[pct-l] (no subject)

[marmot marmot]

Dear Iceaxe
Please write up your stories of your TC and send them off to the TC committee. Years after people hike the trails some hikers are still getting their plaques. I personally love reading each hikers accounts of their hikes. I would really like to see you turn up this year or any year at the Gathering Originally Alice Gmuer,Steve Queen,Ray and Jenny Jardine were given the first plaques in '93. But, each year people apply who have hiked the trails years and years ago. Come to the Gathering and allow us all to cheer and congratulate you. That is what the event is every year. I mean it when I say I cry every year. It touches my heart to hear each story.  It is a "Gathering" of people who love being out there for month after month. Each story I hear adds to the bonding. It's walking cold,hurt,lost and finding the strength to do that ,not for an award,(I wouldn't walk across the street for that) but because you just love being out there. All this talk about doing it for the award, I find confusing. Not many people I know do that. They hike the trails for the same reason they always have---to be where they want to be--in the wilderness. 
 I only ask people each year not to claim to have done the whole trail,if you did not, because I'm finding out in the changing trail culture, many hikers are claiming the whole trail without a continuous footpath. They yellow blaze whenever they miss their friends or run out of money or a road walk feels too hard. All of that is difficult and anyone can make any choice they want. But then they have to take responsibility for the choice. Each year many people have to have shortened or stopped hikes for multiple reasons. But in the past few would have thought it acceptable to then claim that they had finished. Some times hiking the trail is just impossible. (That's why I talk about how sad and painful it is when you chose a year that is especially difficult). I have two trails that are unfinished and probably always will be. Everyone who doesn't tell the truth about their hike is probably well known. But the PCT and Aldawest are not aware of a hiker is not telling the truth. They have not seen it. 
If I had not heard of and seen multiple incidents  of this behavior over the last few years---I would not know. Actually the hikers write about it themselves in their on-line blogs. I read them when I'm stuck in town. It is publicly documented but would take more people to monitor the yellow blazing than any of the organizations has the time or energy. So I'm appealing to their sense of honor. 
Someone said that Yogi said no one does every step of the trails. What she was talking about was having to take alternatives ---not hitch hiking and skipping sections of the trail. I can't imagine her ever yellow blazing. She is an honorable person. 
See you at the Gathering I hope
Marmot
Sent from my iPhone

> On Jun 25, 2018, at 1:13 PM, Matthew Edwards <iceaxehikes at gmail.com> wrote:
> 
> "So basically that's what this has all come down to?? To get a certificate
> or some kind of award for thru hiking the AT or the PCT?? I would argue
> that anyone out there doing it for an award or some kind of certificate
> shouldn't be out there in the first place.? The hike in and of itself is
> its own reward.? I've always thought thru hikers were people who thru hiked
> for the love of it and the way I see it you shouldn't need a pat on the
> back for something you love to do.?? It's not a profession or a job, or an
> academic achievement ", Dave
> 
> You know Dave,
> I did not put in for the Triple Crown Award even though I did achieve that
> feat.
> Against closures on the CDT too.
> You make a good point.
> Those were my reasons too.
> 
> But years on..
> I wish I could have gone to that ceremony in Washington state.
> Shake Yogi's hand, see Billygoat, comiserate with trail buddies.
> It is like a funeral; not for the dead, but for the survivors.
> Big hugs to everyone.
> In a good place now 9 years from the days in the Sierra south of Tahoe
> along the PCT.
> Still hurts a bit to talk about that beautiful life.
> The possibilities I realized for myself.
> The pain I felt for myself and those that fell down along the way.
> The gratitude for generosity I can never repay, even if I try, to those
> that helped me.
> 
> I am still completely screwed up from the trail.
> Don't carry a fully loaded pack with "going to Canada gear" anymore.
> But the trail haunts my life in good and bad ways everyday.
> I say; go get that award.
> If I had the money at the time, and had conquered my reservations about it.
> I'd have that award.
> But more importantly; the chance to thank a small group of folks that
> helped me.
> -iceaxe
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