November 26, 2025 • 59 mins
A snowstorm at Springer Mountain. Two brothers in their seventies, both Vietnam veterans, staring down 2,190 miles of Appalachian Trail and a tangle of pain that maps can’t solve. That’s where our conversation with Rand Timmerman begins—raw, funny, and unexpectedly tender—as we unpack the hike that stretched into a three‑year passage through grief, addiction, and the kind of honesty only a long trail demands.
Rand walks us through the blueprint that made the miles possible: two vehicles, opposite‑direction section hikes, camps near trailheads. We dig into what the AT really asks of older hikers—elevation, rocks, relentless climbs. The stories are vivid and human: a rattlesnake guarding its meal, seven straight days of bear sightings in Shenandoah, and the day a bad slip on a Massachusetts rock slide turned into blood, shock, and eventually a hip replacement. Through it all, the brothers’ differences become their strength—Ron’s pilot‑precise logs and spiritual reflections, Rand’s people‑first eye and gritty humor, including a running gag where hikers mistake “Ran Bow” for the movie Rambo.
The heart of the episode lives in their inner work. Ron, shattered after losing his wife, stumbles into a literal halo of light on a gray Father’s Day and feels peace wash in. Rand, four years sober when they start, carries recovery into the woods and finds that the rhythm of hiking mirrors the 12 steps: one step at a time, surrender, service. A terrifying night on a knife‑thin ridge in the Smokies becomes a prayer and a turning point. By the end, one brother tags the terminus with his son, the other chooses to stop with integrity—and both finish with something larger than a summit photo.
If you care about the Appalachian Trail, long‑distance hiking, resilience or how to keep moving when the map turns mean, this one’s for you. Share it with a friend who needs courage, and leave a quick review to help others find the show.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
SPEAKER_09 (00:00):
Thanks for tuning in this week.
Remember to hit that subscribeor follow button wherever you
downloaded this podcast.
And if you're enjoying thecontent, please tell a friend
about assorted conversations andhelp me spread the word.
Thanks.
And now for this week's episode.
SPEAKER_08 (00:29):
Everyday people following their passions.
SPEAKER_06 (00:33):
That's probably like one of the highlights of my life
so far.
Just being able to be creativelike that.
Something I've always wanted.
SPEAKER_03 (00:41):
And then I decided to get another hive, and that
turned into a lot of hives.
SPEAKER_02 (00:47):
As long as I can do that, I want to be a good
citizen, help people out.
SPEAKER_08 (00:52):
Putting themselves out there, taking chances, and
navigating challenges along theway.
SPEAKER_07 (00:59):
I I absolutely identified with having stage
right because, you know, anytimeI went on stage, I just felt
like I was having a hot attack.
SPEAKER_05 (01:06):
Very first lap, very first practice session, I
crashed, turned the car upsidedown, made a spectacle of
myself, and I got back on thathorse and started riding again.
SPEAKER_08 (01:16):
As they pursue what makes them happy and brings them
joy.
SPEAKER_00 (01:21):
As long as people are having a good time and I
have the opportunity to putsmiles on people's faces, I love
what I do.
SPEAKER_01 (01:27):
I have done things that I never thought I could do.
SPEAKER_12 (01:32):
To have somebody tell me how real it looks and
how, you know, from their actualmemory.
Because that's telling me Icaptured what I was trying to
get.
SPEAKER_08 (01:44):
Welcome to Assorted Conversations.
I'm your host, Helen.
SPEAKER_09 (01:50):
It's Wednesday, and welcome to anybody who's joining
Assorted Conversations for thefirst time, and welcome back to
anybody who's coming back foranother episode.
I am so glad you are all here.
So this week's episode is prettyinspiring.
My guest this week, Drew hikedthe Appalachian Trail with his
(02:11):
brother, and they were both intheir 70s.
Now, although that's an amazingphysical feat in itself, you'll
hear from Rand Timmerman, myguest this week, that both
brothers not only used thisjourney to complete a physical
goal, but they also used it tohelp them work through life
(02:35):
difficulties.
One was battling addiction andmaintaining sobriety, and the
other one was battling grief.
And you'll hear at the end ofthis 2,000-mile journey how they
found peace and closure, as wellas some funny trail stories, and
some pretty scary trail stories.
(02:57):
So not for the faint of heart,but a fantastic story.
So take a listen to this week'sepisode, and I'll see you on the
other side.
This week's guest has quite thebackground from the army in
Vietnam and on to becoming a JAGofficer to practicing law in
(03:17):
upstate New York.
Rand Timmerman has seen and donea lot, but those things pale in
comparison to what heaccomplished at the age of 72.
He, along with his brother,strew hiked all 2190 miles of
the Appalachian Trail, and theypublished a book about their
(03:38):
journey.
I am thrilled to welcome RandTimmerman to Assorted
Conversations.
Hi Rand.
SPEAKER_04 (03:44):
Hi, Helen.
Thank you so much.
SPEAKER_09 (03:46):
How are you?
SPEAKER_04 (03:48):
Oh, I'm fine.
I'm good.
SPEAKER_09 (03:50):
Good, good.
And and I I trust that you'verecovered from that long walk in
the woods.
SPEAKER_04 (03:55):
Yes.
Well, I'm 80 now.
I was 72 when we did that in2018.
And I still hike.
I hike three miles this morningbefore daylight, and I do a lot
of exercises and stuff.
So yeah.
Gotta keep moving.
Use it.
SPEAKER_09 (04:11):
Good for you.
You're my inspiration.
So what inspired you to takethis journey along the
Appalachian Trail, all the wayfrom Georgia to Maine?
SPEAKER_04 (04:24):
My brother, Ronnie.
You know, we were both combatveterans from the Vietnam War.
I was in the Marine Corps, hewas in the Army.
And then when we came back, hemarried our mother's best
friend, Edie.
Edie was 14 years older thanRonnie, divorced with seven
children.
SPEAKER_10 (04:44):
Wow.
SPEAKER_04 (04:45):
And the next thing I know, they're hanging out, going
line dancing, and stuff.
He fell madly in love with herand she with him.
And they got married and endedup moving to Utah and became
very involved in the Mormonchurch.
And then so Ronnie was just veryhappy.
(05:05):
He was always a you know areligious man, a very spiritual
man.
I lost all of that pretty muchmy childhood, resentment,
poverty, which we were reallyburied in.
My father had been a Mustangpilot during World War II, and
he came home, married my mom,and then had me and my brother,
and he got polio and ended upparalyzed from the waist down
(05:29):
for the rest of his life.
SPEAKER_09 (05:30):
Oh, wow.
SPEAKER_04 (05:31):
So we, you know, we were raised in a very poor, more
cows and people type place,which actually was good.
I had a really interestingchild.
I had to grow up fast, and I wasdriving tractors by the time I
was 12 and trapping and huntingand all kinds of stuff.
So I had a pretty goodchildhood, but so yeah, Edie,
(05:54):
you know, Ronnie married her.
They went out there and sheproduced not only the seven
children, but 27 grandchildrenand 27 great-grandchildren when
she died in 2017.
SPEAKER_09 (06:07):
Holy cow! What a legacy!
SPEAKER_04 (06:10):
Yeah, and you know, my brother and I have both been
very active our whole adultlives.
I became a lawyer as youintroduced me as a fluke in the
Marine Corps.
Marine Corps gave me the worstexperiences and one of the best.
I had no clue what I was gonnabe when I really grew up.
So, you know, they sent me toJag school without even having a
(06:31):
college degree or anything, andand that was an amazing
experience.
I ended up there with 99 guyswho were all real lawyers,
graduated law school.
They were all captains.
They made them captains becauseyou know they needed to do that
in order to inspire them to comein the military for a stint.
And when we got there for that,I I decided, you know, I had an
(06:52):
alcohol problem.
I kind of knew I I liked it waytoo much, even at that stage.
And I decided not to drink atall during the week, and I
really worked that out.
Ended up being the honor man ofthe class.
SPEAKER_02 (07:04):
Oh, wow.
SPEAKER_04 (07:04):
Yeah, and I realized, holy cow, I can do
this.
So I ended up being aprosecuting attorney in the uh
Marine Corps for a while, andthen when I got out, I was
married, had my first child, andwent to came to Syracuse and got
uh my degrees.
Ended up being a you knowself-employed lawyer for four
(07:25):
decades.
So but Ronnie and I both werevery active our whole lives.
He became a commercial pilot,mostly freight, mail, until at
the end he was taking touristson on flights through the Grand
Canyon.
SPEAKER_02 (07:41):
Wow.
SPEAKER_04 (07:42):
That was pretty exciting.
So anyway, Edie had a massivestroke in 2011.
Oh and then unfortunately, shenever got better, she got worse.
She had a whole bunch of ministrokes.
So she spent the rest of herlife in a wheelchair pretty
much.
Ronnie took care of her verylovingly and diligently.
(08:04):
He wouldn't let anybody else.
And then thought he was readywhen she passed, but I could
tell by the voice, you know,when I talked to him on the
phone that he was struggling.
I think it challenged everythingthat he believed in, in a sense,
about, you know, spiritual powerand God and all that.
He certainly was still somewhatspirit.
(08:25):
He was just challenged big time.
He was incredibly sad, probablyalmost clinically depressed in a
way.
SPEAKER_09 (08:31):
Yeah, that well, that was the love of his life,
right?
SPEAKER_04 (08:34):
Yes, absolutely.
She's a beautiful person, shereally was.
Anyway, we so I went out to seehim in January of 2018, you
know, which is like a month anda half after she passed.
And I said, Well, I had talkedto him on the phone, and before
that, and I had never been outthere.
So they came east every year.
We would get together like oneday a year.
So when I talked to him on thephone, he said, I think I'm
(08:57):
gonna hike the AppalachianTrail.
I thought, well, that's crazy.
It's absolutely insane.
Because I had hiked in the SmokyMountains quite a bit.
SPEAKER_10 (09:06):
Uh-huh.
SPEAKER_04 (09:07):
You know, I ran 26 marathons, I did cross-country
ski races in the wintertime.
I was very active.
I was like a weekend warriortype person.
SPEAKER_09 (09:17):
Yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_04 (09:18):
And as a result of that, though, I had destroyed my
left knee, and I had anartificial left knee, and then
my right knee, my right leg wasa half inch shorter than my
left.
So I walked with a pretty badlimp.
And but I had hiked in the uhAppalachian Trail in the Smokies
quite a bit.
I like to go on weekend justmyself.
(09:39):
We both had PTSD.
I had horrible nightmares forquite a while.
And I would just go on theseadventures, right?
So I knew quite a bit about themountains.
What I didn't realize was thatRonnie was doing a lot of hiking
in Utah.
He and he and Edie and thefamily had done a lot, he was in
really good shape.
(09:59):
Even when she was taking care ofher, he would put her in the
wheelchair by the front window,and then he would go out and run
a few miles, and he'd swing byevery once in a while and make
sure she was all right and stufflike that.
So he had a good physical basetoo.
SPEAKER_09 (10:14):
Right.
SPEAKER_04 (10:15):
We both, but we're in our 70s.
SPEAKER_09 (10:18):
Right, right.
So I'm like, this is I mean, I'mtelling you, in your 70s, you
guys are far more active than Iam currently.
SPEAKER_04 (10:26):
So yeah.
Well, we're kind of that warriorclass, I guess you would say.
Yeah.
Guys, I don't know, we justcan't help it.
Plus after the the Vietnam War,we both pro I know myself, I
needed that physical exertionevery day.
I needed that feeling of theendorphins and the Yeah.
You know, you spend 13 monthswalking in the jungle, armed to
(10:48):
the teeth, you know, always gota certain level of anxiety and
fear, you know, undercurrent,because you know, you know,
things are gonna happen, youjust don't know when or what.
SPEAKER_11 (10:58):
Yep.
SPEAKER_04 (10:58):
And then and then you'd have these moments of
terror.
And so you get used to a gentleand rushes and things like that.
So we both replaced it withphysical vigor, I guess you
would say.
Okay, that makes sense.
Yeah.
So I asked him how he's gonna doit.
We're hiking in the desert inUtah, and and he's insisting
he's gonna hike the AppalachianTrail.
(11:18):
I said, What are you gonna do?
And he said, Well, I bought abutt, I got all my gear.
And he'd actually done a lot ofstudying, he had got all the
maps, and I mean he had reallythought it through pretty much
as far as actually doing thetrail.
And he said, Well, I'm gonnatake the bus to uh Springer
Mountain and start walking.
And I said, Well, that sucks.
(11:41):
That's not a good plan, bro.
I don't think that'll work verywell.
How about if I go with you?
And he said, Would you?
And I said, Yeah.
Now, in my brain, Helen, I'mthinking, two weeks max.
Right.
I'm gonna pacify him, we'll godown there, and it's gonna hurt
like heck, but I can do twoweeks, and then he'll be come to
his senses and we'll come home,and you know, that'll be the end
(12:04):
of it.
And because, you know, I did doa lot of hiking and stuff like
that, walking, but I was in painall the time.
SPEAKER_09 (12:10):
And right, right.
So at the time he proposed this,did you it you didn't think you
guys would finish?
SPEAKER_04 (12:19):
I absolutely was a hundred percent guarantee we
won't.
Okay, we won't.
And when I wrote the book, whichwas a couple years after we did
it, and then he was I wasshowing it to him, and he when
he read in there, I wrote inthere two weeks max.
He said, Did you really think weonly go two weeks?
And I said, Absolutely.
(12:40):
Wow, anyway, we could but I wasnot going to let him go by
himself.
You know what I mean?
I felt it's not safe, it wouldbe very unsafe and very
difficult.
It was very difficult anyway,but it would have uh to me, it
would have been possible, and Iwould have been I wouldn't have
been able to sleep for you knowsix months, right?
Wondering where he was and whathe's doing, and how much did he
(13:03):
need me to help him and you knowstuff like that?
