that six inches, I asked myself? Looked more like five and a half. Good enough! Off came the hiking shorts. Off came the underwear. I grabbed the tree in a bearhug and squatted. I’m sure you don’t need me to explain the rest of what happened, other than to say my payload was less than solid, and leave it at that. Once everything was properly covered up and all my clothes back on, I took five steps away from the tree when it hit me again! I had no time at all to find another tree. So, to avoid digging up what I already knew was down there, I used the other side of the tree. You know, the side facing the trail? Ass hanging out for all the hikers in the world to see if they happened to come strolling along at that moment. Luckily (for me and them), nobody did.

Back at my downed pack, I sat and leaned back on it. What was going on here? If you read my last post, then you’ll know I contracted COVID and was down for three weeks not long before this hike. However, I had been off quarantine and feeling just fine the whole week before we left. I didn’t know if this was some lingering issues from that or a whole new problem. One thing I did know as I was sprawled out, listening and feeling my stomach continue to gurgle, this was going to be one shitty (yes, intended) hike if I had to stop and dig cat holes constantly. There’s a saying in the hiking community, listen to your body. I listened and it told me don’t push it today, pal. I decided to listen even though I was bitterly disappointed in only getting maybe a mile in for the day. The rest of the miles would be backtracking back to Hog Pen Gap. That’s what I decided to do. There was a big camping spot at the gap and the plan was to camp there for the night and see how I felt in the morning. I also decided to change the itinerary and hike south the next day if I felt well. It would take me over an area of the trail that I had already been before but there was a way I could utilize another side trail that would loop around from the AT and back to Hog Pen and we could take our time and stay out for the next three days.

Another reason I wasn’t too upset with this change of plans, was that the new route would take me to a place that I had been interested in for years. It was a place just off the trail where a thru-hiker had been found murdered in 2011. I discovered this fact after Sawyer (Finn’s older brother) and I did our first ever solo overnight hike in the same area several years after that. The murder has never been solved and I have been trying to write a book about it for a while. Now, I would be able to do a little more research in describing the place and take some pictures for the book if it ever gets written. I say if, because in doing research for the book I have come up against a brick wall when it comes to getting information from the authorities on the case. Because it is still an open investigation, the local police in Amherst, the county police, and the state police refuse to discuss any of the details with me. I also filed a FOIA request with the FBI who has overall responsibility for the case since it happened on federal land. They denied me for the same reason. I haven’t given up on the book yet, but it has certainly been moved to one of the back burners.

With the new plan made, I strapped the pack on and we headed right back down the mountain we had just hiked up. As we approached Hog Pen Gap there was a side trial with a marker indicating there was a water source that way. Even though we didn’t need any water at the moment (only two miles hiked), I wanted to check out how reliable the source was. What I didn’t want to do was haul my pack down there and back. I dropped it off under a big tree with sprawling branches. You might think that I would be crazy to leave my pack there by itself, but most hikers do that on the trail. There is hardly ever a time when another hiker will mess with someone’s pack. When we see a pack sitting by itself, it usually tells us one of two things. The hiker is having a business meeting (refer to the cat hole quote again) or getting water. There are some rare occasions where a pack will get messed with or stolen but it usually isn’t a hiker that did it. They don’t want to carry anymore weight than they already are.

Walking down the side trail, sans pack, with Finn bounding along by my side, we headed toward the water source. Along the way we saw a back country campsite off to the side of the trail. There was a flat spot for a couple of tents and a fire ring built out of rocks. This got me to thinking. At Hog Pen there are many tent spots and several fire rings which tends to attract quite a few hikers at night. While I love to spend time among hikers (my usual social anxiety is non-existent on the trail), I was thinking that digging catholes there might be difficult and privacy at a very low level. A small campsite off the main trail might be a better option for me. However, the campsite I had just spied was right out in an open field with no trees around to provide shade. Not really an ideal spot. That point shortly became moot as we happened upon another primitive site that was nestled among a number of trees and looked very cozy. Yup, this is where we are going to stay.

We continued down to the water source which was flowing deep and fast, something a hiker is always thankful for. While I was letting Finn get a drink, a female thru-hiker showed up to get some water. I chatted with her for a bit while she filled up. We all headed back out at the same time, but with her well toned trail legs from her long distance trip, she soon rocketed away from us. I continued to sloth my way back up the side trail while Finn bounded up ahead, turned around and looked at me disapprovingly while I caught up, then repeated the process all the way back up to the trail intersection. When we got there I could see the same female hiker and another guy standing under the tree where I had dropped my pack. I met the other hiker and we chatted for a bit longer when I heard a sound off in the distance.

“Was that thunder?” I asked them.

“Yup,” the girl said.

