Skywalker--Close Encounters on the Appalachian Trail (13 page)

Elmer had hiked about eighty percent of the trail in 1976. He was so captivated by the experience that he purchased a two-story Victorian edifice in Hot Springs—that is a state historical site—to put up hikers. When I entered he made it clear this was no ordinary business. “You are a guest in my house,” he plainly stated. “You are expected to follow my guidelines.” He handed me a rules sheet.

“For sure,” I replied and ambled upstairs with my backpack.

I wandered down the main street where hikers were making rounds of the usual places (outfitter, grocery store, Laundromat, Post Office).

I passed a motel where a tall, leggy brunette was pulling something out of a red Volkswagen. Our eyes met and she came over to ask, “We saw you walking into town and were making bets. Just how tall do you happen to be anyway?”

“Almost as tall as my little sister,” I replied to her horror. (My sister is actually 5’10”).

“Are you a hiker?” I wanted to know.

“Not only am I a hiker,” she replied, “but I hiked the entire
width
of the Appalachian Trail just today.” This seemed like a pretty good line, but it unfortunately ended up being the first of approximately sixty-three times I would hear it from her over the next several hours.

“Do you want to see my home?” she asked. “My name is Tanya, by the way.” No other hiker, or any female on the trail, had invited me to see her home, so I readily accepted.

When we got over to the red Volkswagen, brimming to the top with clothes, she cheerfully said, “Welcome to my home.”

“Do you sleep at this motel?” I asked.

“Sure,” she replied, “and I’ve got a big king-size bed you could probably fit in. Come take a look.” Entranced, I dutifully followed her as she pulled out the key to her “big” private room.

Upon entering the room she said, “Look at this bed.” She jumped into it and lay down as if exhibiting a toy, as I looked on in amazement. “Here, try it,” she slapped on the mattress right next to her. “If you have to, you can lie diagonally.” This was surreal on the face of it. But there was something about this girl’s modus operandi that said she wasn’t the genie out of a bottle that she might seem on the surface.

I went to the post office to check on the long-johns I had ordered. When I returned to Tanya’s hotel she was engaged in an animated discussion outside her “room” with G.I. Joe, a big, red-headed hiker of about thirty. He trained his total attention on her to the exclusion of me, and I didn’t feel compelled or able to outlast him. I moved off to the grocery store to re-supply.

But upon leaving the grocery store I looked across the street and, to my surprise, GI Joe was gone. I would soon find out why. She saw me and yelled out, “Hey, you’re not getting away so easy.”

Dutifully, I walked back over and into her room. She posed sassily and said, “So what are you afraid of?”

“How much did this big suite cost you?” I asked. It was an obvious question to someone whose home was her car. An awkward look came over her face.

“Have you seen the Indian guy who owns this place?” she asked.

“Can’t say that I have,” I replied.

“Good,” she said. “He might be a little jealous because he has, you know, a thing for me.”

Not shocking news. I nodded, “So the price is right, huh?”

“Yeah,” she said wearily, “but there is just one catch.” I listened in rapt attention. “This guy’s weird,” she said intently. “I mean really weird. The deal is, and this is the third time I’ve stayed here, but, he gets to feel my breast for five minutes. And, God, I never knew five minutes could seem so long until I met this guy.”

I was unable to find the appropriate reply, so she continued. “And listen to this,” she said in an amazed tone. “The last time when I was staying here I turned to him in the middle of the five minutes and said, ‘Can I ask you a question? Are you dehydrated?’ He looked confused,” she continued, “and said, ‘No, why?’”

“
Because your hands are so cold
,” she said cracking up.

We entered the Bridge Street Cafe to a virtual standing ovation from the tables full of hikers. Sal Paradise and Scavenger were joyfully feasting at the next table after completing a night-time, twenty-two-mile hike into Hot Springs. Scavenger called over, “Skywalker, you’re my hero. How do you do it?”

But then Tanya stood up on her chair and announced at the top of her lungs, “I hiked the width of the Appalachian Trail three times today.”

Cheers rained out in her direction, which encouraged her to ramp it up. “Fellow hikers,” she called out. “After dinner I’m leading a group of any and all takers to the world famous Hot Springs Spa.”

She finally sat down, but then her eccentricities began to morph into lunacies. After hugging the blushing waitress several times and aggressively questioning her about her various proclivities toward both the male and female genders she took to her feet on the chair again. “Ladies and gentlemen,” she shouted out. “Silence, silence,” she barked at an inattentive hiker. “I have a question,” she said firmly when all had been hushed. “Does anybody know the difference between a female thru-hiker and a possum?”

“There is no difference” a stray male voice in the back blurted out.