So yeah, and so we ended up youknow on March 22nd of 2018,
we're at Springer Mountain inthe snowstorm.
SPEAKER_09 (13:17):
Oh gosh.
SPEAKER_04 (13:20):
I have a picture of my brother on that first day,
and he's standing inside of oneof the shelters, and it's just
like an open, it's athree-walled little wooden
shelter like a bus depot, yeah,with the front open, and he's
standing in there and it'ssnowing.
I don't look at his face.
(13:40):
It's like I could just see youwas thinking, what have I got
myself into?
SPEAKER_09 (13:44):
Right, right.
Oh wow.
SPEAKER_04 (13:47):
But I also knew my brother, if he makes up his mind
he's gonna do something, he'lldo it, he'll do it.
He will he will do it, he willdo it until it kills him.
And there's a little bit of thatin me too, maybe not quite as
powerful as he was, but yeah.
SPEAKER_09 (14:04):
Well, I would think it's the it's gotta be in
anybody that through hikes theAppalachian Trail.
I mean, it's it's many milesthrough many states.
I was taking a look at it on theon a map, and I'm not sure my
map is that clear, but it startsin Georgia, goes through
(14:24):
Tennessee.
Does it clip North Carolina ordoes it stay in Tennessee and go
right into West Virginia andthen Virginia?
SPEAKER_04 (14:32):
No, it goes it goes Georgia, like 85, 90 miles, and
then you're in Tennessee, andthen the the Appalachian Trail
goes right through Tennessee.
The eastern border of Tennesseeand the western border of North
Carolina are the same.
SPEAKER_09 (14:47):
Okay, yeah.
SPEAKER_04 (14:48):
There's like I can't remember the exact distance, but
they're like 150 miles whereyou're that can't common border.
And as a matter of fact, andwhen we were in Madison County,
North Carolina, on the westernside of it, we came across a
cemetery, really old cemetery.
SPEAKER_09 (15:07):
On the trail?
SPEAKER_04 (15:08):
Right, yeah, right there.
I saw it as we as I was walkingby, and I just went right in
there and started looking at thetombstore.
It was older than sin.
And I found a tombstone thatsaid they were members of the
Shelton family that wereConfederate soldiers and that
they had been massacred byConfederate soldiers.
SPEAKER_09 (15:30):
Wow.
SPEAKER_04 (15:31):
Yeah, and I took a picture of it and I thought, how
could that possibly happen?
That just makes no sense.
I ended up writing a 600-pageabout the Shelton Laurel
Massacre in Madison County,North Carolina, because it
really did happen.
I could not believe how couldthat be possible, but it was.
That's what happened.
There's a huge history.
(15:51):
I have like 50 books at home onthe Shelton Laurel massacre in
Madison County, North Carolina.
What's right on right, it'sright on the western side of
North Carolina in 1863.
It was a real gosh.
SPEAKER_09 (16:10):
Some of the things you stumbled upon and got to
discover.
SPEAKER_04 (16:13):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_09 (16:14):
Pretty cool.
So then it goes from Tennessee,North Carolina border into West
Virginia and Virginia, all theway up to Pennsylvania.
Does it clip New Jersey a littlebit?
SPEAKER_04 (16:29):
Yes.
You go in and out of New Yorkand New Jersey a couple of
times.
SPEAKER_09 (16:33):
Okay.
And then Connecticut, Mass, NewHampshire, Maine.
SPEAKER_04 (16:38):
Yep.
SPEAKER_09 (16:40):
Wow.
SPEAKER_04 (16:42):
Virginia's the longest, 550 miles in Virginia.
SPEAKER_11 (16:46):
Yep.
SPEAKER_04 (16:47):
So once you get into Virginia, it's like, when are we
ever going to get out ofVirginia?
It is crazy, but I would saytoo, you asked which was the
most beautiful part.
I'm going to say Virginia.
SPEAKER_09 (16:59):
Virginia.
SPEAKER_04 (17:00):
Oh my God, yes.
I mean, I took there was one dayI took 50 pictures because it
was just so amazingly beautiful.
I mean, beyond and the pro thething is too, the Appalachian
Trail, the mountains are only acouple thousand feet high there.
And Virginia, other than themountains, is fairly flat,
right?
So a lot of times you'd seethese amazing vistas.
(17:22):
You can actually see, you know,you can see 500 miles of the
state down below what it lookslike, you know.
And a lot of raptures and thingslike it was very beautiful.
A lot of stones, a lot of rocks,a lot of slides.
But Virginia, I found it to bethe most beautiful.
And I took so many picturesbecause I would come around the
(17:43):
corner and my jaw would just go,oh my god, look at that.
That's so cool.
SPEAKER_09 (17:47):
Oh wow.
SPEAKER_04 (17:47):
Yeah, the rock outclimbings.
There's a picture of me on arock outclimbing where it looks
like I'm suspended in space.
I mean, it's just so cool.
Out there, yeah.
Ronnie did not take hardly anypictures because he was he was
about being very precise aboutwhere we were, how far we went,
(18:08):
you know, how many feet inelevation.
There's 2195 miles on theAppalachian Trail, like you
said, 14 states it goes through.
Goes over 600 mountains.
300 of them are named.
Every state has a bear mountain.
A lot of bears.
(18:30):
3 million people hike some partof the Appalachian Trail every
year, but only about 2,500 to3,000 try to do the whole thing.
They call them.
And 17% make it.
So you're talking about 500people a year.
So an 80 year old 80-year-oldlady just did it this year.
SPEAKER_09 (18:50):
Really?
SPEAKER_04 (18:51):
Yes.
That's in that's incre I knowhow hard it is and how
dangerous.
I don't think my heart would myheart would go, we're done, kid.
SPEAKER_09 (19:04):
This is I don't think I could handle it now.
SPEAKER_04 (19:10):
That person is really a freak of me.
SPEAKER_09 (19:13):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_04 (19:14):
I mean, literally be able to do that at eight.
My hats off to her.
All respect.
SPEAKER_09 (19:19):
Absolutely.
SPEAKER_04 (19:20):
Amazing.
And then there was another ladythat ran it in about 45 days, I
think it was.
I mean, there's some God hascreated some amazing people.
We're not, I'm not one of themas far as physicality goes.
I'm more or less kind of normalor average, maybe a little above
average, but not.
But it's amazing what peoplehave done on the Appalachian
Trail.
(19:40):
But most people most peopledon't make it.
SPEAKER_09 (19:43):
I I would say, I mean, for you and your brother
to have done it in your 70s, youknow, um, I don't know if if you
trained for it or if it was justyour your background naturally,
always being active, having thatmilitary experience, you know,
always hiking, running, doingmarathons, if that got you to
(20:05):
the shape that you needed to beto even consider trying to do
something like this.
SPEAKER_04 (20:11):
Yeah.
At that time I was walking eightto ten miles a day, and I could
walk like two and a half milesin an hour.
I did have that baseline.
Ronnie was kind of the same, butI'm telling you, when you get
into the mountains, it's a wholedifferent ball game.
(20:32):
If you could do a mile and ahalf in the mountains, that is
practically sprinting.
SPEAKER_09 (20:38):
Right.
SPEAKER_04 (20:39):
We did we averaged 11 miles uh a day.
We went 30, 33 days in a row acouple times.
That's insane too, actually.
Wow.
But we would start at daylight,and I Ronnie usually got done
quicker than me because of mylimp.
I was slower than him, but hewould usually get finished about
a half an hour, an hour beforeme.
(21:00):
And but it would always be likethree or four o'clock in the
afternoon.
I mean, and I remember even inGeorgia when we first started
out, you'd be climbing thesemountains, and you think with
Georgia, it's like they can't bethat bad.
They're big ones.
And we and we would go overfive, six mountains in 11 miles.
SPEAKER_10 (21:19):
Uh-huh.
SPEAKER_04 (21:21):
And you get up the top, it's all like rocks and
really challenging, and thendown.
And I would be praying, Helen,God, just give me, just give me
a hundred feet.
No, a hundred yards flat.
I want to walk flat, just ahundred yards between the next
before we get to the nextmountain.
And you get down the bottom, youwalk ten feet, and you're going
(21:42):
up the next one.
The gaps are like 10 feet wide.
That's it.
SPEAKER_09 (21:47):
Yeah, I have a friend who's a through hiker,
and her goal is to hike theentire Appalachian Trail.
And the part that runs throughMassachusetts, she out she asked
me, Hey, would you want to meetup with me and do the
Massachusetts part of the hike?
And I was like, I don't know.
Is it flat?
I'll do the flat part.
(22:07):
So she hasn't made it to Massyet.
I think she just completedeverything in Pennsylvania,
Pennsylvania, Delaware, I think,just uh maybe a month ago.
So and she's she's in decentshape.
So I can't imagine uh the typeof shape you need to be in to
(22:27):
tackle through hiking it.
And you know, to the point ofhow few people actually complete
it versus the the people thatstart it.
I mean that stat was a littlemind mind-boggling.
SPEAKER_04 (22:41):
Right.
SPEAKER_02 (22:42):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_04 (22:42):
It took us three years.
It took us three years.
Yeah.
And because we had two vehicles,Ronnie hiked south most days,
and I hike north.
And you can say, how the heckdid you do that?
We parked on the trail almostevery night or you know, at
nighttime.
But there's a there's a somekind of a road going over the
Appalachian Trail on averageevery 10 to 15 miles.
(23:05):
Now there are places wherethat's not true, like Priest and
in the Smoky Mountains aroundClingman's Dome, there's a
couple of 35-mile stretches andso on.
So we had to do the full packthing.
Carrying a 40-pound pack versuscarrying a 40-pound pack is a
lot different.
Those days were really, reallychallenging, and we couldn't do
11, we'd do nine or ten at themost.
(23:26):
But oh my gosh.
So what we did in the morning, Iwould get up, I would start
hiking.
Ronnie would drive down themountain to the valley, take the
next road, take a road down,find the next road.
Usually they were dirt, some ofthem were really bad.
Drive up to the top of themountain.
So he's back on the AppalachianTrail.
Now he's on the AppalachianTrail, you know, 11 miles
(23:48):
further north than I am.
He would walk south, I wouldwalk north.
So we would meet in the middlefor a few minutes, right?
And then he would get my truckand repeat what he had done in
the morning and come back up towhere his car was, and then we
would stay right there.
And usually, you know, I had awhole bunch of food and and
water and stuff like that in mytruck.
(24:09):
I bragged that I slept in a tentevery night on the Appalachian
Trail, but usually it was about10 feet from my truck.
SPEAKER_09 (24:17):
So you you the two of you didn't really experience
the hike together.
SPEAKER_04 (24:23):
No, we could.
It would never have worked.
When we did we did walk togethera few times.
The problem is I can walk thesame pace as Ron, but because of
my short leg, I'm I'm movingforward uh, you know, an inch
and a inch and a half to twoinches shorter than he is.
So within moments, he's pullingaway from me.
(24:44):
And if I try to keep up withhim, now I'm getting up up on a
different, I'm in a differentgear.
Long range gear, I'm in theshort range gear.
SPEAKER_09 (24:53):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_04 (24:54):
It was and and then so what would happen the few
times we did, he'd get way aheadof me, almost out of sight.
He would stop, wait for me tocatch up.
When I got within about 10 feetof me, turn around and go.
Yeah, we it just didn't workwell.
His son Rick hiked with us for acouple weeks in the beginning,
and then him and Ron finished itto the end.
(25:15):
I did not finish the trail, Ionly did 1,863 miles.
SPEAKER_09 (25:19):
Ah.
Only.
SPEAKER_04 (25:22):
I fell down a rock slide in Massachusetts and did
uh it was bad.
Really, really bad.
And we ended up going off.
I couldn't even walk after that.
So I'm almost to the top ofWilcox Mountain in
Massachusetts.
When you get near the top, yousee this great big rock slide.
I mean, huge rocks and boulders,and it's steep.
(25:44):
And you look at it, you go,there's no way the trail goes up
there.
And then you look all the way upthe top and you see a white
slash mark on a tree.
The trail goes up there.
So I climbed up that rock slide,and this there's a lot of them.
But this I got within about 10feet of the top, and my my pole
slipped, and when it did, Itried to correct it.
(26:06):
I should have just fallenforward, right?
It wouldn't have peel.
I would have, you know, I mighthave gotten a bloody hand or
something, but but I didn't.
I stabbed, try to regain mybalance, and when I did it,
flipped me 180 degrees, and thenI stabbed with the other pole,
and that didn't work, and I dida swan dive off that rock slide,
(26:27):
and I went down about 20 feet,and I closed my eyes because I
knew I I was thinking this isgonna hurt.
I mean, I've been banged up, youknow, in Vietnam, hurt and stuff
and uh wounded, whatever.
So I kind of know a lot aboutpain, and but I thought this is
gonna hurt, but I didn't imagineit hurt way worse than anything
(26:47):
else I had ever experienced.
I mean, it was just incredible.
And then my leg, my foot gotcaught between two rocks,
otherwise I probably would havegot killed.
SPEAKER_09 (26:58):
Oh wow, so that stopped you from going down
farther.
SPEAKER_04 (27:01):
Yeah, I laid there with my eyes closed, I don't
know, for a little a bit forsure.
And then finally I, you know,opened my eyes.
I had it covered with blood formy my elbows and my hands and my
face.
And it felt like somebody hadtaken a the one of those steel
bands that he put on barrels,put it around my waist, and then
(27:23):
just crank it down as hard as Icould.
I mean it was so I crawled tothe top and I'm standing, I
finally got stood up, and I'mlike, I've come three miles, I
got nine more miles to get towhere my brother is, where he
left his car.
Fathom how I would ever get downthat rock slide.
I'm just like, I can't, I can'tdo it.
SPEAKER_09 (27:44):
Right.
SPEAKER_04 (27:44):
So I just turned around and started walking, and
for a while, I don't know ifyou've ever You were able to
walk.
Yeah, I could walk.
