Episode #255 - Erik Russell (Lars)

Mighty Blue On The Appalachian Trail: The Ultimate Mid-Life Crisis

We have a couple of interesting topics on the show this week. Our first guest, Erik Russell, wrote to me to convey a notable if somewhat jarring, incident that he witnessed while hiking the AT in the 1997. Erik took a lot from both the hike and the incident, and he tells us how those two things contributed to help shape the man he is today.

Erik is one of the few guests I've had on the show who had to search high and low for pictures of him hiking! Eventually, he found the only two that he has from his 90s thru-hike, as well as two from recent days on the trail.

He also referred to an organization that he led trail crew for. This is the Student Conservation Association (SCA). They run a large number of programs for different ages including the Summer trail crews for teenage volunteers, Americorp programs and others. The SCA may be of interest to listeners who would like a way to work within the trail community or who have teenage children. Their website can be found at https://www.thesca.org/

Our ATC segment is entitled "Stay in the Know" this week, with Communication Director, Jordan Bowman. While we started with that subject, I eventually moved it on to the other interesting topic I mentioned earlier.

Finally, today, Larry Luxenberg's Walking the Appalachian Trail warns us of the multitude of things that COULD go wrong on a thru-hike. Be warned!!

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