Tanya, luxuriating in her starring role, shouted down all murmurs and blurted out, “The difference is, you
might
consider eating a
possum
!” The uproar was deafening as the males let out sounds of ecstasy, while the females looked at each other ashen-faced.

“But ladies, ladies, shut up everybody. … Ladies,” Tanya shouted. This was beginning to look like her fifteen minutes of fame. “Raise your hands, raise them high, like this, yeah,” she demanded, “if you are a member of the Lorena Bobbit Fan Club.”

“Remember our motto, male hikers,” she threatened, “
if you abuse it, you lose it!
”

Shouts of pandemonium erupted from all quarters of the restaurant, and Sal and Scavenger screamed over, “Skywalker, watch out tonight.”

Finally, to my great relief, the manager came over to diplomatically inform Tanya she would have to depart. I jumped up apologetically and tried escorting Tanya out as boos rang out over our ejection. At the door she gave a curtain call, screaming out, “Happy hiking,” at which point a voice in the back shot back, “Happy humping, Skywalker.”

When we finally got outside I immediately announced, “I’m headed back to Elmer’s.”

“I’ve been to Elmer’s,” she said. “Do you mind if I tag along with you?”

We got to Elmer’s and I began to introduce Tanya to some guests Elmer was entertaining. She dove into conversation (“I hiked the width of the AT three times”) as I sat over in a corner. Finally, I went upstairs to bed.

An organic breakfast is served at eight o’clock sharp every morning at Elmer’s. I got down about fifteen minutes late, grabbed the far chair at the end of the crowded table of hikers, and busied myself eating. A few minutes later everybody cleared out, except Elmer.

“I want you to know,” Elmer opened his speech, “that in the thirty years I’ve been living here and putting up hikers, last night was the single most unpleasant experience I’ve ever had here.” Gnashing his teeth he asked, “What were you thinking? I don’t understand such a thought process; bringing somebody over and letting her run amok.”

I was hoping to take a “zero (rest) day” and stay another night, and it was quite clear a half-hearted apology wouldn’t suffice. “I completely blew it,” I said plainly. “I’m embarrassed by the whole thing and apologize.”

This seemed to soften him up a bit because he said, “I guess naivete is no crime.” But then he added, “This woman is a terrible human being. She offered to have sex with one guest, accused a woman of having fake breasts, and called a close friend of mine a pipsqueak.” Finally, his diatribe ended, but it didn’t leave me resentful. He was right, and I was damn lucky he didn’t chuck me out.

When I walked onto the main street, where hikers were already roaming, I ran into Sal Paradise and Scavenger. “Skywalker,” Scavenger knowingly said. “Congratulations.”

Sal added: “That girl from last night is looking all over and asking about you.”

My stomach sank and I mildly replied, “You guys are giving me more credit than I deserve.”

Scavenger would have none of it. “Skywalker,” he said wryly, “You’re a sandbagger. You always say you can’t handle the cold weather, and the other night you claimed to have no interest in getting laid on the trail. Now here you are—the toast of the town.”

“Jesus Christ,” I muttered as I went off to find this nut case and try to muzzle her.

Bear Can ambled up and said, “Skywalker, that girl from the restaurant last night just asked us where you are.”
Oh great.
Bear Can was on anybody’s list of most attractive females and popular people on the trail.

Finally, I ran into Tanya near the motel where this whole misadventure had begun. She was standing on a wall wearing a green Mao cap and looking like a street agitator. “Where the heck have you been,” she immediately barked out. “Have you made up your mind whether you want to go to the mineral baths?”

I filibustered and headed on, deciding to cut my losses. A while later I passed by and her Volkswagen was gone. I never saw her again. Perhaps the poor owner of the motel had experienced a sudden epiphany. Or maybe he was suffering again from hypothermia in his extremities!

Chapter 7

I
t was overdue time for me to mature as a hiker and leave the crises of the first few weeks behind—the unseasonably cold springtime weather had wracked me. And there was another imperative: I had to start covering more miles. It’s a sixty-eight-mile hike over consistently mountainous terrain from Hot Springs, North Carolina to Erwin, Tennessee, the next trail town with few road crossings along the way.

I was looking left at the mountains when I exited town and was surprised how long I had to remain on the main road because the AT rarely runs on major roads for any appreciable length. After about fifteen minutes of going straight up the highway and not seeing the trail to the left I flagged down a car and asked, “Is this the AT I’m on?”

“Yeah, yeah, straight up the highway to the bridge,” came the friendly reply.

I kept on trooping and even began thinking that the rectangular white reflector plates on the guard rails off to the side of the highway were blazes. After all, they were white and rectangular. But after another mile of walking straight uphill into the sun it just didn’t seem possible that this was the trail. So I flagged down another car and sure enough it stopped immediately. “Excuse me, can you tell me if this is the AT?” I pleaded.