"Baxter officials say thru-hikers are openly using drugs and drinking alcohol, camping where they aren’t supposed to, and trying to pass their pets off as service dogs." - Sounds like a pretty good time to me.
I don't think that I can get behind a complaint that people are hiking in the wilderness _too much_. This is a good problem to have.
I doubt many would disagree with you, if the people hiking were dispersed. But there is (obviously, I think) such a thing as overuse when it comes to a given natural resource.
More importantly, treating this like it's an issue of "people hiking... too much" ignores an awful lot. The hiking isn't the problem, it's discourtesy, entitlement, and destructiveness that are worrisome.
For some reason wherever there are lots of people (at least in the US...I don't know about the rest of the world) discourtesy, entitlement and destructiveness seem to abound.
Personally I think the answer is better policing and giving out large tickets for litterers and destroyers. I don't see people smoking some weed why they hike being a real problem.
Also, when you have very many people you only need a tiny number of them to leave litter for it to be a problem.
That surprised me though. The few times I've been to the US it was absolutely litter free. I've only been to a very small number of places, and those places probably don't have people dropping litter, but after seeing those places it feels weird to me that Americans would leave trash in the wild.
Over here (UK) there is trash everywhere. David Sedaris picks litter as a hobby. Or perhaps crusade. He picked so much (and wrote about the experience) that his local council (when he lived in England) named a bin lorry (garbage truck) after him.
My experience in Italy is that they manage a high number of users pretty well without getting so uptight about things.
Just one bizarre example: you can bring a rifle into a wilderness area and kill an animal with it, but riding a mountain bike or even using a baby stroller is forbidden.
People in the US seem to get into all these NIMBY sorts of huffs, despite the vast amounts of space available.
I agree. Not all of the trail is on public land, but that sort of thing would be helped a great deal by having an adequate number of law enforcement rangers patrolling the Appalachian Trail land managed by the National Park Service. But there are nowhere near the number of rangers employed by the NPS as are necessary to have broadly effective enforcement.
I'm on a flight right now, and am not readily finding concrete figures to support this, but I am a member of the Association of National Park Rangers (though not a ranger myself) and have a little bit of familiarity with related issues.
It's not wilderness if they're leaving trash and destroying wildlife.
I sort of agree with you though - if sheer numbers of people is the problem does it matter if they carry booze or not? If the alcohol is causing problems that probably needs some extra detail.
Pets and rogue camping do cause damage. If more usage is what's important, why not just pave the whole AT? Because we already have plenty of those kinds of places!
I pondered this for a while the first time I saw a "stay on the trails" sign at a national park. The immediate reaction is to think that we're just animals like any other, so wherever we want to walk is "natural" and should be perfectly fine.
But then I realized the differentiating factor is that the only reason I was at this specific place is because somebody put a dot on the map and built a road most of the way there. So even when we leave behind most of the artifacts, we're still part of a populous advanced civilization that can easily destroy these places. No matter how alone you seem, the trail is more like walking through a "nature museum" than actually being part of nature.
Irresponsible drug use could cause an increased load on emergency rescues, but it's probably just a red herring focused on by overproscriptive government agencies. Most park rangers are awesome people, but they've still drank that LEO kool aid.
> No matter how alone you seem, the trail is more like walking through a "nature museum" than actually being part of nature.
That's true, but it's largely to help people avoid getting lost and dying in authentic nature. Backpacking trails are much further toward the "what trail?" end of the spectrum, but they're still marked trails. Going off the trail is dangerous.
(That said, another purpose of "stay on the trails" signs is to help prevent shortcut-based erosion, an entirely different goal coming from an entirely different motivation for leaving the trail.)
I didn't really think of the getting lost aspect. I was in the Badlands when I started thinking about this, where IIRC getting lost didn't seem like a major concern. But yes, not being able to easily find civilization is one of those changed assumptions people need to be constantly reminded of.
Erosion and other destruction is what I was focusing on, either concentrated because of a "shortcut" or not. We're not worried about the erosion/destruction caused by animals running all over, so what makes human animals different? That's what I was trying to tease out.
Not until you run into ruts and mud knee deep with trash all around you. There can be too many people. I think I saw in three different times used needles and one of them had a burnt spoon. It can be very frustrating.
These are the kinds of folks on the AT: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gjyNO0Ltc6U. They're partiers, not hikers, who are destroying the wilderness and opportunities for solitude.
I'm confused how people can party every night and then hike. The problem is the AT is just so accessible these are the things you're going to find when something becomes hip.
Head to the Rockies or out to Oregon if you want solitude hiking. When I hiked Mt. Bierdstadt in CO I was completely alone for 7 hours and never saw another person the entire day.
I attempted a thru hike in 2005. The thing about hiking is, doing it is a lot more difficult than talking about it. Something like 60% of thru hikers give up in the first 20 miles of their 2100 mile hike.
That being said, of course there are people like in this article, but they're only at the shelters that are close to town. Walk a bit away from the town, and you're golden.
Walking 15 miles into the woods to "party" is a huge ask. Shitty people are lazy.
The real story behind all of this is how young / homeless / disenfranchised people are turning to the trail as an outlet / support group. That is more interesting to me, and worthy of a story, rather than judgement as doom of the trail.
That 60% statistic is incredible. It takes months of planning and preparation to thruhike the AT. Throwing it all away on the second day is mind boggling to me.
Adding to this, if people want a lonely long hiking trail the Continental Divide is a good choice. My longest period without seeing another person at all was 6days, and I know several who have gone went weeks without seeing anyone(apart from hitchhiking into town for more food).
Its also just a really awesome trail (Montana/Wyoming/Colorado/New Mexico) with on a good year maybe 300 hikers starting(far fewer finishing or making significant progress)
Though it does take map and compass navigation as the trail is not complete and even when it is, there often isn't a trail just a line on a map.
That's great! When I lived in CO I hiked some of the same 1-2 day loops over and over across different seasons (some hit the continental divide). Seeing the same trail change depending on time of year was great. My favorite time hiking is in the winter (talk about being completely alone!). The stillness is so quiet, and all you hear is the snow crunching beneath your boots or the actual snow falling.
The AT just seems anti-why I like to hike, and sounds more like a backpacking trip across Europe with your HS senior class.
I would argue the locals having "hiker feeds" and handing out free beer are a cause of some of the problems. It seems hospitable, but it leads to bunching. When you have one hiker feed a year in a spot, you will attract everyone there at once. And they aren't coming for the love of the trail and to meet fellow hikers, but for the free food.
I have to wonder how many through hikers are actually boozing it up? Booze is heavy, not something that's easy to lug around. Even a bottle of Everclear won't last that long on a hike if you're actually trying to get drunk regularly.
This sounds a lot like "kids are partying in the woods, sometimes near the AT!", which has been true since trails were invented. There is a definite "get off my lawn!" vibe in the article.
It's quite possible to thru-hike the AT and sleep in a real bed in a town almost every single night. Most of the trail is shockingly close to towns, so resupplying is no problem.
When my brother thru-hiked it he said locals would often leave coolers full of iced beer out with a sign that said "help yourself", so it's not hard to get booze if you want it.
I don't think that I can get behind a complaint that people are hiking in the wilderness _too much_. This is a good problem to have.