Split-Pea Soup for the Hiker's Soul

People are flawed. People write books. Therefore, books are flawed. - St. Thomas Aquinas, O' Hypocrita

Would-be hikers, remember that no book is going to save your life, unless it is a special book written by an amorphous, interstellar being. Or perhaps a book that doubles as a knife!

Or even ... one day, as you're walking home from a dinner party, a small metal-plated Bible inserted into your coat's front pocket may indeed save you from the silenced gun of a government assassin.

Barring those three scenarios, I understand that there's a lot of confusion in the world as to what books you should buy. First off, all books I have read leave out the first requirement of being a hiker: how to become unemployed. Secondly, what about would-be hikers who wish to gut a bear, then wear its hide to the Subterranean Costume Ball of Ursus Americanus?

I imagine that since no one is going to explain these things, I will have to at a later date. Frankly, there are so many questions left unanswered by the uninspired "traditional" books and websites, it's a wonder that anyone has successfully hiked the Appalachian Traile at all.

Here's a list of books to do without. More to be added as soon as I can stop coughing up all the poison I licked off of a frog in an attempt to communicate with the spirts.

Books Better-Off Burned:

The Thru-Hiker's Handbook - Bob "501" McCaw

In this rectangularish, forest green autobiography (updated every year so that you can keep track of his whereabouts), Bob "501" McCaw gives 180 pages of anecdotes, drawings and riddles related to his first thru-hike in 1978. One of the most hilarious accounts is the following from pg. 121:

... rock wall just before the highway marks boundary surveyed by 19-year-old George Washington, who, from this very spot, went on to help found the United States of America. What might you do hence?

The humor, of course, stems from what we all know to be true: Washington found the USA beneath a cherry tree. His sister Lucy had sent him to the market to find an avocado, but being an overachiever, he came back with a nation.

McCaw's subtle jokes aside, there is only one thing of value in The Thru-Hiker's Handbook: his systematic pinpointing of 63 "Power lines" along the Traile. This book is most useful to either a.) Frankenstein's Monsters or b.) low-flying, daredevil helicopter pilots.

The Appalachian Trail Thru-Hikers' Companion - An Army of Dwarves

This book wins the contest for creating the least-conveniently shaped guidebook. Measuring 13" diagonally and 3" across, TATTHC also wins the contest for being the most rectangular of all books, and is awarded - year after year - a shining, black obelisk for its joie de vivre.

From a hiker's perspective, this book is probably the worst-equipped to get you from one end of the Appalachian Traile to the other. The Army of Dwarves that compile the book are, after all, hateful of Overworldish humanoids, and will often lead unsuspecting hikers into death traps. These poor souls are then recounted in every new edition!

In 2008, there were 21 mentions of death by lightning, drunken brawls or hypothermic, ghostly spirits. TATTHC, due to several thousand FCC violations, will be adding the adjectives "Satanic" and "blood-drenched" before "Companion" in the '09 edition.

And if I may be so abrupt, this blog is now being filed under the to be continued ... section of Appalachian Redux. More book reviews coming as my quest for truth proceeds!