The day after my 51st birthday, I flew to West Lebanon New Hampshire (just south of Hanover) to resume my long-running quest to complete my hike of the AT. I had hoped to perhaps finish all 400+ remaining miles, but it was not to be. After hiking, climbing, crawling and occasionally falling up and down the Whites, I limped into Gorham with a hamstring injury that would have made going on really painful. So . . . it looks like my seven year AT hike plan is now an eight year AT hike plan! The Whites were as magnificent as I remembered, but the walking was a LOT harder than I recalled from my walks back in 2001 - age is indeed reminding me of my mortality, but it was so good to see such beautiful alpine country above treeline! As usual, I met great old and new friends - my ol dhiking buddy Larry ("After") walked (and crawled) some of the way with me, and I met many great new friends, including Dan and Debbie, who are still headed for a complete yo-yo thruhike after 15 weeks on the Trail already.

After attending the ATC's biennial meeting at Ramapo College in northern NJ (where yours truly was elected to the ATC Board - all input welcomed re how we can make the ATC a better organization for hikers and the conservation of this great national park treasure), I drove up to Vermont, met my good friend Larry ("After"), and started northward again on the AT from North Adams to walk in the green mountains of Vermont. Other than walking with a slightly broken toe from a prior injury, and lots of rain, mud and skeeters, we had a great time!

I took Friday off work to go ski some of the best conditions ever at Tucks. I started skiing about 400 feet shy of the summit of Washington and didn't take off my skis until I got to the parking lot. Then, I headed to Vermont for some easier hiking and a good party with friends.

Thru-Thinker (Clark), Fingers (Rob) and The King (Brian) decided to escape the house and test out global warming on the AT from Damascus to the Grayson Highlands over a long weekend (Jan. 10-13, 2007). We met one SOBO and generally had a grand time; the Highlands are always so beautiful to me!

Sometimes we get lucky in life . . these pictures are from an incredible 10-week trip "out west" that I planned and took with my best friend Paul in the summer of 1976. We both were 18 at the time, and life was good - incredibly good! I have not (yet) had time to correct the order and add to the captions, but I think you'll enjoy joining me on a journey down memory lane - we saw some amazing things as we camped and hiked our way through almost all of America's major parks - and some not-so-major places, too . . . Enjoy!