You know, I mean the way thepain was ridiculous, but then
after a while, I don't know ifyou've ever been hurt bad, but I
knew that if I just got moving,at some point it would just kind
of dissipate into usually itdissipates into just kind of a
dull ache, you know, an ache.
SPEAKER_09 (28:05):
Yeah, and that was I think that's kind of being in
shock though.
SPEAKER_04 (28:08):
No, yeah, probably.
When I met my brother, he said,What the heck happened to you?
I said, Well, it wasn't good.
He said, What are you gonna do?
And I said, Well, nobody's gonnaget me out of here, so I'm gonna
walk, I'll meet you like wealways do.
So we did, but I knew I was soanyway.
I got up the next morning, I gotout of my tent.
I couldn't uh I couldn't Icouldn't walk on an 80 hang on
(28:31):
to something.
And uh so my brother said, Whatdo you want to do?
And I said, I think we we bettergo home.
And uh so we did, and I I didn'tget medical treatment or
anything, and after a few days Istarted walking again, and and
then Ronnie calls me up andsays, You want to try to finish
it?
And I said, Sure, let's oh mygod.
(28:51):
So I did another 300 miles afterthat.
We did the whites, but not MountWashington because that was
close.
Well, Washington gets snow everymonth of the year.
SPEAKER_09 (29:02):
Yeah, I they have two seasons good sledding and
bad sledding.
That's it.
SPEAKER_04 (29:06):
Yeah, they have that cog rail road that goes up it
and everything.
I mean, it's it's a amazingthing.
That's a three-day because it'slike 60 miles to get across.
Well, not that far.
It's like 35 miles to get acrossthere.
There's no road or anything youcan um so we jumped ahead.
We did Moose Lock, which is areally beautiful big mountain.
(29:29):
I thought I was gonna fall inthat sucker too.
Getting back down was amazinglydifficult.
And then I did Wolf, and then wewent back to do Washington.
We had our full packs ready todo three days together, and we
went in and started up themountain, and I turned around, I
just started crying.
I looked around and I said, Ican't do it.
(29:51):
My pain was so bad I couldn'teven hardly sleep anymore, you
know.
So I, you know, he just lookedat me and he said, Well, you
want to try to do Just do a dayhike.
And I said, no, I I'm done.
We had both lost 35 pounds.
I'm 155 for crying out loud.
Not a big only 5'8, but mynormal rate was weight was
around 175, 180.
(30:13):
So he finished it with his sonRick.
So I didn't do the last couplehundred miles.
SPEAKER_09 (30:19):
Wow.
So what I mean, what injuriesdid you sustain from that fall?
I know you didn't get medicalhelp, but I mean you were still
in pain.
I'm hoping eventually you soughtmedical attention.
SPEAKER_04 (30:31):
I couldn't sleep at all.
And I ended up having well, Iwas having a hip replacement
while Rick and Ronnie werefinishing the trail.
SPEAKER_09 (30:39):
Oh my God.
Yeah.
Well, yeah.
I know it's dangerous, but holycow.
Any uh like let's look on thebrighter side of the hike.
Because I am still in shockabout that fall and then how you
tried to continue on and youknow where you wound up.
(31:02):
Throughout throughout the hike,what state had uh had the the
toughest terrain?
SPEAKER_04 (31:08):
And I'm guessing it might have been Massachusetts,
but no, you know, it's funny toobecause I when we crossed the
Hudson River, I thought thesemountains aren't gonna be this
is gonna be nothing, right?
SPEAKER_11 (31:21):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_04 (31:22):
Oh my god.
No, they're just as bad as anyof the other mountains in New
York and New Jersey.
You know, you'd be up there andall you could see is raptors and
trees.
And at that point, it afterHarper's Ferry in West Virginia,
before that, you see people allthe time, right?
That's about roughly halfway.
(31:43):
We logged in there, they haveyou know, you you get to prove
that you went that far at least.
And after that, and in the firsthalf of the hike, Helen,
probably as many, if not more,women than men.
Really?
Yeah, yeah.
No, I I mean we saw a lady outthere with four kids.
(32:03):
Her kids, 16 was the oldest.
I think the youngest was likesix years old.
And this was in Virginia, sothey'd already gone quite a
ways.
The probably oldest woman wesaw, I think, was 68, so not
that much younger than us.
A few people in their 60s, mostof them are in their 20s, 30s,
40s.
SPEAKER_09 (32:22):
Yep.
SPEAKER_04 (32:23):
Some rugged guys in their 50s.
But then after Harper's Ferry,we didn't see too many women, or
anybody, really.
I mean, it it just tapers rightoff big time after that.
SPEAKER_09 (32:35):
How how can you tell the difference between a through
hiker and somebody who is a asection hiker?
SPEAKER_04 (32:43):
Smell.
SPEAKER_09 (32:48):
I don't know why I didn't think of that.
SPEAKER_04 (32:50):
Oh yeah, no.
Well, you you you we would uhafter a couple weeks, we would
try to stay.
We would always find a campsitesomewhere that had showers.
SPEAKER_11 (32:59):
Uh-huh.
SPEAKER_04 (32:59):
And we would stay there for a day or two and then
hike north or south.
Like in Loft Mountain inShenandoah Park in the southern
part of Virginia is a perfectexample.
We got a campsite there.
I have a picture of my brotherthere with a buck standing next
to him at our picnic site.
Campsite.
And then we had a shower.
(33:20):
So we stayed, I think we stayedthere four days because we had
the vehicles we could drive downand hike a 12-mile section and
then do another one.
And come back.
Yeah, and come back.
So we did that when we could, soto get clean.
Biggest thing, you get so youdon't even like you can't even
stand the way you smell.
I mean, your own self.
You're like, you're a turd.
(33:41):
You can just tell throughhikers.
They just, you know, like Isaid, we lost 35 pounds in in
the first year.
Actually, we were in oh, I thinkwe were almost in New Jersey
when we stopped in 20 uh 18because we both lost like 30
pounds at that point.
We look like usherwoodsurvivors.
(34:02):
I mean, the all the throughhikers, they have that gaunt
face, they have that kind oflike like a base level of
fatigue written out.
SPEAKER_09 (34:09):
Kind of yeah, hollow.
SPEAKER_04 (34:11):
You can just tell the way their gear is the way
they move, you know, they're notlackadaisical, they're pretty
you're pretty precise about.
And I fell every day, I brokefour hiking poles.
SPEAKER_02 (34:25):
Ouch.
SPEAKER_04 (34:26):
Yeah, we had the look.
SPEAKER_09 (34:27):
Yeah.
And how did you guys getsupplies?
I mean, because you had yourvehicles, you were able to, you
know, when the stop allowed forit, were were you able to, you
know, drive somewhere, go to astore, get water, get you know,
whatever you needed.
SPEAKER_04 (34:44):
There is, believe it or not, there's a food general
or food city, the dollar storesat the base of almost every road
that crosses over theAppalachian Trail.
I mean, literally, you canalmost hike.
The problem is you got to getdown the mountain to get to the
store, right?
And usually that could be two,three miles.
(35:06):
I mean, we gave people ridesalmost every day.
Will you can we ride down withyou to get some food at the
yeah, sure, get in, you know.
Then drive back up.
So we would buy I buy you knowfreeze-dried food there and
water and stuff, and then wejust kept it in our truck.
I still have a bucket full ofyou know dried food in my truck.
(35:33):
Wow, but yeah, that's and weshared some too.
I mean, a lot of campers werenot particularly well prepared.
Prepared.
I always carried two 24 bottlesof water because there's no
place to get water on the top ofthe the trail does not go around
the mountains, it goes overthem.
(35:53):
So you're always on top, prettymuch, whether you're on the
ridge going up to the top orwhatever.
And once you get to top of themountain, there's no water.
I had some of those uh aluminumblankets.
People would get trouble.
I gave away my water purifiertwice.
I gave away because people hadthey didn't have proper, you
(36:15):
know, thing.
The other thing that people didwas if you went to the shelters
usually like in the afternoon, Iwould go to the shelters just to
log in.
I wanted to have proof.
So many pictures too, I think.
I want in my own mind.
I I didn't know I was gonnawrite a book, but I I just I
don't know, I was documentingthat we were actually doing
(36:36):
this, right?
SPEAKER_09 (36:37):
Right.
SPEAKER_04 (36:37):
And I if you were going down to the shelter, and
then usually aren't on the topof the mountain, you have to
walk down a little bit, I couldusually smell where it was
before I could see it.
Okay.
Yeah.
So a lot of these youngerhikers, you see them the next
day, they've got their earbudsin and they're hiking, and their
(36:59):
eyes look like you know, arebig.
SPEAKER_10 (37:02):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_04 (37:03):
They're not very present.
Right.
They're just kinda so forwhenever I saw like poisonous
snakes, I would try to make surethey got off the trail because I
was afraid somebody would gethurt, you know, they're paying
attention.
And one day, you know, you weretalking about critters at the
(37:24):
very beginning.
One of my more memorable,memorable experiences was I came
across a rattlesnake, big, bigsnake.
And he would not get off thetrail.
Usually they just you know goright away, right?
SPEAKER_11 (37:38):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_04 (37:39):
But he was had an attitude, and he coiled on me,
and I'm like, oh, this is notgood.
And then I couldn't, he wouldnot leave.
And then I look down and I see achipmunk laying by my foot, and
it's got two blood spots on it.
SPEAKER_09 (37:54):
Oh no.
And I go, Oh, you were standingon his dinner.
SPEAKER_04 (37:57):
Yeah, he was it was quivering, and I go, Oh, I get
it.
So I I squatted down.
We I'm eyeball to eyeball withthis snake, right?
He's watching me intently, andI'm staring at him.
Don't, don't, I'm, I'm a goodguy, you know?
I squatted down, picked it up bythe tail, I shook it in front of
his face pretty much, and Ithrew it as hard as I could over
(38:20):
his head into the forest.
And that rattler, you could nothave shot an arrow faster than
that snake went.
I mean, my jaw almost hit thetrail because I'm like, oh my
god, I had no idea how fast hecould move.
And I thought, if he wanted tostrike me, I would there's
(38:41):
nothing I could have done.
There's no way.
Oh, I would have missed him.
I would, he would have got me ina heartbeat.
But I wanted to make it that'scrazy.
SPEAKER_09 (38:49):
And you have any other any other animal
encounters on the trail?
SPEAKER_04 (38:53):
Bears.
Bears.
In the Shenandoah Mountainssection, the national park,
there's 300 square miles.
And for seven days, we ran intoa bear every day.
I ran into a bear every day.
SPEAKER_09 (39:10):
Really?
SPEAKER_04 (39:12):
Yeah.
And which is fine because mostof the time they run away,
right?
They don't they're not gonnamess around with you.
But one of them, huh?
I've had bad experiences on solohikes in the uh smoky mountains.
I had a bear that I played hideand seek with not in a fun way
(39:32):
for about an hour and a half.
Oh my gosh.
He was stalking me.
And it was in the fall, and Isuspect because he was getting
ready to hibernate, he wasreally, really hungry.
SPEAKER_11 (39:43):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_04 (39:43):
And he fake charged me.
I fake charged him because youcannot you cannot show a bear
any fear.
You cannot, and you definitelydon't want to run away because
if you do, they will attack youimmediately because they can't
see very well.
They just see kind of movement.
They see a movement and it'sgoing away from them, they their
(40:04):
brain goes, food, and theyattack right.
So he's trying to make me runaway by charging.
He'd do these fake.
I mean, if you ever saw like anature film when they charge,
they're like growling and theirfeet are the paws are going
fast, but they're not reallymoving, they're just putting out
a big show, right?
SPEAKER_02 (40:22):
Yeah, and then I would say the same act of them.
SPEAKER_04 (40:35):
And I would do that, and then he would leave, and
then I would go down the trailfurther, and then he would come
back out.
Oh my god.
And then I at one point I almostI had a weapon.
I was thinking, I don't want toshoot a bear, I really don't
want to shoot a bear.
Absolutely don't, but this guyis not leaving me alone.
Eventually that bear did leave,and I just I got the heck out of
(40:58):
there slowly, but I walked outof there.
So anyway, I came around thetrail on the in Shenandoah
Mountain, pretty close to LoftMountain, and there's this bear.
SPEAKER_12 (41:08):
I came around a corner and he was right in front
of me.
I mean like 10 feet.
SPEAKER_04 (41:14):
Oh and he stopped, so his paws in the air, he froze
like a statue with one paw inthe air.
His head looked like a bowlingball.
SPEAKER_12 (41:24):
And wow in my brain saw, oh my god, this is the most
beautiful beast I have ever.
Helen, he was gorgeous, his furwas shiny, shiny black.
I mean, it was just unbelievablyvivid.
SPEAKER_04 (41:40):
And his eyes, big brown eyes looking at me,
frozen, and so and I'm notthinking very clearly, right?
I'm not going for my bear sprayor anything.
I reached back and got my phoneso I could take a picture,
right?
And I'm standing there froze,he's frozen.
I'm bringing it up.
As soon as I got up in front ofme, he whirled and went down the
(42:02):
trail like as fast as he could.
I never within two seconds hehad gone a hundred feet at
least.
And then he took to the left andwent down the mountain.
Now, the day before I had seen abear in a similar situation,
except he was way further awayfrom me, right?
When he saw me, he just went offthe woods in the right and
disappeared.
I actually ran down the trail.
(42:23):
Well, sort of ran, because Iwant to take a picture of him,
right?
To where he went down themountain, went out into the
forest down the mountain, and Ididn't see him, I didn't hear a
thing.
But this bear, this day, when heturned off that trail, oh my
God, another hiker came upbehind me and he goes, What's
that?
And I said, That's a bear.
No way.
(42:43):
I said, because it sounded likesomebody in a bulldozer going
down the mountains.
It sounded like he was knockingtrees over the boulders or
something like it was a hugeracket.
And then shortly after that, Iran into a conservancy guy by
the name of Gene Anderson,actually.
And I have his picture in thebook.
