On the 21st I came back from a canoe trip at Lake Lila’s primitive wilderness in the Adirondacks. Ome of the days we went to Mt. Marcy for a hike and the Rangers had closed it off because of bear/human encounters…my question is…does this happen on the A.T.? is there parts where a thru-hiker wont be able to hike because rangers close off?..what should one do if this happens?
Anthony
I never hiked teh A.T. but planning a thru hike for 2005. Hungry howie recommened this site to me from some good info. does that mean that i cant come here anymore becuase i never hiked the A.T.?..what is the URL for whiteblaze.com/,net/.org??
Anthony
A website ain’t gonna get you a thru-hike. Info overload will shut you down. Just walk.
Wolf
the best thing I did to prepare for my thru hike was cancell my subscription to WF’s mailing list before I read a single message. Life is a mystery to experience not a problem to solve. Learn by doing, baby steps if it helps you. A thru hike isn’t a baby step.
Bears: I’ve never heard of anywhere on the AT being closed for bear problems. When a problem arrises the educaters go out and help eliminate the problem by teaching the humans how to stay out of the way of the bears, Or put up chain link fence on shelters.
whiteblaze dot net (they have trolls too!)
celt
You won’t find the trail closed because of bears - there are several areas that are notorious for bear encounters, sometimes on a daily basis. As far as I could tell, they were ignored completely. (i.e. Sunfish Pond in NJ, Ethan Pond in NH, etc.) You might find the trail closed because of fires or drought. The Shenandoahs have been closed a few times because the fire danger was so high. This usually seems to happen to southbounders in the fall, but only rarely. On my first thruhike in 1988 I was rerouted around Harriman - Bear Mountain SPs (actually through, on the road) because there were five fires burning that day in the mountains, and one fire actually burned quite close to one of the shelters.
Ginny
The bears in the 'Daks are way more habituated from what I understand than any you will encounter on the AT, even in the National Parks (Smokies and Shennies). As mentioned above, fire closures are more likely. There were probably 4-5 sections closed at different points last year, if so they will make arrangements to shuttle thru-hikers around or provide a road detour. Nothing to worry about ahead of time.
As for planning and research all these guys are trying to say is you can plan and read up lots, but in the end it will be you and your head that get you up the trail. But this is a good forum to start asking questions, but it shouldn’t be your only source.
Bluebearee