Book Review: Walk in the Woods

A Walk in the Woods: Rediscovering America on the Appalachian Trail

Bill Bryson is funny. Let’s just get that out of the way. Ok. This travel journal recounts the exploits and adventures of Bryson and his friend, Katz, as they, like so many others, try to walk the entire Appalachian Trail. For those of you who don’t know, the AT is more than 2,000 miles long and you have to climb to the highest point in almost every state on the East Coast. Spoiler Alert: they don’t climb the whole thing in this book. But that’s not the point. I will also brag a little in that I have done sections of the AT (including the great Katahdin, which Bryson does not summit). But he has summited Mt. Washington in New Hampshire, which is still on my bucket list. But that’s not the point. It’s not the competitive athletic nature that abounds in this novel. Quite the contrary, Bryson mixes anecdotal accounts of the day-to-day, with its typical bumbles and blunders, with lesser-known information about the history of the trail and the nature and government surrounding it. Granted the majority of this information comes when both men are still invigorated by the initial days in the south, but I appreciated Brysons respect for the little towns that he stumbles upon and what they used to be.  I didn’t know about the dangerous Pennsylvania coal fire towns or that the AT was originally meant to be a string of hostels and basically vacations and retreats above treeline, which, depending on who you ask, it kind of is. But my favorite parts resound with the funny frustration of preparing for an adventure that sounds much better in your head than when you are schlepping along ridgelines; the packing list, the food, the backpack posture, the weight, where to clip things, your first time at the outing gear store with the guy who is clearly (ridiculously even) more experienced and intense and excited about carabeaners (not sure how to spell that) than you. And then there are the bears. Pardon my French, but the best line of the whole book comes as Bryson is describing what he would do if not one, but 4 bears, came into his tent: “ Why, I would die, of course. Literally shit myself lifeless. I would blow my sphincter out my backside like one of the unrolling paper streamers you get at children’s parties- I daresay it would even give a merry toot- and bleed to death in my sleeping bag.”  Bears are an issue along the AT, but nowhere near to the obsessive degree to which Bryson makes them out to be. But it’s still funny. And the characters along the trail are priceless, including Chicken John who keeps getting lost on the trail and the woman who keeps clearing her ears by snot-rocketing. But it’s the purposeful meditation that comes with putting one foot in front of the other, and becoming “a walker” that was the most powerful. Walking through nature and history is one thing, but having the fortitude and the discipline (or the lack of social life) to decide to partake in some of the most grueling walking there is on the East Coast, takes a personality that one might say is similar to that of those that would join the Peace Corps. You know what you are getting into in the outline, but not in the details, not in the day-to-day. And it is the same personality that has the ability to adapt to the daily challenges and also incorporate breaks and rewards in an otherwise punishing and awkward life decision. And most importantly, as Bryson comes to terms with not having actually completed the full length of the AT, it is about knowing your limitations and taking joy in all the accomplishments, getting a great deal more out of the experience that the start and end points. And don’t care what anybody says: if you climbed one mountain, you hiked the AT and if you lived in a foreign country for 27 months working for development, you did the Peace Corps.