(43:10):
And so we were talking about thebears, and I was telling him a
little bit about what hadhappened, and he goes, Yeah,
there's a he said there's 600bears in this Shenandoah
National Park.
And I said, Well, there's 300square miles.
So that's two bears for everysquare mile.
SPEAKER_09 (43:28):
Right.
SPEAKER_04 (43:29):
And and half of it, half of those 300 miles, they're
not gonna, they're not gonnawalk there.
Right, you know, they're that'sthere's a reason why they're
walking on the trails.
A lot of the the bears aren'teven gonna walk there.
You know, I walked under a treewith a bear in it at one point.
That was fun.
(43:51):
And Gene Anderson said, Yeah, hesays we got way too many bears.
The reason is they don't allowhunting.
Someday somebody's gonna gethurt.
SPEAKER_09 (43:58):
So they just keep reading.
SPEAKER_04 (43:59):
Yeah, and I said, someday somebody's gonna get
hurt.
And he said, Yeah, probablywill.
I don't know.
But you have to be smart aboutit.
Don't show fear, don't run.
Ronnie had a situation with uh alady that went hysterical on
him.
I had a similar situation.
There was whenever there wasstuff across the trail, because
(44:20):
of the we had some zombies outthere.
Yeah, I would get it off thetrail.
So one day there's this hugelog, it was probably 10 feet
long, it was about you knowalmost half a foot in diameter,
so it was good size, but it wastotally rotten.
So it was I thought, well, if Ican move it, I'll move it.
(44:41):
And when I got a hold of it, itwas I could pick it up on one
end.
I stood up on one end and I gaveit a big shove.
And when I gave it a big shove,it went off the hit mountain and
it made you know a crash downthe mountain a little ways.
Well, there's a man and womanright behind me.
I didn't realize it.
And they were just comingaround, they hadn't seen me yet,
but they heard it.
SPEAKER_03 (45:01):
And they go, the the woman screaming, bear, bear,
bear! And the husband's going,No, honey, it'll be okay, it'll
be okay.
And I said, I turned around andwalked back towards them.
I said, It's not a bear, itwasn't a bear.
Yes, it was, it had to be abear, it couldn't be anything,
could not.
SPEAKER_07 (45:14):
Oh, wow.
SPEAKER_04 (45:17):
I think they ended up uh they were not through
hikers, so they just turnedaround and went back the other
way.
They didn't believe me.
SPEAKER_09 (45:25):
Oh, that's funny.
That's funny.
Now, we've talked an awful lotabout the book, kind of
indirectly, but based on youryour journey on the Appalachian
Trail, both you and your brotherjournaled, and eventually you
put the two pieces of writingtogether, along with thousands
(45:50):
of photos that you took.
I actually just received thebook maybe two or three days
ago, and I've and I've lookedthrough all the photos, and I am
like just blown away by howbeautiful everything is.
Talk to me a little bit aboutmelding your written account and
your brother's written accountto create a spiritual passage.
SPEAKER_04 (46:14):
Right.
Both of us kept journals on adaily basis, and luckily they
were completely different.
So I had made a decision aftermy brother would be there's map,
there's pictures of him in thebook, and he's always looking at
a map.
I mean, he studied those mapsevery night, and somewhere along
(46:34):
the line, the first coupleweeks, I said, thought to
myself, you know, uh, I'm justgonna I'm not gonna do this
anymore.
I'm not gonna try to figure outwhat it looks like, you know,
what the terrain is and all thatstuff.
I'm just gonna hike it like it'sin 1970, and whatever is is,
right?
I'm just gonna follow the lightslashes, and so Ronnie's journal
entries were like, we were here,we went to here, the elevation
(46:58):
changes were there's 46,500,000feet of elevation changes on the
Appalachian Trail.
That's almost a half a millionfeet of elevation changes.
Wow, yeah, and so thetopographical maps show those,
right?
Wow, so he would record all thatstuff, and then he would say, I
love my family, my family'ssupporting me, blah, blah, blah.
(47:19):
You know, he always had thatspiritual thing in his mine, it
was completely different.
I'm like, right, a little bitabout where we were and where we
were going, but I was like, thishappened.
I recorded every trail name ofpeople that I met, and and I put
them in there because the trailnames were fascinating.
Ronnie's fail trail name wasAttitude Indicator, which is an
(47:39):
instrument in an airplanebecause he's a pilot that tells
you what the attitude of theairplane is relative to the
horizon, right?
SPEAKER_11 (47:46):
Uh-huh.
SPEAKER_04 (47:47):
My trail name was Ran Bow.
SPEAKER_09 (47:53):
I love it.
SPEAKER_04 (47:53):
Ronnie came up with that.
Yeah, well, almost got mekilled.
SPEAKER_09 (47:57):
Oh no.
SPEAKER_04 (47:57):
So I would say, when I ran into hikers, I would say,
I stick my hand out, say, myname is Ranbo, what's yours?
You know, and then they wouldtell me and we'd shake hands,
right?
Or same thing.
And then I would write all thenames in my journal at night.
So I and then I did put them inthe book.
Well, one day we were up in thewhites.
I had I was days were going by,I wasn't seeing anybody.
(48:18):
And this one day I saw twopeople, two people, two duos
twice, and they were both menand women.
And the first time I stuck myhand out, Rambo, and the hot and
the guy goes, Oh, whatever hisname was.
Oh man, yeah, I'm so great tosee you.
Uh can I can I have my picturetaken with you?
And he put their arm around me,and the guy would go, I thought
(48:39):
you'd be bigger, and the bookwas the guy taking the picture,
like, you know.
And then the first time Ihappened, I was like, that's
kind of weird.
And then it happened again.
A little few hours later, and Ithought, what the heck?
So that night we were eatingdinner, you know, getting ready
to go to sleep.
And and I I said to Ronnie, Isaid, Something strange is
happening today, bro.
(49:01):
Twice I ran into these couples,and they went on my picture
taken.
The guy said something like, Oh,yeah, can I have my picture
taken with you?
And I thought you'd be bigger.
And Ronnie's not looking at me.
And I go, What's going on, bro?
And he's nothing, nothing.
Come on.
Something's not right here.
And he goes, Well, I've beentelling them that you're you're
(49:25):
Rambo and you're the guy theymade the movie about.
SPEAKER_10 (49:29):
Oh my gosh.
SPEAKER_02 (49:31):
Um war with Sylvester Stallone, Rambo.
You get you gotta love brothers.
I said, Don't do that.
You're gonna get me killed.
Somebody's gonna say, I'm gonnatake this guy, I'm gonna kill
Rambo.
SPEAKER_09 (49:44):
Oh, too funny.
SPEAKER_02 (49:45):
Yeah, it was funny.
SPEAKER_09 (49:46):
Too funny.
So you you mentioned that thatRon was more methodical and more
planned out and more spiritualin what he captured in his
journals, and it sounds like youwere there for every experience.
The beauty, the challenge, andthat you were more into the
(50:08):
journey, and your brother wasmore into getting to the final
destination.
Is that accurate?
SPEAKER_04 (50:17):
Yeah, that is accurate.
He did have a situation where hesaw a halo in an otherwise very
dark day with no sun at all thewhole day, except this one
moment when there was a a halo,a very bright light in the on
the trail, and there's a picturehe took a picture of it.
(50:39):
Because it was Father's Day, itwas June, what is it, 21st,
2018, and he was thinking aboutEdie and he was thinking about
our dad, and then he saw thatlight, and he had a spiritual
experience.
He ended up walking towards it.
It had looked like there wassomebody in it, like Jesus or
Muhammad, or what you know, itcould be whatever you want, but
(51:01):
and he got a feeling of peaceand serenity finally.
He thought he could feel Ediesaying, Ronnie, it's okay, it's
okay.
I'm with your dad.
unknown (51:11):
It's okay.
SPEAKER_09 (51:12):
Wow.
Yeah.
Wow.
So pretty cathartic for him.
SPEAKER_04 (51:17):
Yeah, for me, I had been sober four years.
I had been in the program, I didthe program, I did the 12 steps,
I had a really great sponsor.
And then right after that, Istarted sponsoring guys because
men work with the men and womenwork with the women.
And I I, you know, was a part ofseeing men turn their whole
(51:37):
lives around.
And one of the things I hadtalked to my sponsor about was
what am I going to do on thetrail?
I'm not going to be going tomeetings or anything because I
go to meetings every day.
SPEAKER_10 (51:47):
Right.
SPEAKER_04 (51:48):
I work with guys every day.
So he had suggested I memorizethe readings, and I did meetings
in my head on the trail.
Every people would do like anhour and pretend I was in a
meeting and we'd bring up atopic and somebody, and I would
go around the room because Iknew what a lot of these people
would say.
It would be like the easiest dayof the hour of the day for me.
(52:08):
I just get in that zone.
I'm not even, and all of asudden at the end of it, I'm
like, man, I don't rememberwalking this last hour.
You know, it was it wasbeautiful for me.
And I had guys, I would turn myphone on every morning.
I had a couple guys that I hadbeen working with, and they
would call me and just check in.
Yeah, we're doing good, Rand.
How are you?
You know, that kind of thing.
So I had that spiritual thing,and then I had a really bad
(52:29):
experience.
I almost died in the SmokyMountains during a horrible
night, windstorm.
I I pitched my tent, and it wascalled False Gap, which means
there was no gap.
And I was on a ridge that wasonly like 12 feet wide, and it
dropped off hundreds of feet onboth sides, and I had to pitch
my tent, and the weather turnedreally bad right at dark, dusk,
(52:52):
and uh and these freight trainsof wind came flying up during
the night and right over me.
And it was my tent was beatingme to death.
Ronnie said, Would you were youhanging on to the rods that
hold, you know, we had thesetents that were made for you
know, for survival tents,basically.
I said, No, I was pushing downwith the stakes as hard as I
(53:12):
could with my feet and handsbecause I felt like it I felt
like I was in a body bag and itwas gonna just blow me off.
And I and I was praying to God,the one I didn't used to believe
in, to me, I'm just you know, Iwas saying, I've been a good
boy, God.
I've really been a good guy forthe last four years and I've
been helping people.
So if you want to kill metonight, okay, I guess that's
(53:34):
the way it's gonna be, but I'dreally rather not.
SPEAKER_09 (53:37):
Right, right.
SPEAKER_04 (53:39):
And it's uh daylight, just as it started
getting light, the winds finallyabated.
It was scary as hell.
I I was convinced I was gonnaget blown off of there, but I
didn't until wow.
SPEAKER_02 (53:50):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_09 (53:51):
Well, you know, looking back on the experience,
because it sounds like you werevery in the moment and you got a
lot out of it from the AAmeetings in your head to the
beautiful pictures you took andthe people you met and the
experiences you had, both goodand dangerous.
Looking back on it, what did youget out of that journey?
(54:12):
What did that journey mean toyou?
SPEAKER_04 (54:14):
It means everything.
I think, you know, our one ofour mottos is uh one step at a
time, and I incorporated thatinto the book because in the
book I ended up describing how Igot sober at 68 years old.
Alcohol didn't really bother mea whole lot for for many years,
but if you're an alcoholic, youmetabolize alcohol differently
(54:37):
than normal people.
That's why the AMA just made ita disease.
American Medical Associationdefined it as a disease in 1956.
And when I learned that aboutmyself, I thought it was some
kind of a moral failure, youknow.
Very common with alcoholics tothink, why can't I do it?
I did all these other things,you know.
SPEAKER_10 (54:56):
Right.
SPEAKER_04 (54:57):
Could not, at the end, if you're an alcoholic,
alcohol will get you.
It would just, and you it willtake over and you will have un
be unable to not drink.
You just it's an amazing thingthat happens.
So you need a higher power.
And I had been taught how to dothat, and I had a relationship
with a higher power, and itdefinitely grew, it got way
bigger on the trail.
SPEAKER_09 (55:20):
Yeah, oh I bet.
SPEAKER_04 (55:21):
Yeah, so now today I don't have any problem turning
the weight of my difficultiesover to that power that got me
through a war, it got methrough.
I had a client try to kill me asa lawyer.
Wow, got me through all kinds ofstuff, and and I didn't know it
for a long time, but I came toappreciate the fact that
something bigger than than meexisted that could help me get
(55:43):
through my difficulties and alot of other people, yeah.
All over the world, you know,and be happy, be serene, right,
be joyful.
Gave me joy.
That's beautiful.
Gave me joy, Helen.
It really did.
SPEAKER_09 (55:57):
That's amazing.
I'm so happy for you.
And thank you and your brotherfor your service to our country.
I've got to say that at the verybeginning, but thank you because
there's there's an awful lotthat goes into that that a lot
of people don't know about.
And I am so happy that you andyour brother worked through a
lot of that and that thisjourney was part of working
(56:21):
through those things that you'vesacrificed for us.
So thank you very much.
SPEAKER_02 (56:25):
Thank you.
SPEAKER_09 (56:26):
And I also want to thank you for all the time
you've shared with me.
Besides the book, is thereanything that I can put in the
show notes for our listeners tofollow along with you, contact
you, see what you're up to?
SPEAKER_04 (56:41):
Yes, they can randimmerman.com.
It's just my name run together,lowercase, no dots or anything,
just randimmerman.com.
I'll take them to my website.
And they can see some of thevideos and and the pictures and
the book, you know, information,and they can order books on
there too if they want to.
SPEAKER_09 (57:00):
Great.
Thank you so, so much for yourtime, Rand.
I'm so glad you survived.
And you took all of those, allof those experiences and turned
them into something positive.
So thank you again for all yourtime.
This is a fantasticconversation.
I really appreciate it.
SPEAKER_10 (57:18):
Thank you, Alan.
Appreciate you.
SPEAKER_09 (57:24):
Truly an amazing story.
Although both Rand and hisbrother Ron were rugged men from
their military backgrounds tothe way they kept themselves in
shape and some of the otherhobbies that they had that
helped them do that.
