The ADT Journey – Week 01

We started our journey from Point Reyes with temperatures in the forties and driving rain.  Both of us started the hike relatively out of shape, but without full packs we went the first 6 ½ miles without stopping.  At that point my nephew Tom joined us for the rest of the day, which eventually cleared up.  That first day eliminated concerns about Cindy’s physical ability.

Adrenaline alone often carries a long distance hiker through the first day out, but then there can be hell to pay the next day.  Cindy still was doing fine, but her cognitive difficulty surfaced.  As we walked along a ridge with a spectacular view of the Pacific Ocean I asked Cindy, with my digital recorder in hand, about how she felt on the second day out.  

Friends in Cindy’s hiking circle called her “Gabby Galvin,” after her maiden name and her ease at conversing with anyone, anytime.  Any number of her hobbies, or her reactions to nature, could spur a warm gabfest from Cindy.  The question I asked should have been a lob for her to hit out of the park, but she gave a timid, restrained answer instead.  This was a consequence of the insecurities instilled by her affliction.  I seldom would be using my digital recorder with Cindy during the journey.

Our first week on the ADT provided a significant contrast to the wilderness trails Cindy or I hiked in the seventies and eighties.  We “camped” the third night out at the Hayes Valley Inn in San Francisco, arranged by Dennis, a Lions Club connection who managed the Inn.  The fourth day out we hiked through three different cities, each culturally distinct from the others.  The farmer’s market on the wharf in San Francisco bustled with activity, while on the other side of a ferry ride across the bay brought us to seemingly deserted Oakland.  By the end of the day we had passed through the college town of Berkeley.  Nope, this was not like hiking in the wilderness at all.

The first week of breaking in to long distance hiking can be tough, but we had company to boost our emotions.  Leslie, a high school classmate of mine, joined us for hiking the first twelve miles of our fifth day out. Then we were hosted at the end of the week by legendary hikers Ken and Marcia.

Our hosts gave no indication they detected something amiss with Cindy.  Perhaps unlike Marty, a hiking buddy from the seventies, they had no frame of reference for gauging her decline.  Or they may have been focused on what they considered to be my own cognitive shortcomings.

Though Ken and Marcia took up long distance hiking later in life, they were already the first two people to complete the Grand Slam of long distance trails.  I would become the third when we finished the ADT, but I hiked the other three trails decades ago.  We were of similar ages and similar achievements, but adapted to much different hiking cultures.

Most of my previous hiking was done in the era when “weight is no object” for long distance hikers.  Part of the reason for this mantra, scorned by most modern hikers, was to go long stretches in between supply stops, to maximize time spent in wilderness in proportion to the time spent in town. I also had much of the heavier gear used in that earlier era.  Hikers like Ken and Marcia now generally walk more miles per day, with much lighter packs.

At the end of our stay, our legendary and generous hosts gave me skeptical glances as I packed to begin our second week of hiking.  The weight I had in my bulky, external pack for two days equaled what they might pack for a week.  I also hobbled along with a foot injury that felt like I had gout.  I would learn over the course of the journey that too many miles in a day aggravated my left foot, not too much pack weight, but our hosts may have placed bets as to when we were destined to quit the hike shortly after we left behind the good graces of their hospitality.