This article was originally published in the Fall 2023 Long Trail News. It was written by GMC volunteer Kathy Elkind, who is the author of To Walk It Is to See It: 1 Couple, 98 Days, 1400 Miles on Europe’s GR5, now published. She lives in the Mad River Valley.
The September sunlight squeezing between dark spruce trunks ignites the morning mist. The green glow of moss turns the suspended water molecules an ethereal green. That’s the word I’ve been looking for–ethereal! I stop, take out my phone, and write “ethereal” in my Notes App under “Words and Phrases.”
I started hiking a half hour ago from Appalachian Gap, where my husband Jim dropped me off. My destination is 11 miles south at Lincoln Gap. I love this stretch of the Long Trail (the Monroe Skyline)—walking over Stark Mountain, Mount Ellen, Lincoln Peak and finally Mount Abraham. I’m fortunate to live 14 minutes from the trailhead. In the last four years I have walked this stretch once or twice a year while writing my memoir of walking Grande Randonnée Cinq (GR5) in Europe. I also walk the dirt roads of the Mad River Valley and climb the service road at Mad River Glen during mud season while writing in my head. But it is the Long Trail that transports me back to the GR5, and I connect to my European experiences of 2018.
I’m new to writing but not to hiking, — both walking and hiking are in my blood. At age 58 after our 1,400 mile walk the length of Europe, I had a powerful desire to write about our walk on the GR5. I spent 2019 recording stories from our three month adventure, and I spent the next three years shaping and cutting the narrative. The act of walking clears my mind and helps me see where the story needs to go. Walking the Long Trail pushes my body, but it also pushes my brain to see my story from different perspectives, like seeing the flowing ridgeline from the Mad River Valley. And then experiencing the rugged terrain that is not so flowy.
As I continue to walk through the ethereal mist on the Long Trail, I realize I’m walking at an ethereal pace. I’m floating. When we were walking on the GR5 in the Alps one morning with streamlets burbling, cow bells echoing off the valley walls, and wildflowers dancing in the breeze, I felt I had fallen into a pace at which I just flowed through the mountains. No effort was involved, just celestial steps on the path leading onward. And the words I’m searching for are “ethereal pace.” I have found the words for one trail on another trail.
By midday I arrive on the summit of Mount Ellen and enjoy the spectacular view of Lake Champlain and the Adirondacks to the west. I sit in the shade and savor a peanut butter sandwich and dried mango slices. It’s the perfect day for walking in the mountains, not too hot, no clouds. I relax and let my mind and heart wander through the landscape of my soul. Walking through the creative crevasses of my brain, lunging from right brain to left brain I seek new ideas and metaphors. How far is a minute? How far is a minute uphill?
I begin walking again, and I’m surprised as always at how steep the descent of Mount Ellen is. Using my hands to lower myself down the stony trail, I wonder, how far is a minute downhill when sixty-year-old knees are involved? I need to write about pace, distance, and time. And how they transport us.
I’ve been reading Wanderers: A History of Women Walking, by Kerri Andrews, about the lives of ten famous women writers who used walking to support their writing. They also wrote about walking itself. Their stories have inspired me to trust that walking in the mountains will guide me on my writing path.
Later in the afternoon I arrive on top of Mount Abraham with its 360-degree view. Surprisingly, only one other person is here. I traverse the bedrock summit, staying off alpine plants, and lie down on the warm granite and close my eyes. My body needs rest. The last 2.6 miles is all downhill, and my knees are not sure they can make it. Half an hour later I open my eyes, and the words “unimaginable beauty” form in my mind. Yes, this is unimaginable beauty, and those are the words I need to describe the Jura Mountains in France. Again, I add words to my phone, because my short-term memory for details is fading.
The walk down toward Lincoln Gap is long. Somehow miles grow longer as the day does. My body and mind are done. No new writing inspiration comes—I’m spent. The Long Trail has done its job of transporting me, and I’ll sleep well tonight.
As I fold myself into my car, every muscle screaming, I send gratitude to the Long Trail and the Green Mountains for providing the sacred activities of walking, hiking, pondering, and creating.
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