“We gotta get going,” the guy said.

They quickly donned their packs and, swift as gazelles, hiked north on the AT. I looked at the sky which was a bright blue but then I heard another unmistakable sound of thunder and it sounded like it was getting closer. “Come on, Finn. We are on a time crunch now.” I hoisted my pack and we hiked back down to the primitive camping site we had chosen for the night, while hearing more thunder indicating that a storm was advancing our way.

Usually, top priority when I got into camp was getting my bear (food) bag hung up first to keep any Yogi Bears from coming around looking for some pic-a-nick baskets, but the priorities had changed. First order of business was to get that tent up before we got soaked! Actually, my stomach decided that the first order of business was to dig another cat hole. That was the first of many cat holes that would be dug at that site and it cost me some time as I could already see the skies darkening as I shoveled dirt back over the hole. I got the tent up in the most basic of configurations (didn’t even stake it down) just as the skies opened up. I got Finn inside, shoved my pack in, then followed. It was a close call and I only got slightly wet. Inside, Finn settled down for a nap, and I spent the next two hours playing on my phone, listening to an audiobook, or joining Finn. The storm got pretty intense at one point, buffeting the poorly erected tent back and forth so that I thought it was going to collapse. It didn’t, and when it was all over the sun came back out and started drying everything. We emerged from the tent and began our normal camp chores which I won’t bore you with here because I bored you with them in the video.

We did walk up to Hog Pen at one point just to chat with some other hikers who had stopped for the night and had a good time doing that, but my stomach wouldn’t let me stay as long as I would have liked. Back at camp, I cooked up a lasagna backpacker meal and filmed an instructional video on cooking with a backpacker stove. Two of the hikers from Hog Pen stopped by to say hi on their way back from getting water and remarked at how nice the campsite was. I could tell that they were wondering why I was camping away from the others so I explained to them that I was having stomach issues. They stopped me right there, very aware of what was going on since it had probably happened to them once or twice on their journeys. After that, I built a fire, which was a challenge with the wood being wet from the storm, but I got it going. The night actually got a little chilly so I sprawled out right next to the fire. Finn doesn’t like campfires, or more accurately, the smoke they produce. He was laying down beside the tent which was a considerable distance from the fire. The wimp.

Hiker’s midnight came upon us and we retired to the tent where I listened to some more of my audiobook before we both fell asleep. I got a pretty good night’s sleep except for the times that cat holes called me, and thankfully there was only one. They seem to plague me more often in the daytime. The next morning, I got up around eight, determined to get back on the trail and execute Plan B. I unzipped the tent to see a clear beautiful sun filled sky. I let Finn out with his leash dragging behind him to go do his business as I sat in the open vestibule of the tent. As awesome as the day seemed to be, my insides were less than so. I still wasn’t feeling all that well and thought I would just stretch back out again for maybe half an hour. Four hours later when I woke, gasping at the time I saw on my watch, there was Finn sleeping at my side. He had been free for four hours (something I normally would have never done) and had not wandered off but stayed with me. What a great dog! I should take some time here to say that Finn was having the time of his life no matter how many times we changed plans. And change plans we did again as I was feeling even worse than before.

We ended up taking a zero. For those of you who have read my books, you’ll know what that means. For those of you who haven’t; well, shame on you! What are you waiting for? I’ll explain it to you anyway. It’s when you hike zero miles that day. In other words, a day off. Seeing as how I was only going to be on the trail for the long weekend, I hadn’t planned any zeros. My stomach, however, planned one for me. We actually did a little hiking as we explored some of the area around and chatted with other thru-hikers at hog pen and down at that water source, but we mostly just took it easy and I had several cat naps to go along with my several cat holes.

Another night in the tent and when I woke up feeling not much better than before, I decided to hit the abort button. Thing weren’t getting any better stomach wise and why stay still while suffering when the jeep was only parked on the other side of Hog Pen? So around noon we packed up and marched back to the jeep. The stomach issue did not affect my appetite, so after grabbing a Whopper burger from Burger King in Buena Vista, the closest town, we took a leisurely couple hour drive back to the rig along the Blue Ridge Parkway. We stopped along the way at a scenic overlook to eat that burger and chicken strips for Finn.

I classified this trip as a trail failure because my body failed me. It turned into more of a camping trip than it did a backpacking one. However, we were still out there for three days and two nights and it feed my mind and spirit with positive energy as well as Finn. Not quite the way I had envisioned it would be, but I was glad to take what I could get before being away from my beloved trail for a long period of time. Our next adventures will having us traveling out west (with a stop in Texas) next week. We plan on going back to Colorado and beyond. The only thing I need now is to break Michelle out from Canada. That’s a whole other story.

Video is below if you’d like to watch.

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