I found it incredibly funny thatat the very beginning, Rand
thought, no more than two weekswill this go on, and we will
(57:49):
come to our senses and go home.
And uh little did he know theywould persevere for the next
three years to complete thetrail and just how much they
would experience, learn, andgrow from that time on the
trail.
I also found it funny how Randwas more of in the moment, here
(58:11):
for the journey and theexperiences, and his brother Ron
was methodical and tactical andplanned, almost linear, if you
will.
And life with the AppalachianTrail is anything but linear,
and yet the trail finallybrought them peace and clarity
with all of its ups and downs.
(58:33):
I just their story truly isinspiring to me.
If you enjoy Assort ofConversations, please leave a
five-star written reviewwherever you downloaded today's
episode.
It helps the podcast becomevisible to other folks who may
be interested in these storiesas well.
So that's it for this week.
(58:54):
Keep on following your passions,and I'll see ya in two weeks.
Thanks for tuning in this week.
Remember to hit that subscribeor follow button wherever you
downloaded this podcast.
And if you're enjoying thecontent, please tell a friend
about assorted conversations andhelp me spread the word.
Thanks.
And now for this week's episode.
SPEAKER_08 (00:29):
Everyday people following their passions.
SPEAKER_06 (00:33):
That's probably like one of the highlights of my life
so far.
Just being able to be creativelike that.
Something I've always wanted.
SPEAKER_03 (00:41):
And then I decided to get another hive, and that
turned into a lot of hives.
SPEAKER_02 (00:47):
As long as I can do that, I want to be a good
citizen, help people out.
SPEAKER_08 (00:52):
Putting themselves out there, taking chances, and
navigating challenges along theway.
SPEAKER_07 (00:59):
I I absolutely identified with having stage
right because, you know, anytimeI went on stage, I just felt
like I was having a hot attack.
SPEAKER_05 (01:06):
Very first lap, very first practice session, I
crashed, turned the car upsidedown, made a spectacle of
myself, and I got back on thathorse and started riding again.
SPEAKER_08 (01:16):
As they pursue what makes them happy and brings them
joy.
SPEAKER_00 (01:21):
As long as people are having a good time and I
have the opportunity to putsmiles on people's faces, I love
what I do.
SPEAKER_01 (01:27):
I have done things that I never thought I could do.
SPEAKER_12 (01:32):
To have somebody tell me how real it looks and
how, you know, from their actualmemory.
Because that's telling me Icaptured what I was trying to
get.
SPEAKER_08 (01:44):
Welcome to Assorted Conversations.
I'm your host, Helen.
SPEAKER_09 (01:50):
It's Wednesday, and welcome to anybody who's joining
Assorted Conversations for thefirst time, and welcome back to
anybody who's coming back foranother episode.
I am so glad you are all here.
So this week's episode is prettyinspiring.
My guest this week, Drew hikedthe Appalachian Trail with his
(02:11):
brother, and they were both intheir 70s.
Now, although that's an amazingphysical feat in itself, you'll
hear from Rand Timmerman, myguest this week, that both
brothers not only used thisjourney to complete a physical
goal, but they also used it tohelp them work through life
(02:35):
difficulties.
One was battling addiction andmaintaining sobriety, and the
other one was battling grief.
And you'll hear at the end ofthis 2,000-mile journey how they
found peace and closure, as wellas some funny trail stories, and
some pretty scary trail stories.
(02:57):
So not for the faint of heart,but a fantastic story.
So take a listen to this week'sepisode, and I'll see you on the
other side.
This week's guest has quite thebackground from the army in
Vietnam and on to becoming a JAGofficer to practicing law in
(03:17):
upstate New York.
Rand Timmerman has seen and donea lot, but those things pale in
comparison to what heaccomplished at the age of 72.
He, along with his brother,strew hiked all 2190 miles of
the Appalachian Trail, and theypublished a book about their
(03:38):
journey.
I am thrilled to welcome RandTimmerman to Assorted
Conversations.
Hi Rand.
SPEAKER_04 (03:44):
Hi, Helen.
Thank you so much.
SPEAKER_09 (03:46):
How are you?
SPEAKER_04 (03:48):
Oh, I'm fine.
I'm good.
SPEAKER_09 (03:50):
Good, good.
And and I I trust that you'verecovered from that long walk in
the woods.
SPEAKER_04 (03:55):
Yes.
Well, I'm 80 now.
I was 72 when we did that in2018.
And I still hike.
I hike three miles this morningbefore daylight, and I do a lot
of exercises and stuff.
So yeah.
Gotta keep moving.
Use it.
SPEAKER_09 (04:11):
Good for you.
You're my inspiration.
So what inspired you to takethis journey along the
Appalachian Trail, all the wayfrom Georgia to Maine?
SPEAKER_04 (04:24):
My brother, Ronnie.
You know, we were both combatveterans from the Vietnam War.
I was in the Marine Corps, hewas in the Army.
And then when we came back, hemarried our mother's best
friend, Edie.
Edie was 14 years older thanRonnie, divorced with seven
children.
SPEAKER_10 (04:44):
Wow.
SPEAKER_04 (04:45):
And the next thing I know, they're hanging out, going
line dancing, and stuff.
He fell madly in love with herand she with him.
And they got married and endedup moving to Utah and became
very involved in the Mormonchurch.
And then so Ronnie was just veryhappy.
(05:05):
He was always a you know areligious man, a very spiritual
man.
I lost all of that pretty muchmy childhood, resentment,
poverty, which we were reallyburied in.
My father had been a Mustangpilot during World War II, and
he came home, married my mom,and then had me and my brother,
and he got polio and ended upparalyzed from the waist down
(05:29):
for the rest of his life.
SPEAKER_09 (05:30):
Oh, wow.
SPEAKER_04 (05:31):
So we, you know, we were raised in a very poor, more
cows and people type place,which actually was good.
I had a really interestingchild.
I had to grow up fast, and I wasdriving tractors by the time I
was 12 and trapping and huntingand all kinds of stuff.
So I had a pretty goodchildhood, but so yeah, Edie,
(05:54):
you know, Ronnie married her.
They went out there and sheproduced not only the seven
children, but 27 grandchildrenand 27 great-grandchildren when
she died in 2017.
SPEAKER_09 (06:07):
Holy cow! What a legacy!
SPEAKER_04 (06:10):
Yeah, and you know, my brother and I have both been
very active our whole adultlives.
I became a lawyer as youintroduced me as a fluke in the
Marine Corps.
Marine Corps gave me the worstexperiences and one of the best.
I had no clue what I was gonnabe when I really grew up.
So, you know, they sent me toJag school without even having a
(06:31):
college degree or anything, andand that was an amazing
experience.
I ended up there with 99 guyswho were all real lawyers,
graduated law school.
They were all captains.
They made them captains becauseyou know they needed to do that
in order to inspire them to comein the military for a stint.
And when we got there for that,I I decided, you know, I had an
(06:52):
alcohol problem.
I kind of knew I I liked it waytoo much, even at that stage.
And I decided not to drink atall during the week, and I
really worked that out.
Ended up being the honor man ofthe class.
SPEAKER_02 (07:04):
Oh, wow.
SPEAKER_04 (07:04):
Yeah, and I realized, holy cow, I can do
this.
So I ended up being aprosecuting attorney in the uh
Marine Corps for a while, andthen when I got out, I was
married, had my first child, andwent to came to Syracuse and got
uh my degrees.
Ended up being a you knowself-employed lawyer for four
(07:25):
decades.
So but Ronnie and I both werevery active our whole lives.
He became a commercial pilot,mostly freight, mail, until at
the end he was taking touristson on flights through the Grand
Canyon.
SPEAKER_02 (07:41):
Wow.
SPEAKER_04 (07:42):
That was pretty exciting.
So anyway, Edie had a massivestroke in 2011.
Oh and then unfortunately, shenever got better, she got worse.
She had a whole bunch of ministrokes.
So she spent the rest of herlife in a wheelchair pretty
much.
Ronnie took care of her verylovingly and diligently.
(08:04):
He wouldn't let anybody else.
And then thought he was readywhen she passed, but I could
tell by the voice, you know,when I talked to him on the
phone that he was struggling.
I think it challenged everythingthat he believed in, in a sense,
about, you know, spiritual powerand God and all that.
He certainly was still somewhatspirit.
(08:25):
He was just challenged big time.
He was incredibly sad, probablyalmost clinically depressed in a
way.
SPEAKER_09 (08:31):
Yeah, that well, that was the love of his life,
right?
SPEAKER_04 (08:34):
Yes, absolutely.
She's a beautiful person, shereally was.
Anyway, we so I went out to seehim in January of 2018, you
know, which is like a month anda half after she passed.
And I said, Well, I had talkedto him on the phone, and before
that, and I had never been outthere.
So they came east every year.
We would get together like oneday a year.
So when I talked to him on thephone, he said, I think I'm
(08:57):
gonna hike the AppalachianTrail.
I thought, well, that's crazy.
It's absolutely insane.
Because I had hiked in the SmokyMountains quite a bit.
SPEAKER_10 (09:06):
Uh-huh.
SPEAKER_04 (09:07):
You know, I ran 26 marathons, I did cross-country
ski races in the wintertime.
I was very active.
I was like a weekend warriortype person.
SPEAKER_09 (09:17):
Yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_04 (09:18):
And as a result of that, though, I had destroyed my
left knee, and I had anartificial left knee, and then
my right knee, my right leg wasa half inch shorter than my
left.
So I walked with a pretty badlimp.
And but I had hiked in the uhAppalachian Trail in the Smokies
quite a bit.
I like to go on weekend justmyself.
(09:39):
We both had PTSD.
I had horrible nightmares forquite a while.
And I would just go on theseadventures, right?
So I knew quite a bit about themountains.
What I didn't realize was thatRonnie was doing a lot of hiking
in Utah.
He and he and Edie and thefamily had done a lot, he was in
really good shape.
(09:59):
Even when she was taking care ofher, he would put her in the
wheelchair by the front window,and then he would go out and run
a few miles, and he'd swing byevery once in a while and make
sure she was all right and stufflike that.
So he had a good physical basetoo.
SPEAKER_09 (10:14):
Right.
SPEAKER_04 (10:15):
We both, but we're in our 70s.
SPEAKER_09 (10:18):
Right, right.
So I'm like, this is I mean, I'mtelling you, in your 70s, you
guys are far more active than Iam currently.
SPEAKER_04 (10:26):
So yeah.
Well, we're kind of that warriorclass, I guess you would say.
Yeah.
Guys, I don't know, we justcan't help it.
Plus after the the Vietnam War,we both pro I know myself, I
needed that physical exertionevery day.
I needed that feeling of theendorphins and the Yeah.
You know, you spend 13 monthswalking in the jungle, armed to
(10:48):
the teeth, you know, always gota certain level of anxiety and
fear, you know, undercurrent,because you know, you know,
things are gonna happen, youjust don't know when or what.
SPEAKER_11 (10:58):
Yep.
SPEAKER_04 (10:58):
And then and then you'd have these moments of
terror.
And so you get used to a gentleand rushes and things like that.
So we both replaced it withphysical vigor, I guess you
would say.
Okay, that makes sense.
Yeah.
So I asked him how he's gonna doit.
We're hiking in the desert inUtah, and and he's insisting
he's gonna hike the AppalachianTrail.
(11:18):
I said, What are you gonna do?
And he said, Well, I bought abutt, I got all my gear.
And he'd actually done a lot ofstudying, he had got all the
maps, and I mean he had reallythought it through pretty much
as far as actually doing thetrail.
And he said, Well, I'm gonnatake the bus to uh Springer
Mountain and start walking.
And I said, Well, that sucks.
(11:41):
That's not a good plan, bro.
I don't think that'll work verywell.
How about if I go with you?
And he said, Would you?
And I said, Yeah.
Now, in my brain, Helen, I'mthinking, two weeks max.
Right.
I'm gonna pacify him, we'll godown there, and it's gonna hurt
like heck, but I can do twoweeks, and then he'll be come to
his senses and we'll come home,and you know, that'll be the end
(12:04):
of it.
And because, you know, I did doa lot of hiking and stuff like
that, walking, but I was in painall the time.
SPEAKER_09 (12:10):
And right, right.
So at the time he proposed this,did you it you didn't think you
guys would finish?
SPEAKER_04 (12:19):
I absolutely was a hundred percent guarantee we
won't.
Okay, we won't.
And when I wrote the book, whichwas a couple years after we did
it, and then he was I wasshowing it to him, and he when
he read in there, I wrote inthere two weeks max.
He said, Did you really think weonly go two weeks?
And I said, Absolutely.
(12:40):
Wow, anyway, we could but I wasnot going to let him go by
himself.
You know what I mean?
I felt it's not safe, it wouldbe very unsafe and very
difficult.
It was very difficult anyway,but it would have uh to me, it
would have been possible, and Iwould have been I wouldn't have
been able to sleep for you knowsix months, right?
Wondering where he was and whathe's doing, and how much did he
(13:03):
need me to help him and you knowstuff like that?
So yeah, and so we ended up youknow on March 22nd of 2018,
we're at Springer Mountain inthe snowstorm.
SPEAKER_09 (13:17):
Oh gosh.
SPEAKER_04 (13:20):
I have a picture of my brother on that first day,
and he's standing inside of oneof the shelters, and it's just
like an open, it's athree-walled little wooden
shelter like a bus depot, yeah,with the front open, and he's
standing in there and it'ssnowing.
I don't look at his face.
(13:40):
It's like I could just see youwas thinking, what have I got
myself into?
SPEAKER_09 (13:44):
Right, right.
Oh wow.
SPEAKER_04 (13:47):
But I also knew my brother, if he makes up his mind
he's gonna do something, he'lldo it, he'll do it.
He will he will do it, he willdo it until it kills him.
And there's a little bit of thatin me too, maybe not quite as
powerful as he was, but yeah.
SPEAKER_09 (14:04):
Well, I would think it's the it's gotta be in
anybody that through hikes theAppalachian Trail.
