Bart hanging out on the corner of Zmikly and Zulski

North Country Trail Summer 2007

Sept 15, 2007

Below on this very poor quality map that roughly illustrates the routes of the 8 National Scenic Trails Bart's progress in hiking and photographing all the trails is shown.  The black lines are what he has finished and the grey lines are what he has left to do.  Currently he is hiking in North Dakota heading for the Minnesota border.  Once he finishes with North Dakota he will be completing his last segment on the North Country Trail which is New York.  He hopes the weather will hold up and plans on returning home in December.  After he finishes his hiking he wants to spent a couple of weeks photographing along the North County Trail as well as the Pony Express Historic Trail as he motors home for  Christmas with his family.

November 16, 2007

   While Bart was at the 11th Conference on the National Trails System he met Steve Elkinton, who is the Program Leader of the National Trails System.  During a conversation with him, Bart learned about Ed Talone, the first person to hike all the National Scenic Trails.  I emailed him at the American Hiking Society, where he works, to see if he would talk to Bart about his experience.  He called Bart the next morning and they talked for 4 hours!   If anyone out there knows of any one else who has hiked all the NST please let us know who they are.  We want to included them in our plans at the Finish Line.  Mark your calendars--that will be Sept 25, 2008 at Glacier Park, MT.

November 27, 2007

   The weather did not cooperate with Bart.  After holing up in hotels for about a week along the Finger Lakes Section in New York waiting for a break in the weather he finally decided to come home and use his time sorting and labeling slides.  It was very disappointing for him, but it was very extremely dangerous road walking with the baby jogger due to the icy and snowy conditions.  Good choice Bart, we want you alive for the Finish Line and Grande Finale.  He should be home by Dec 5th. 

   On his way thru Ohio he stopped by and spent the night with John and Lois Shaffer.  The Earl Shaffer Foundation  recently funded another printing of  Calling  Me Back to the Hills.  Bart signed several boxes of books.  The book was out of print for awhile so this is a great chance to pick up a copy for your hiking loved one suffering from the "February Blahs"

http://www.earlshaffer.com/publications.html

January 28, 2008

   Bart got home the first week of December.  He loved being out of the elements!  Since he was gone 9 1/2 months in 2007 his work was cut out for him.  Sorting thru his 1000's of new slides, keeping only the best took several weeks.  Then there was the labeling and now the scanning.  We are working on our new website ThatTrailGuy.com--hopefully it will be posted in March when Bart starts hiking in New Mexico.