Episode #455 - Don Robinson - 900 Miler Award

Mighty Blue On The Appalachian Trail: The Ultimate Mid-Life Crisis

Steve Adams

Sports, Wilderness

4.8 • 599 Ratings

🗓️ 24 October 2024

⏱️ 64 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

We're going to talk about the Great Smoky Mountains today, with Don Robinson sharing his love of the park, and his recent induction into the 900 Miler Club, having hiked all the trails in the Smokies.

It's a pretty exclusive club, with fewer than a thousand members, yet the logistics required to get this done would fry my brain! Don has provided me with links to the two books he suggests, should you wish to follow in his footsteps. Day Hiker's Guide to All the Trails in The Smoky Mountains and Hiking Trails of the Smokies.

You can learn more about the Smokies and the club, by visiting their website at Smoky Mountains Hiking Club - 900 Miler Club

After Don, we had a second visit from the lovely Sally Brooks, who has produced the book about her own thru-hike two decades ago. Sally is a stand-up comedian, laughs easily, and is sure to have included her humor in the book. It is called "Going to Maine." You can find it on her website at www.sallychaffinbrooks.com, or on Amazon at Going to Maine: All the Ways to Fall on the Appalachian Trail.

Here she is with her friend Erin, on Katahdin 20 years ago, and this year.

Our new book reading, Happy Hiking, by my friend, Emily Leonard is–of course–written from a woman's POV and a woman's voice. I hope you enjoy listening to my reading of it. If you'd like to buy the book, you can find it on Amazon at Happy Hiking: Falling in love on the Appalachian Trail, or on Emily's website, at Happy Hiking.

I used my recent hike in the UK on the South West Coast Path to help raise money for my absolute favorite charity, Parenting Matters, on whose board I've been privileged to serve for over a decade. You can learn more about the hike and the organization–and donate–by visiting Hike with Steve - Empowering Parents, One Step at a Time | Parenting Matters %. I hope you want to support this critical mission.

Don't forget. Our entire series of videos from our Woods Hole Weekend in 2022 is now FREE and available at my YouTube page at Woods Hole Weekend - Trailer There, you'll find all sorts of tips and tricks that our guests took away from the weekend that helped them with their own hikes this year. Check it out.

I often ask listeners for ideas on who to interview, and I'm sure several of you say, "I could do that. I've got an awesome story to tell." You're the person we need to hear from. If you'd like to be interviewed on the podcast, just register as a guest on the link below, and I'll be in touch. Come on the show!

If you like what we're doing on the Hiking Radio Network, and want to see our shows continue, please consider supporting us with either a one-off or monthly donation. You'll find the donate button on each Hiking Radio Network page at Hiking Radio Network .

If you prefer NOT to use PayPal, you can now support us via check by mailing it to Mighty Blue Publishing, PO Box 6161, Sun City Center, FL 35751, or by Zelle, to steve@hikingradionetwork.com. Any support is gratefully received.

If you'd like to take advantage of my book offer (all three of my printed hiking books–with a personal message and signed by me–for $31, including postage to the United States) send a check payable to Mighty Blue Publishing at the address just above.

Transcript

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0:00.0	You are listening to the Hiking Radio Network, where we taught the walk with shows by hikers
0:05.3	about hikers for everybody. Mighty Blue on the Appalachian Trail, the ultimate midlife crisis, joins Stephen his guests every week as he staggers from Georgia to Maine.
0:33.6	Hey guys, good to be back with you all again for another episode of Mighty Blue on the Appalachian Trail,
0:38.1	the ultimate midlife crisis. This is episode number 455 and I'm your host Steve Marty Blue
0:43.6	Adams. Before we get on to this week's guests, I wanted to mention again that I'm going to be
0:48.1	heading north on Sunday November 3rd, starting work on the Monday morning, helping out a Mountain
0:53.2	Harbour hostel. And to be honest, it looks like there would just be the three of us several of you have written to me to say why you're unable to join us but I'm reaching out again to see a few of you can still come and help out I spoke with John Jordan at Aldi yesterday and he said that the hostel still needs help urgently so that's where we're going to. I know many of you have work, but for those of you wanting to help out in any way, I'd love to have you along with us. Reach out to me at steve at hikingradionnetwork.com and we'll set it up. This week we're going to concentrate on the smokies with my friend Don Robinson, telling us how he became a member of the 900 Mila Club earlier this year.
1:29.2	Don has been working on this award for several years,
1:31.8	though he concentrated more intently on it after he suffered a personal tragedy a few years ago.
1:36.3	We're going to hear from Don in a moment.
1:38.5	Then we have a returning guest once more.
1:40.6	Sally Brooks, or not yet, hiked the trail two decades ago, and when we spoke back in 2020,
1:46.1	she was writing a book on her adventure.
1:48.3	Oh, the book's here at last.
1:50.2	And so, Sally, you'll get a kick out of her infectious laugh and humour, and she'll be on after dawn.
1:55.9	Then the first part of Chapter 12 of Happy Hiking.
1:59.4	You've probably noticed that I've recently been presenting
2:01.8	chapters over two weeks. This is mainly to help reduce the length of each show and of course
2:07.5	the amount of time I take to edit it. I try to stop at pretty much the halfway point in the chapter
2:12.6	so as not to confuse you all when I start up the following week. From your emails, many of you seem to be happy with this, so we're going to carry on with it. So let's learn about what it takes to end up with an award that less than a thousand people have earned. Here's Don Robinson to tell us his story. Oh, by the way, Don's wife appears to be clearing up in the background every now then, and much as I try to edit it out you'll still hear
2:35.1	a few weird background noises here's Don we have a guest today who gave me a wonderful present
2:44.7	a few years back you may remember this he presented me with the mcuyver's gigapixel wall map
	...

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