[pct-l] Trail Names

[abiegen at cox.net]

Gary Swing wrote:

>Diane's comment below is my favorite.
>Yeah, maybe I over-reacted to Paul's remarks. You can just use my birth name for now.

How about "Reactor?" ;-}

Anyway you do have to be careful about being given a trail name. Just today I was on our trek to the coffee shop with Piper. We were talking about trail names and I wandered off topic a bit.  I was telling her about trying to upload some videos to YouTube. I use my trail name TrailHacker for everything and have for 15+ years. I was mumbling on and on about trying to log on to YouTube and the problems associated with that and ended my tirade with "Gave up!'

Piper who apparently wasn't listening very closely, turned to me and said, "Did you say 'Gay Bar'? Is that your new trailname?" No, no, NO! But that is how it goes on the trail.

The best trail name is one that is mildly self-deprecating to show you have a sense of humor, says something insightful about you and has a very interesting and amusing story behind it on how you got the name. There are hikers who are very good at giving trail names - Zelda of Tarzan and Zelda have given out several good ones.

Examples:

Not-a-Moose - a young Canadian woman who didn't find out that the back of the Canadian Quarter was a Caribou and not a moose until she was an adult.

Apricots - a young woman who wanted to take some healthy food on a backpack trip with friends and showed up with a five pound bag of apricots. 

Cuddles -  a man who while hiking the PCT sitting and drinking around a campfire with other thru-hikers in a contest to see who could come up with the worst trail name. Cuddles unfortunately came up with Cuddles.

Princess - a fit rock climbing instructor he used to egg on the noobie climbers by taunting them, "you can do it princess. Keep going princess."

Disreali Gears - three young Israeli men who had just finished their military service before hiking the PCT in lock step military fashion, looking like gears in machinery.

Gorgeous and Beautiful - two young women who were, well, gorgeous and beautiful. But the funny part was - they were always together on the trail so I never could figure out which was Gorgeous and which was Beautiful. They were just "Gorgeous and Beautiful."

and so on....

TrailHacker

"When my feet hurt, I can't think straight"
Abraham Lincoln