Episode #239 - Pat Stith (Lucky)
Mighty Blue On The Appalachian Trail: The Ultimate Mid-Life Crisis
Steve Adams
4.8 • 599 Ratings
🗓️ 8 October 2020
⏱️ 81 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
We have another of our vintage hikers on the show today. Pat Stith didn't get started with his hiking until he was in his early 60s, yet he's certainly made up for lost time in the interim. Now 78, Pat goes through his various adventures with Steve, including his Appalachian Trail thru-hike in 2015 when he was into his 70s.
Pat loves the people he meets even more than the hiking and mentions friendships that have survived the trail with far younger hikers.
His blog, at http://patstith.com/ is full of the wisdom of age and the experience of a trail shared.
Bill Tickner catches up with Steve after two weeks and is into his final state; Virginia. He reflects on the many places he's seen in this past couple of weeks. With Damascus as his goal to complete his Triple Crown, we only have Bill for a few more weeks.
In his book, Balancing on Blue, Fozzie passes through the New York Zoo that is part of the trail, with thoughts of freeing a caged fox that he sees there.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | You are listening to the Hiking Radio Network where we talk the walk with shows by hikers |
| 0:05.3 | about hikers for everybody. Mighty Blue on the Appalachian Trail, the ultimate midlife crisis, |
| 0:24.0 | joins Steve and his guests every week as he staggers from Georgia to Maine. |
| 0:34.3 | Hey guys, it's me again, Mighty Blue or Steve Adams, and you are listening to Mighty Blue on the Appalachian Trail, the ultimate midlife crisis. |
| 0:42.8 | I went back to the Appalachian Trail this past weekend, and it filled me with all sorts of nostalgic memories. |
| 0:48.8 | I was there as part of the Woods Hole Retreat weekend. |
| 0:51.5 | I don't know if you remember, but I mentioned this a few times a couple months ago. The basic idea was to give back to the trail, and in particular, the hostels. We based ourselves at the Woods Hole hostel near Peresburg and spent the three or four days hiking and talking about hiking. The group of paying guests of which there were 12 joined me, Clay Bonham and Evans, R.T.K and Jester, along with Tina and Neville from the |
| 1:11.4 | Quarterway Inn and Woods Hole, respectively. We were socially distanced, spent the whole |
| 1:16.8 | time outdoors, and it's such a good time that I'm going to make next week's episode about the |
| 1:21.7 | weekend. I think you're going to enjoy it. This week, though, we have a fellow vintage |
| 1:25.9 | hiker, Pat Stiff or Lucky, was suggested to me by Chris |
| 1:29.2 | Myers, one of our listeners. He didn't start hiking until he was in his 60s, a bit like me, |
| 1:34.1 | and now at 78, he's still going strong. He's quite the raconteur and as you'll hear, |
| 1:38.8 | very accomplished professionally. Lucky will be along soon. I eventually got through to Bill Tickner |
| 1:43.9 | this week and he'll be joining us after Pat for a two-week round-up. He's pushing on through and now into his last state, Virginia, as, if you recall, his journey and his completed Triple Crown will finish in Damascus. Keith Fosket is also pushing on with just a few states to go in my reading of his book, balancing on. I'm currently looking around at a couple of contenders for our next book. So if you have a few ideas, email me at steve at hiking radio network.com. Or, actually, as I've just remembered, you can go to our new hiking radio network website and send me a voice message. I only notice the microphone in the bottom right hand corner the other day |
| 2:18.8 | and you can talk for a couple of minutes. |
| 2:20.9 | I love to hear from some of you if you've got any good ideas, |
| 2:23.8 | either for the books or even ideas for the show. |
| 2:26.6 | So let's get on with it. |
| 2:28.0 | Here's Pat Stiff or Lucky. |
| 2:33.7 | I'd like to introduce you to another hiker of, let's say, more vintage years like myself. |
| 2:40.1 | This is Pat Stiff or Lucky. |
... |
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