I mean, it's it's many milesthrough many states.
I was taking a look at it on theon a map, and I'm not sure my
map is that clear, but it startsin Georgia, goes through
(14:24):
Tennessee.
Does it clip North Carolina ordoes it stay in Tennessee and go
right into West Virginia andthen Virginia?
SPEAKER_04 (14:32):
No, it goes it goes Georgia, like 85, 90 miles, and
then you're in Tennessee, andthen the the Appalachian Trail
goes right through Tennessee.
The eastern border of Tennesseeand the western border of North
Carolina are the same.
SPEAKER_09 (14:47):
Okay, yeah.
SPEAKER_04 (14:48):
There's like I can't remember the exact distance, but
they're like 150 miles whereyou're that can't common border.
And as a matter of fact, andwhen we were in Madison County,
North Carolina, on the westernside of it, we came across a
cemetery, really old cemetery.
SPEAKER_09 (15:07):
On the trail?
SPEAKER_04 (15:08):
Right, yeah, right there.
I saw it as we as I was walkingby, and I just went right in
there and started looking at thetombstore.
It was older than sin.
And I found a tombstone thatsaid they were members of the
Shelton family that wereConfederate soldiers and that
they had been massacred byConfederate soldiers.
SPEAKER_09 (15:30):
Wow.
SPEAKER_04 (15:31):
Yeah, and I took a picture of it and I thought, how
could that possibly happen?
That just makes no sense.
I ended up writing a 600-pageabout the Shelton Laurel
Massacre in Madison County,North Carolina, because it
really did happen.
I could not believe how couldthat be possible, but it was.
That's what happened.
There's a huge history.
(15:51):
I have like 50 books at home onthe Shelton Laurel massacre in
Madison County, North Carolina.
What's right on right, it'sright on the western side of
North Carolina in 1863.
It was a real gosh.
SPEAKER_09 (16:10):
Some of the things you stumbled upon and got to
discover.
SPEAKER_04 (16:13):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_09 (16:14):
Pretty cool.
So then it goes from Tennessee,North Carolina border into West
Virginia and Virginia, all theway up to Pennsylvania.
Does it clip New Jersey a littlebit?
SPEAKER_04 (16:29):
Yes.
You go in and out of New Yorkand New Jersey a couple of
times.
SPEAKER_09 (16:33):
Okay.
And then Connecticut, Mass, NewHampshire, Maine.
SPEAKER_04 (16:38):
Yep.
SPEAKER_09 (16:40):
Wow.
SPEAKER_04 (16:42):
Virginia's the longest, 550 miles in Virginia.
SPEAKER_11 (16:46):
Yep.
SPEAKER_04 (16:47):
So once you get into Virginia, it's like, when are we
ever going to get out ofVirginia?
It is crazy, but I would saytoo, you asked which was the
most beautiful part.
I'm going to say Virginia.
SPEAKER_09 (16:59):
Virginia.
SPEAKER_04 (17:00):
Oh my God, yes.
I mean, I took there was one dayI took 50 pictures because it
was just so amazingly beautiful.
I mean, beyond and the pro thething is too, the Appalachian
Trail, the mountains are only acouple thousand feet high there.
And Virginia, other than themountains, is fairly flat,
right?
So a lot of times you'd seethese amazing vistas.
(17:22):
You can actually see, you know,you can see 500 miles of the
state down below what it lookslike, you know.
And a lot of raptures and thingslike it was very beautiful.
A lot of stones, a lot of rocks,a lot of slides.
But Virginia, I found it to bethe most beautiful.
And I took so many picturesbecause I would come around the
(17:43):
corner and my jaw would just go,oh my god, look at that.
That's so cool.
SPEAKER_09 (17:47):
Oh wow.
SPEAKER_04 (17:47):
Yeah, the rock outclimbings.
There's a picture of me on arock outclimbing where it looks
like I'm suspended in space.
I mean, it's just so cool.
Out there, yeah.
Ronnie did not take hardly anypictures because he was he was
about being very precise aboutwhere we were, how far we went,
(18:08):
you know, how many feet inelevation.
There's 2195 miles on theAppalachian Trail, like you
said, 14 states it goes through.
Goes over 600 mountains.
300 of them are named.
Every state has a bear mountain.
A lot of bears.
(18:30):
3 million people hike some partof the Appalachian Trail every
year, but only about 2,500 to3,000 try to do the whole thing.
They call them.
And 17% make it.
So you're talking about 500people a year.
So an 80 year old 80-year-oldlady just did it this year.
SPEAKER_09 (18:50):
Really?
SPEAKER_04 (18:51):
Yes.
That's in that's incre I knowhow hard it is and how
dangerous.
I don't think my heart would myheart would go, we're done, kid.
SPEAKER_09 (19:04):
This is I don't think I could handle it now.
SPEAKER_04 (19:10):
That person is really a freak of me.
SPEAKER_09 (19:13):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_04 (19:14):
I mean, literally be able to do that at eight.
My hats off to her.
All respect.
SPEAKER_09 (19:19):
Absolutely.
SPEAKER_04 (19:20):
Amazing.
And then there was another ladythat ran it in about 45 days, I
think it was.
I mean, there's some God hascreated some amazing people.
We're not, I'm not one of themas far as physicality goes.
I'm more or less kind of normalor average, maybe a little above
average, but not.
But it's amazing what peoplehave done on the Appalachian
Trail.
(19:40):
But most people most peopledon't make it.
SPEAKER_09 (19:43):
I I would say, I mean, for you and your brother
to have done it in your 70s, youknow, um, I don't know if if you
trained for it or if it was justyour your background naturally,
always being active, having thatmilitary experience, you know,
always hiking, running, doingmarathons, if that got you to
(20:05):
the shape that you needed to beto even consider trying to do
something like this.
SPEAKER_04 (20:11):
Yeah.
At that time I was walking eightto ten miles a day, and I could
walk like two and a half milesin an hour.
I did have that baseline.
Ronnie was kind of the same, butI'm telling you, when you get
into the mountains, it's a wholedifferent ball game.
(20:32):
If you could do a mile and ahalf in the mountains, that is
practically sprinting.
SPEAKER_09 (20:38):
Right.
SPEAKER_04 (20:39):
We did we averaged 11 miles uh a day.
We went 30, 33 days in a row acouple times.
That's insane too, actually.
Wow.
But we would start at daylight,and I Ronnie usually got done
quicker than me because of mylimp.
I was slower than him, but hewould usually get finished about
a half an hour, an hour beforeme.
(21:00):
And but it would always be likethree or four o'clock in the
afternoon.
I mean, and I remember even inGeorgia when we first started
out, you'd be climbing thesemountains, and you think with
Georgia, it's like they can't bethat bad.
They're big ones.
And we and we would go overfive, six mountains in 11 miles.
SPEAKER_10 (21:19):
Uh-huh.
SPEAKER_04 (21:21):
And you get up the top, it's all like rocks and
really challenging, and thendown.
And I would be praying, Helen,God, just give me, just give me
a hundred feet.
No, a hundred yards flat.
I want to walk flat, just ahundred yards between the next
before we get to the nextmountain.
And you get down the bottom, youwalk ten feet, and you're going
(21:42):
up the next one.
The gaps are like 10 feet wide.
That's it.
SPEAKER_09 (21:47):
Yeah, I have a friend who's a through hiker,
and her goal is to hike theentire Appalachian Trail.
And the part that runs throughMassachusetts, she out she asked
me, Hey, would you want to meetup with me and do the
Massachusetts part of the hike?
And I was like, I don't know.
Is it flat?
I'll do the flat part.
(22:07):
So she hasn't made it to Massyet.
I think she just completedeverything in Pennsylvania,
Pennsylvania, Delaware, I think,just uh maybe a month ago.
So and she's she's in decentshape.
So I can't imagine uh the typeof shape you need to be in to
(22:27):
tackle through hiking it.
And you know, to the point ofhow few people actually complete
it versus the the people thatstart it.
I mean that stat was a littlemind mind-boggling.
SPEAKER_04 (22:41):
Right.
SPEAKER_02 (22:42):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_04 (22:42):
It took us three years.
It took us three years.
Yeah.
And because we had two vehicles,Ronnie hiked south most days,
and I hike north.
And you can say, how the heckdid you do that?
We parked on the trail almostevery night or you know, at
nighttime.
But there's a there's a somekind of a road going over the
Appalachian Trail on averageevery 10 to 15 miles.
(23:05):
Now there are places wherethat's not true, like Priest and
in the Smoky Mountains aroundClingman's Dome, there's a
couple of 35-mile stretches andso on.
So we had to do the full packthing.
Carrying a 40-pound pack versuscarrying a 40-pound pack is a
lot different.
Those days were really, reallychallenging, and we couldn't do
11, we'd do nine or ten at themost.
(23:26):
But oh my gosh.
So what we did in the morning, Iwould get up, I would start
hiking.
Ronnie would drive down themountain to the valley, take the
next road, take a road down,find the next road.
Usually they were dirt, some ofthem were really bad.
Drive up to the top of themountain.
So he's back on the AppalachianTrail.
Now he's on the AppalachianTrail, you know, 11 miles
(23:48):
further north than I am.
He would walk south, I wouldwalk north.
So we would meet in the middlefor a few minutes, right?
And then he would get my truckand repeat what he had done in
the morning and come back up towhere his car was, and then we
would stay right there.
And usually, you know, I had awhole bunch of food and and
water and stuff like that in mytruck.
(24:09):
I bragged that I slept in a tentevery night on the Appalachian
Trail, but usually it was about10 feet from my truck.
SPEAKER_09 (24:17):
So you you the two of you didn't really experience
the hike together.
SPEAKER_04 (24:23):
No, we could.
It would never have worked.
When we did we did walk togethera few times.
The problem is I can walk thesame pace as Ron, but because of
my short leg, I'm I'm movingforward uh, you know, an inch
and a inch and a half to twoinches shorter than he is.
So within moments, he's pullingaway from me.
(24:44):
And if I try to keep up withhim, now I'm getting up up on a
different, I'm in a differentgear.
Long range gear, I'm in theshort range gear.
SPEAKER_09 (24:53):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_04 (24:54):
It was and and then so what would happen the few
times we did, he'd get way aheadof me, almost out of sight.
He would stop, wait for me tocatch up.
When I got within about 10 feetof me, turn around and go.
Yeah, we it just didn't workwell.
His son Rick hiked with us for acouple weeks in the beginning,
and then him and Ron finished itto the end.
(25:15):
I did not finish the trail, Ionly did 1,863 miles.
SPEAKER_09 (25:19):
Ah.
Only.
SPEAKER_04 (25:22):
I fell down a rock slide in Massachusetts and did
uh it was bad.
Really, really bad.
And we ended up going off.
I couldn't even walk after that.
So I'm almost to the top ofWilcox Mountain in
Massachusetts.
When you get near the top, yousee this great big rock slide.
I mean, huge rocks and boulders,and it's steep.
(25:44):
And you look at it, you go,there's no way the trail goes up
there.
And then you look all the way upthe top and you see a white
slash mark on a tree.
The trail goes up there.
So I climbed up that rock slide,and this there's a lot of them.
But this I got within about 10feet of the top, and my my pole
slipped, and when it did, Itried to correct it.
(26:06):
I should have just fallenforward, right?
It wouldn't have peel.
I would have, you know, I mighthave gotten a bloody hand or
something, but but I didn't.
I stabbed, try to regain mybalance, and when I did it,
flipped me 180 degrees, and thenI stabbed with the other pole,
and that didn't work, and I dida swan dive off that rock slide,
(26:27):
and I went down about 20 feet,and I closed my eyes because I
knew I I was thinking this isgonna hurt.
I mean, I've been banged up, youknow, in Vietnam, hurt and stuff
and uh wounded, whatever.
So I kind of know a lot aboutpain, and but I thought this is
gonna hurt, but I didn't imagineit hurt way worse than anything
(26:47):
else I had ever experienced.
I mean, it was just incredible.
And then my leg, my foot gotcaught between two rocks,
otherwise I probably would havegot killed.
SPEAKER_09 (26:58):
Oh wow, so that stopped you from going down
farther.
SPEAKER_04 (27:01):
Yeah, I laid there with my eyes closed, I don't
know, for a little a bit forsure.
And then finally I, you know,opened my eyes.
I had it covered with blood formy my elbows and my hands and my
face.
And it felt like somebody hadtaken a the one of those steel
bands that he put on barrels,put it around my waist, and then
(27:23):
just crank it down as hard as Icould.
I mean it was so I crawled tothe top and I'm standing, I
finally got stood up, and I'mlike, I've come three miles, I
got nine more miles to get towhere my brother is, where he
left his car.
Fathom how I would ever get downthat rock slide.
I'm just like, I can't, I can'tdo it.
SPEAKER_09 (27:44):
Right.
SPEAKER_04 (27:44):
So I just turned around and started walking, and
for a while, I don't know ifyou've ever You were able to
walk.
Yeah, I could walk.
You know, I mean the way thepain was ridiculous, but then
after a while, I don't know ifyou've ever been hurt bad, but I
knew that if I just got moving,at some point it would just kind
of dissipate into usually itdissipates into just kind of a
dull ache, you know, an ache.
SPEAKER_09 (28:05):
Yeah, and that was I think that's kind of being in
shock though.
SPEAKER_04 (28:08):
No, yeah, probably.
When I met my brother, he said,What the heck happened to you?
I said, Well, it wasn't good.
He said, What are you gonna do?
And I said, Well, nobody's gonnaget me out of here, so I'm gonna
walk, I'll meet you like wealways do.
So we did, but I knew I was soanyway.
I got up the next morning, I gotout of my tent.
I couldn't uh I couldn't Icouldn't walk on an 80 hang on
(28:31):
to something.
And uh so my brother said, Whatdo you want to do?
And I said, I think we we bettergo home.
