In late summer, back in the day, we used to get away from it all by retreating to one of the Atlantic beaches and doing nothing but catch the sun, ride the waves, drink beer, cook on the grill and eat fresh corn. For a week, we relaxed. Can you imagine? But that was before mobile phones dragged the work world into our vacation hideaways.
It is still possible to get away, however. You just have to walk into the biggest woods you can find. I recommend it.
I recently returned from two weeks solo hiking the 136 miles of the Northville-Placid Trail in the Adirondack Park in Upstate New York. Here is a corner of America where cell phones do not ring and the newsfeed does not ping. My phone picked up service only a couple of times near road crossings (as far as I know, anyway; most of the time mine was switched off and stored in my backpack). That makes the NPT trailhead a portal to a timeless and peaceful world where one’s heart rate slows and blood pressure drops.
Enter it and the present becomes the past. Your world will, in Thoreau’s term, “simplify.”
The NPT is the polar opposite of the better-known Appalachian Trail (AT). Many of us have read Bill Bryson’s “A Walk in the Woods” — a comic reporting of the trials of hiking the ridgeline AT, which arduously takes the hiker from mountaintop to valley bottom and back up again. The more-obscure (and much shorter) NPT, by contrast, sticks to the low road. The hiker gets to enjoy pleasantly walking along through the forest.
There are still challenges, of course. Your backpack straps will dig into your shoulders. Deerflies and other biting insects will hover. The predawn cold will seep into your sleeping bag. But all in all, things are good.
And once you find your rhythm, your whole world becomes walking — eight hours each day for me. When was the last time you walked eight hours? I’m 74, and I can report that this is possible even for someone my age. That much walking leads you into a semiconscious zone in which your mind wanders to all manner of subjects. You walk and daydream. The daydreaming causes time to slip away. The day passes. Then it is time to choose a campsite, set up the tarp and mosquito net, start a fire, boil water. Freeze-dried meals require hot water and some stirring and that’s it. Then to bed — darkness falls early in the forest. Trying to decode a few pages of “Moby Dick” led me to a long and restful sleep.
I walked through a vast forest landscape. The Adirondack Park encompasses nearly 6 million acres — twice as much as Yellowstone and Yosemite national parks combined. The route took me through an array of designated wild forests and wilderness areas, each featuring lakes, streams, beaver swamps, rivers, mountains and woodlands. Common loons, barred owls and coyotes sang to me at night. Songbirds serenaded me during the day. The dappling of the sun filtering through the forest canopy painted calming patterns of light and shadow as I walked.
My interest in nature kept my days lively. I focused on birds and trees. I counted every bird I heard singing (1,221 in all) — mainly the ever-present red-eyed vireos (387), ovenbirds (121) and thrushes (93). These went into a small notebook I carried in my right hand (my left held my walking stick). I also admired the great and ancient forest trees that bordered the trail — the meter-thick yellow birches, towering eastern white pines, pole-straight red spruces and stately eastern hemlocks clustered in shady ravines. Every trail bend brought a new type of forest to appreciate — some young and some old; sometimes deciduous, sometimes coniferous, sometimes mixed.
And oh, the solitude. I walked alone in the forest for 14 days. Over that whole fortnight, I met just five other through-walkers. Some days I did not see a single soul. Every night I camped on my own and spoke only to myself, but I didn’t feel alone. There was the familiar to comfort me. The blue circular NPT trail markers, nailed to tree trunks, were always there to assure me I was not lost. I also met past versions of myself when I walked on trails and camped in lean-tos I had visited a half-century ago.
On the trail, uninterrupted by the din of the outside world, my thoughts left the present and threaded back to Adirondack summers of my boyhood. Buried memories bubbled up from my younger self: formative events — summer hikes, canoe excursions, young friendships and crushes, and wildlife encounters long past but now freshly recalled.
All worries about work deadlines and anger about current events melted away. It was akin to tapping the fountain of youth, and it was a worthwhile payoff for the effort of a big, long walk. And no matter how long you scroll, you won’t find it on your phone.
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