Miles to Go
exploring Virginia's section of the Appalachian Trail
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Text by Nancy S. Moseley
In order to assay the grandiosity that is the Appalachian Trail, one need look no further than the inspired words of author and novice hiker Bill Bryson ("A Walk in the Woods: Rediscovering America on the Appalachian Trail"): To my surprise, I felt a certain springy keenness. I was ready to hike. I had waited months for this day, after all, even if it had been mostly with foreboding. I wanted to see what was out there. All over America today people would be dragging themselves to work, stuck in traffic jams, wreathed in exhaust smoke. I was going for a walk in the woods. I was more than ready for this. Spanning from Springer Mountain in Georgia to Mount Katahdin in Maine, the 2,193.1-
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NRV MAGAZINE
mile linear footpath ambles along 14 eastern states. It took more than a decade to build and was declared completed in 1937, though improvements and minor reroutes continue. In fact, this year commemorates the 100th anniversary of Benton MacKaye's article entitled "An Appalachian Trail: A Project in Regional Planning" that inspired the creation of the famed trail system. Published in the “Journal of the American Institute of Architects,” the article refers to the divides and ridges of the mountain chain as the "Appalachian skyline" and pitches the benefits that recreational development of the area could have being within a day's drive from more than half the nation's population.
May/June 2021
