Chesterhill to Parkersburg, WV; Distance = 34.5; People Met = 6
We left the Buckeye Trail as soon as we left Chesterhill, but we started to see ADT emblems at every turn. We eventually found out why. On the second day out we stopped for lunch at a small picnic pavilion by Veto Lake Wildlife Area. Across from the lake was the home of Marvin Cowan, whose son Tim came down to take our picture. The moment he approached us saying “you look like ADT hikers” we knew he must have something to do with the trail.
Marvin Cowan
Tim has an innocence and gentleness about him, and the ADT has become his passion. Tim was involved in a serious accident awhile back which I think now limits his options in life, but the ADT fills any void. As we sat on Marvin’s porch Tim brought out a brief case with an ADT emblem on it and pulled out artistic sketches he made of the insignia, along with a postcard he received from previous ADT hikers, Dead Man Walking and Love Bug. We now knew why we started seeing so many ADT markers on this stretch.
Like so many other people we’ve met on this journey Tim wanted to keep doing things for us. He gave me a shirt with the ADT emblem on it. Later on he drove by us as we were taking a break in Belpre, just two miles from our Parkersburg destination. He turned around just to greet us one last time. The amount of thru-hiker traffic on the ADT is still sparse at best, but if it should ever pick up I don’t doubt that Tim will become a legendary trail angel like Sam Waddle or Bonnie Shipe of the Appalachian Trail.
Tim Cowan holds up the shirt he gave me
Tim was not the only ADT aficionado we encountered. Earlier that same morning Vicki Kramer stopped to ask if we needed anything, and related how she had helped Jerry and Karen along with other ADT hikers.
Jill and Vicki Kramer
Yet we spent the most time on this stretch with two people who did not know the ADT went by their property, with an ADT emblem in view from their kitchen window! Jim Polito was out planting berries for his Redbud Berry Farm when his dogs started barking at us. He looked towards his fields first to look for the cause of the barking and then noticed us walking by. Jim hailed us and invited us to stop for a break. As he finished planting his berries we went up his driveway where we met his wife Paula, slightly puzzled until we quickly explained things. Well, a break turned into an overnight stay in their furnished outbuilding.
Paula and Jim Polito
We had supper and breakfast with the Politos and long conversations throughout. Jim is a chemical engineer by trade but purchased and started the berry farm as his retirement job. Paula and I are related somehow, with Nantucket Coffins in both our heritages. By the time we left we felt like neighbors. They wished we could stay another night, and so did we, but the journey beckons us onward. Stopping short at their place meant putting in a 25 mile day into Parkersburg, our longest day with full packs since coming down the Shelf Road in Colorado, but it was definitely worth it.
Other Photos
Like a boat out of water
Watch that first step!
Darn banana peels!