And uh so we did, and I I didn'tget medical treatment or
anything, and after a few days Istarted walking again, and and
then Ronnie calls me up andsays, You want to try to finish
it?
And I said, Sure, let's oh mygod.
(28:51):
So I did another 300 miles afterthat.
We did the whites, but not MountWashington because that was
close.
Well, Washington gets snow everymonth of the year.
SPEAKER_09 (29:02):
Yeah, I they have two seasons good sledding and
bad sledding.
That's it.
SPEAKER_04 (29:06):
Yeah, they have that cog rail road that goes up it
and everything.
I mean, it's it's a amazingthing.
That's a three-day because it'slike 60 miles to get across.
Well, not that far.
It's like 35 miles to get acrossthere.
There's no road or anything youcan um so we jumped ahead.
We did Moose Lock, which is areally beautiful big mountain.
(29:29):
I thought I was gonna fall inthat sucker too.
Getting back down was amazinglydifficult.
And then I did Wolf, and then wewent back to do Washington.
We had our full packs ready todo three days together, and we
went in and started up themountain, and I turned around, I
just started crying.
I looked around and I said, Ican't do it.
(29:51):
My pain was so bad I couldn'teven hardly sleep anymore, you
know.
So I, you know, he just lookedat me and he said, Well, you
want to try to do Just do a dayhike.
And I said, no, I I'm done.
We had both lost 35 pounds.
I'm 155 for crying out loud.
Not a big only 5'8, but mynormal rate was weight was
around 175, 180.
(30:13):
So he finished it with his sonRick.
So I didn't do the last couplehundred miles.
SPEAKER_09 (30:19):
Wow.
So what I mean, what injuriesdid you sustain from that fall?
I know you didn't get medicalhelp, but I mean you were still
in pain.
I'm hoping eventually you soughtmedical attention.
SPEAKER_04 (30:31):
I couldn't sleep at all.
And I ended up having well, Iwas having a hip replacement
while Rick and Ronnie werefinishing the trail.
SPEAKER_09 (30:39):
Oh my God.
Yeah.
Well, yeah.
I know it's dangerous, but holycow.
Any uh like let's look on thebrighter side of the hike.
Because I am still in shockabout that fall and then how you
tried to continue on and youknow where you wound up.
(31:02):
Throughout throughout the hike,what state had uh had the the
toughest terrain?
SPEAKER_04 (31:08):
And I'm guessing it might have been Massachusetts,
but no, you know, it's funny toobecause I when we crossed the
Hudson River, I thought thesemountains aren't gonna be this
is gonna be nothing, right?
SPEAKER_11 (31:21):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_04 (31:22):
Oh my god.
No, they're just as bad as anyof the other mountains in New
York and New Jersey.
You know, you'd be up there andall you could see is raptors and
trees.
And at that point, it afterHarper's Ferry in West Virginia,
before that, you see people allthe time, right?
That's about roughly halfway.
(31:43):
We logged in there, they haveyou know, you you get to prove
that you went that far at least.
And after that, and in the firsthalf of the hike, Helen,
probably as many, if not more,women than men.
Really?
Yeah, yeah.
No, I I mean we saw a lady outthere with four kids.
(32:03):
Her kids, 16 was the oldest.
I think the youngest was likesix years old.
And this was in Virginia, sothey'd already gone quite a
ways.
The probably oldest woman wesaw, I think, was 68, so not
that much younger than us.
A few people in their 60s, mostof them are in their 20s, 30s,
40s.
SPEAKER_09 (32:22):
Yep.
SPEAKER_04 (32:23):
Some rugged guys in their 50s.
But then after Harper's Ferry,we didn't see too many women, or
anybody, really.
I mean, it it just tapers rightoff big time after that.
SPEAKER_09 (32:35):
How how can you tell the difference between a through
hiker and somebody who is a asection hiker?
SPEAKER_04 (32:43):
Smell.
SPEAKER_09 (32:48):
I don't know why I didn't think of that.
SPEAKER_04 (32:50):
Oh yeah, no.
Well, you you you we would uhafter a couple weeks, we would
try to stay.
We would always find a campsitesomewhere that had showers.
SPEAKER_11 (32:59):
Uh-huh.
SPEAKER_04 (32:59):
And we would stay there for a day or two and then
hike north or south.
Like in Loft Mountain inShenandoah Park in the southern
part of Virginia is a perfectexample.
We got a campsite there.
I have a picture of my brotherthere with a buck standing next
to him at our picnic site.
Campsite.
And then we had a shower.
(33:20):
So we stayed, I think we stayedthere four days because we had
the vehicles we could drive downand hike a 12-mile section and
then do another one.
And come back.
Yeah, and come back.
So we did that when we could, soto get clean.
Biggest thing, you get so youdon't even like you can't even
stand the way you smell.
I mean, your own self.
You're like, you're a turd.
(33:41):
You can just tell throughhikers.
They just, you know, like Isaid, we lost 35 pounds in in
the first year.
Actually, we were in oh, I thinkwe were almost in New Jersey
when we stopped in 20 uh 18because we both lost like 30
pounds at that point.
We look like usherwoodsurvivors.
(34:02):
I mean, the all the throughhikers, they have that gaunt
face, they have that kind oflike like a base level of
fatigue written out.
SPEAKER_09 (34:09):
Kind of yeah, hollow.
SPEAKER_04 (34:11):
You can just tell the way their gear is the way
they move, you know, they're notlackadaisical, they're pretty
you're pretty precise about.
And I fell every day, I brokefour hiking poles.
SPEAKER_02 (34:25):
Ouch.
SPEAKER_04 (34:26):
Yeah, we had the look.
SPEAKER_09 (34:27):
Yeah.
And how did you guys getsupplies?
I mean, because you had yourvehicles, you were able to, you
know, when the stop allowed forit, were were you able to, you
know, drive somewhere, go to astore, get water, get you know,
whatever you needed.
SPEAKER_04 (34:44):
There is, believe it or not, there's a food general
or food city, the dollar storesat the base of almost every road
that crosses over theAppalachian Trail.
I mean, literally, you canalmost hike.
The problem is you got to getdown the mountain to get to the
store, right?
And usually that could be two,three miles.
(35:06):
I mean, we gave people ridesalmost every day.
Will you can we ride down withyou to get some food at the
yeah, sure, get in, you know.
Then drive back up.
So we would buy I buy you knowfreeze-dried food there and
water and stuff, and then wejust kept it in our truck.
I still have a bucket full ofyou know dried food in my truck.
(35:33):
Wow, but yeah, that's and weshared some too.
I mean, a lot of campers werenot particularly well prepared.
Prepared.
I always carried two 24 bottlesof water because there's no
place to get water on the top ofthe the trail does not go around
the mountains, it goes overthem.
(35:53):
So you're always on top, prettymuch, whether you're on the
ridge going up to the top orwhatever.
And once you get to top of themountain, there's no water.
I had some of those uh aluminumblankets.
People would get trouble.
I gave away my water purifiertwice.
I gave away because people hadthey didn't have proper, you
(36:15):
know, thing.
The other thing that people didwas if you went to the shelters
usually like in the afternoon, Iwould go to the shelters just to
log in.
I wanted to have proof.
So many pictures too, I think.
I want in my own mind.
I I didn't know I was gonnawrite a book, but I I just I
don't know, I was documentingthat we were actually doing
(36:36):
this, right?
SPEAKER_09 (36:37):
Right.
SPEAKER_04 (36:37):
And I if you were going down to the shelter, and
then usually aren't on the topof the mountain, you have to
walk down a little bit, I couldusually smell where it was
before I could see it.
Okay.
Yeah.
So a lot of these youngerhikers, you see them the next
day, they've got their earbudsin and they're hiking, and their
(36:59):
eyes look like you know, arebig.
SPEAKER_10 (37:02):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_04 (37:03):
They're not very present.
Right.
They're just kinda so forwhenever I saw like poisonous
snakes, I would try to make surethey got off the trail because I
was afraid somebody would gethurt, you know, they're paying
attention.
And one day, you know, you weretalking about critters at the
(37:24):
very beginning.
One of my more memorable,memorable experiences was I came
across a rattlesnake, big, bigsnake.
And he would not get off thetrail.
Usually they just you know goright away, right?
SPEAKER_11 (37:38):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_04 (37:39):
But he was had an attitude, and he coiled on me,
and I'm like, oh, this is notgood.
And then I couldn't, he wouldnot leave.
And then I look down and I see achipmunk laying by my foot, and
it's got two blood spots on it.
SPEAKER_09 (37:54):
Oh no.
And I go, Oh, you were standingon his dinner.
SPEAKER_04 (37:57):
Yeah, he was it was quivering, and I go, Oh, I get
it.
So I I squatted down.
We I'm eyeball to eyeball withthis snake, right?
He's watching me intently, andI'm staring at him.
Don't, don't, I'm, I'm a goodguy, you know?
I squatted down, picked it up bythe tail, I shook it in front of
his face pretty much, and Ithrew it as hard as I could over
(38:20):
his head into the forest.
And that rattler, you could nothave shot an arrow faster than
that snake went.
I mean, my jaw almost hit thetrail because I'm like, oh my
god, I had no idea how fast hecould move.
And I thought, if he wanted tostrike me, I would there's
(38:41):
nothing I could have done.
There's no way.
Oh, I would have missed him.
I would, he would have got me ina heartbeat.
But I wanted to make it that'scrazy.
SPEAKER_09 (38:49):
And you have any other any other animal
encounters on the trail?
SPEAKER_04 (38:53):
Bears.
Bears.
In the Shenandoah Mountainssection, the national park,
there's 300 square miles.
And for seven days, we ran intoa bear every day.
I ran into a bear every day.
SPEAKER_09 (39:10):
Really?
SPEAKER_04 (39:12):
Yeah.
And which is fine because mostof the time they run away,
right?
They don't they're not gonnamess around with you.
But one of them, huh?
I've had bad experiences on solohikes in the uh smoky mountains.
I had a bear that I played hideand seek with not in a fun way
(39:32):
for about an hour and a half.
Oh my gosh.
He was stalking me.
And it was in the fall, and Isuspect because he was getting
ready to hibernate, he wasreally, really hungry.
SPEAKER_11 (39:43):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_04 (39:43):
And he fake charged me.
I fake charged him because youcannot you cannot show a bear
any fear.
You cannot, and you definitelydon't want to run away because
if you do, they will attack youimmediately because they can't
see very well.
They just see kind of movement.
They see a movement and it'sgoing away from them, they their
(40:04):
brain goes, food, and theyattack right.
So he's trying to make me runaway by charging.
He'd do these fake.
I mean, if you ever saw like anature film when they charge,
they're like growling and theirfeet are the paws are going
fast, but they're not reallymoving, they're just putting out
a big show, right?
SPEAKER_02 (40:22):
Yeah, and then I would say the same act of them.
SPEAKER_04 (40:35):
And I would do that, and then he would leave, and
then I would go down the trailfurther, and then he would come
back out.
Oh my god.
And then I at one point I almostI had a weapon.
I was thinking, I don't want toshoot a bear, I really don't
want to shoot a bear.
Absolutely don't, but this guyis not leaving me alone.
Eventually that bear did leave,and I just I got the heck out of
(40:58):
there slowly, but I walked outof there.
So anyway, I came around thetrail on the in Shenandoah
Mountain, pretty close to LoftMountain, and there's this bear.
SPEAKER_12 (41:08):
I came around a corner and he was right in front
of me.
I mean like 10 feet.
SPEAKER_04 (41:14):
Oh and he stopped, so his paws in the air, he froze
like a statue with one paw inthe air.
His head looked like a bowlingball.
SPEAKER_12 (41:24):
And wow in my brain saw, oh my god, this is the most
beautiful beast I have ever.
Helen, he was gorgeous, his furwas shiny, shiny black.
I mean, it was just unbelievablyvivid.
SPEAKER_04 (41:40):
And his eyes, big brown eyes looking at me,
frozen, and so and I'm notthinking very clearly, right?
I'm not going for my bear sprayor anything.
I reached back and got my phoneso I could take a picture,
right?
And I'm standing there froze,he's frozen.
I'm bringing it up.
As soon as I got up in front ofme, he whirled and went down the
(42:02):
trail like as fast as he could.
I never within two seconds hehad gone a hundred feet at
least.
And then he took to the left andwent down the mountain.
Now, the day before I had seen abear in a similar situation,
except he was way further awayfrom me, right?
When he saw me, he just went offthe woods in the right and
disappeared.
I actually ran down the trail.
(42:23):
Well, sort of ran, because Iwant to take a picture of him,
right?
To where he went down themountain, went out into the
forest down the mountain, and Ididn't see him, I didn't hear a
thing.
But this bear, this day, when heturned off that trail, oh my
God, another hiker came upbehind me and he goes, What's
that?
And I said, That's a bear.
No way.
(42:43):
I said, because it sounded likesomebody in a bulldozer going
down the mountains.
It sounded like he was knockingtrees over the boulders or
something like it was a hugeracket.
And then shortly after that, Iran into a conservancy guy by
the name of Gene Anderson,actually.
And I have his picture in thebook.
(43:10):
And so we were talking about thebears, and I was telling him a
little bit about what hadhappened, and he goes, Yeah,
there's a he said there's 600bears in this Shenandoah
National Park.
And I said, Well, there's 300square miles.
So that's two bears for everysquare mile.
SPEAKER_09 (43:28):
Right.
SPEAKER_04 (43:29):
And and half of it, half of those 300 miles, they're
not gonna, they're not gonnawalk there.
Right, you know, they're that'sthere's a reason why they're
walking on the trails.
A lot of the the bears aren'teven gonna walk there.
You know, I walked under a treewith a bear in it at one point.
That was fun.
(43:51):
And Gene Anderson said, Yeah, hesays we got way too many bears.
The reason is they don't allowhunting.
Someday somebody's gonna gethurt.
SPEAKER_09 (43:58):
So they just keep reading.
SPEAKER_04 (43:59):
Yeah, and I said, someday somebody's gonna get
hurt.
And he said, Yeah, probablywill.
I don't know.
But you have to be smart aboutit.
Don't show fear, don't run.
Ronnie had a situation with uh alady that went hysterical on
him.
I had a similar situation.
There was whenever there wasstuff across the trail, because
(44:20):
of the we had some zombies outthere.
Yeah, I would get it off thetrail.
So one day there's this hugelog, it was probably 10 feet
long, it was about you knowalmost half a foot in diameter,
so it was good size, but it wastotally rotten.
So it was I thought, well, if Ican move it, I'll move it.
(44:41):
And when I got a hold of it, itwas I could pick it up on one
end.
I stood up on one end and I gaveit a big shove.
And when I gave it a big shove,it went off the hit mountain and
it made you know a crash downthe mountain a little ways.
Well, there's a man and womanright behind me.
I didn't realize it.
And they were just comingaround, they hadn't seen me yet,
but they heard it.
SPEAKER_03 (45:01):
And they go, the the woman screaming, bear, bear,
bear! And the husband's going,No, honey, it'll be okay, it'll
be okay.
And I said, I turned around andwalked back towards them.
I said, It's not a bear, itwasn't a bear.
Yes, it was, it had to be abear, it couldn't be anything,
could not.
SPEAKER_07 (45:14):
Oh, wow.
SPEAKER_04 (45:17):
I think they ended up uh they were not through
hikers, so they just turnedaround and went back the other
way.
They didn't believe me.
SPEAKER_09 (45:25):
Oh, that's funny.
That's funny.
Now, we've talked an awful lotabout the book, kind of
indirectly, but based on youryour journey on the Appalachian
Trail, both you and your brotherjournaled, and eventually you
put the two pieces of writingtogether, along with thousands
(45:50):
of photos that you took.
I actually just received thebook maybe two or three days
ago, and I've and I've lookedthrough all the photos, and I am
like just blown away by howbeautiful everything is.
Talk to me a little bit aboutmelding your written account and
your brother's written accountto create a spiritual passage.
SPEAKER_04 (46:14):
Right.
Both of us kept journals on adaily basis, and luckily they
were completely different.
So I had made a decision aftermy brother would be there's map,
there's pictures of him in thebook, and he's always looking at
a map.
I mean, he studied those mapsevery night, and somewhere along
(46:34):
the line, the first coupleweeks, I said, thought to
myself, you know, uh, I'm justgonna I'm not gonna do this
anymore.
I'm not gonna try to figure outwhat it looks like, you know,
what the terrain is and all thatstuff.
I'm just gonna hike it like it'sin 1970, and whatever is is,
right?
I'm just gonna follow the lightslashes, and so Ronnie's journal
entries were like, we were here,we went to here, the elevation
(46:58):
changes were there's 46,500,000feet of elevation changes on the
Appalachian Trail.
That's almost a half a millionfeet of elevation changes.
Wow, yeah, and so thetopographical maps show those,
right?
Wow, so he would record all thatstuff, and then he would say, I
love my family, my family'ssupporting me, blah, blah, blah.
(47:19):
You know, he always had thatspiritual thing in his mine, it
was completely different.
I'm like, right, a little bitabout where we were and where we
were going, but I was like, thishappened.
I recorded every trail name ofpeople that I met, and and I put
them in there because the trailnames were fascinating.
Ronnie's fail trail name wasAttitude Indicator, which is an
(47:39):
instrument in an airplanebecause he's a pilot that tells
you what the attitude of theairplane is relative to the
horizon, right?
SPEAKER_11 (47:46):
Uh-huh.
SPEAKER_04 (47:47):
My trail name was Ran Bow.
SPEAKER_09 (47:53):
I love it.
SPEAKER_04 (47:53):
Ronnie came up with that.
Yeah, well, almost got mekilled.
SPEAKER_09 (47:57):
Oh no.
SPEAKER_04 (47:57):
So I would say, when I ran into hikers, I would say,
I stick my hand out, say, myname is Ranbo, what's yours?
You know, and then they wouldtell me and we'd shake hands,
right?
Or same thing.
And then I would write all thenames in my journal at night.
So I and then I did put them inthe book.
Well, one day we were up in thewhites.
I had I was days were going by,I wasn't seeing anybody.
(48:18):
And this one day I saw twopeople, two people, two duos
twice, and they were both menand women.
And the first time I stuck myhand out, Rambo, and the hot and
the guy goes, Oh, whatever hisname was.
Oh man, yeah, I'm so great tosee you.
Uh can I can I have my picturetaken with you?
And he put their arm around me,and the guy would go, I thought
(48:39):
you'd be bigger, and the bookwas the guy taking the picture,
like, you know.
And then the first time Ihappened, I was like, that's
kind of weird.
And then it happened again.
A little few hours later, and Ithought, what the heck?
So that night we were eatingdinner, you know, getting ready
to go to sleep.
And and I I said to Ronnie, Isaid, Something strange is
happening today, bro.
(49:01):
Twice I ran into these couples,and they went on my picture
taken.
The guy said something like, Oh,yeah, can I have my picture
taken with you?
And I thought you'd be bigger.
And Ronnie's not looking at me.
And I go, What's going on, bro?
And he's nothing, nothing.
Come on.
Something's not right here.
And he goes, Well, I've beentelling them that you're you're
(49:25):
Rambo and you're the guy theymade the movie about.
SPEAKER_10 (49:29):
Oh my gosh.
SPEAKER_02 (49:31):
Um war with Sylvester Stallone, Rambo.
You get you gotta love brothers.
I said, Don't do that.
You're gonna get me killed.
Somebody's gonna say, I'm gonnatake this guy, I'm gonna kill
Rambo.
SPEAKER_09 (49:44):
Oh, too funny.
SPEAKER_02 (49:45):
Yeah, it was funny.
SPEAKER_09 (49:46):
Too funny.
So you you mentioned that thatRon was more methodical and more
planned out and more spiritualin what he captured in his
journals, and it sounds like youwere there for every experience.
The beauty, the challenge, andthat you were more into the
(50:08):
journey, and your brother wasmore into getting to the final
destination.
Is that accurate?
SPEAKER_04 (50:17):
Yeah, that is accurate.
He did have a situation where hesaw a halo in an otherwise very
dark day with no sun at all thewhole day, except this one
moment when there was a a halo,a very bright light in the on
the trail, and there's a picturehe took a picture of it.
(50:39):
Because it was Father's Day, itwas June, what is it, 21st,
2018, and he was thinking aboutEdie and he was thinking about
our dad, and then he saw thatlight, and he had a spiritual
experience.
He ended up walking towards it.
It had looked like there wassomebody in it, like Jesus or
Muhammad, or what you know, itcould be whatever you want, but
(51:01):
and he got a feeling of peaceand serenity finally.
He thought he could feel Ediesaying, Ronnie, it's okay, it's
okay.
I'm with your dad.
unknown (51:11):
It's okay.
SPEAKER_09 (51:12):
Wow.
Yeah.
Wow.
So pretty cathartic for him.
SPEAKER_04 (51:17):
Yeah, for me, I had been sober four years.
I had been in the program, I didthe program, I did the 12 steps,
I had a really great sponsor.
And then right after that, Istarted sponsoring guys because
men work with the men and womenwork with the women.
And I I, you know, was a part ofseeing men turn their whole
(51:37):
lives around.
And one of the things I hadtalked to my sponsor about was
what am I going to do on thetrail?
I'm not going to be going tomeetings or anything because I
go to meetings every day.
SPEAKER_10 (51:47):
Right.
SPEAKER_04 (51:48):
I work with guys every day.
So he had suggested I memorizethe readings, and I did meetings
in my head on the trail.
Every people would do like anhour and pretend I was in a
meeting and we'd bring up atopic and somebody, and I would
go around the room because Iknew what a lot of these people
would say.
It would be like the easiest dayof the hour of the day for me.
(52:08):
I just get in that zone.
I'm not even, and all of asudden at the end of it, I'm
like, man, I don't rememberwalking this last hour.
You know, it was it wasbeautiful for me.
And I had guys, I would turn myphone on every morning.
I had a couple guys that I hadbeen working with, and they
would call me and just check in.
Yeah, we're doing good, Rand.
How are you?
You know, that kind of thing.
So I had that spiritual thing,and then I had a really bad
(52:29):
experience.
I almost died in the SmokyMountains during a horrible
night, windstorm.
I I pitched my tent, and it wascalled False Gap, which means
there was no gap.
And I was on a ridge that wasonly like 12 feet wide, and it
dropped off hundreds of feet onboth sides, and I had to pitch
my tent, and the weather turnedreally bad right at dark, dusk,
(52:52):
and uh and these freight trainsof wind came flying up during
the night and right over me.
And it was my tent was beatingme to death.
Ronnie said, Would you were youhanging on to the rods that
hold, you know, we had thesetents that were made for you
know, for survival tents,basically.
I said, No, I was pushing downwith the stakes as hard as I
(53:12):
could with my feet and handsbecause I felt like it I felt
like I was in a body bag and itwas gonna just blow me off.
And I and I was praying to God,the one I didn't used to believe
in, to me, I'm just you know, Iwas saying, I've been a good
boy, God.
I've really been a good guy forthe last four years and I've
been helping people.
So if you want to kill metonight, okay, I guess that's
(53:34):
the way it's gonna be, but I'dreally rather not.
SPEAKER_09 (53:37):
Right, right.
SPEAKER_04 (53:39):
And it's uh daylight, just as it started
getting light, the winds finallyabated.
It was scary as hell.
I I was convinced I was gonnaget blown off of there, but I
didn't until wow.
SPEAKER_02 (53:50):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_09 (53:51):
Well, you know, looking back on the experience,
because it sounds like you werevery in the moment and you got a
lot out of it from the AAmeetings in your head to the
beautiful pictures you took andthe people you met and the
experiences you had, both goodand dangerous.
Looking back on it, what did youget out of that journey?
(54:12):
What did that journey mean toyou?
SPEAKER_04 (54:14):
It means everything.
I think, you know, our one ofour mottos is uh one step at a
time, and I incorporated thatinto the book because in the
book I ended up describing how Igot sober at 68 years old.
Alcohol didn't really bother mea whole lot for for many years,
but if you're an alcoholic, youmetabolize alcohol differently
(54:37):
than normal people.
That's why the AMA just made ita disease.
American Medical Associationdefined it as a disease in 1956.
And when I learned that aboutmyself, I thought it was some
kind of a moral failure, youknow.
Very common with alcoholics tothink, why can't I do it?
I did all these other things,you know.
SPEAKER_10 (54:56):
Right.
SPEAKER_04 (54:57):
Could not, at the end, if you're an alcoholic,
alcohol will get you.
It would just, and you it willtake over and you will have un
be unable to not drink.
You just it's an amazing thingthat happens.
So you need a higher power.
And I had been taught how to dothat, and I had a relationship
with a higher power, and itdefinitely grew, it got way
bigger on the trail.
SPEAKER_09 (55:20):
Yeah, oh I bet.
SPEAKER_04 (55:21):
Yeah, so now today I don't have any problem turning
the weight of my difficultiesover to that power that got me
through a war, it got methrough.
I had a client try to kill me asa lawyer.
Wow, got me through all kinds ofstuff, and and I didn't know it
for a long time, but I came toappreciate the fact that
something bigger than than meexisted that could help me get
(55:43):
through my difficulties and alot of other people, yeah.
All over the world, you know,and be happy, be serene, right,
be joyful.
Gave me joy.
That's beautiful.
Gave me joy, Helen.
It really did.
SPEAKER_09 (55:57):
That's amazing.
I'm so happy for you.
And thank you and your brotherfor your service to our country.
I've got to say that at the verybeginning, but thank you because
there's there's an awful lotthat goes into that that a lot
of people don't know about.
And I am so happy that you andyour brother worked through a
lot of that and that thisjourney was part of working
(56:21):
through those things that you'vesacrificed for us.
So thank you very much.
SPEAKER_02 (56:25):
Thank you.
SPEAKER_09 (56:26):
And I also want to thank you for all the time
you've shared with me.
Besides the book, is thereanything that I can put in the
show notes for our listeners tofollow along with you, contact
you, see what you're up to?
SPEAKER_04 (56:41):
Yes, they can randimmerman.com.
It's just my name run together,lowercase, no dots or anything,
just randimmerman.com.
I'll take them to my website.
And they can see some of thevideos and and the pictures and
the book, you know, information,and they can order books on
there too if they want to.
SPEAKER_09 (57:00):
Great.
Thank you so, so much for yourtime, Rand.
I'm so glad you survived.
And you took all of those, allof those experiences and turned
them into something positive.
So thank you again for all yourtime.
This is a fantasticconversation.
I really appreciate it.
SPEAKER_10 (57:18):
Thank you, Alan.
Appreciate you.
SPEAKER_09 (57:24):
Truly an amazing story.
Although both Rand and hisbrother Ron were rugged men from
their military backgrounds tothe way they kept themselves in
shape and some of the otherhobbies that they had that
helped them do that.
I found it incredibly funny thatat the very beginning, Rand
thought, no more than two weekswill this go on, and we will
(57:49):
come to our senses and go home.
And uh little did he know theywould persevere for the next
three years to complete thetrail and just how much they
would experience, learn, andgrow from that time on the
trail.
I also found it funny how Randwas more of in the moment, here
(58:11):
for the journey and theexperiences, and his brother Ron
was methodical and tactical andplanned, almost linear, if you
will.
And life with the AppalachianTrail is anything but linear,
and yet the trail finallybrought them peace and clarity
with all of its ups and downs.
(58:33):
I just their story truly isinspiring to me.
If you enjoy Assort ofConversations, please leave a
five-star written reviewwherever you downloaded today's
episode.
It helps the podcast becomevisible to other folks who may
be interested in these storiesas well.
So that's it for this week.
(58:54):
Keep on following your passions,and I'll see ya in two weeks.
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