Eating Pineapple in the Woods

“Bring whatever you want,” Jeff said. “You can use my day pack. I’m carrying our tent and your sleeping bag. And the dinner food. So you know. Clothes, snacks, water. A book?”

We were going to hike on the Appalachian Trail for the first time. Jeff was a close friend from high school and it was the summer after our college freshmen years — me at UNC-Chapel Hill, him at Tulane. His mother had just turned fifty and set a lofty goal for herself: to hike the entire AT in sections, every summer, to be completed before she saw sixty. We both agreed it was a definitively badass idea. He signed on for the first week to help her get started and invited me along.

For whatever I lacked in outdoorsmanship (which was everything), I planned to make up for by being a good companion in the woods. I didn’t know exactly what this would mean either. My most extensive “camping” experience so far had been a camping road trip up the northeast coast with my family a few summers back, which I’d spent acting supremely sour and constantly seeking out pay phones so I could call my boyfriend Harrison. It was a thin and discouraging track record.

After I’d had a few days to gather provisions, Jeff came over to see the situation. I laid out my wares: a jar of peanut butter, two enormous bags of trail mix, cans of diced pineapple, a fleece jacket, two bags of clothes, a flashlight, some band-aids, sneakers, flip flops for around camp, soap, a razor, and a large hardcover copy of On the Road by Jack Kerouac.

“These are the things you want?”

“Yes, I think so. You know I love peanut butter.”

“Right. Ok, looks good. Let’s go buy you a RidgeRest. Also, a couple Nalgene bottles so they fit with the water filter.”

Water filter?

Anyone who has even been on a day hike, let alone gone true backcountry, can see how utterly ridiculous — and heavy — this selection was. But Jeff had always liked me (like-liked, as it were) and I still believe it was a bit of chivalry that landed me on the Appalachian Trail toting cans of fucking pineapple while he carried most of the gear I actually needed.

Though the true southern terminus of the 2,175 mile AT is at Springer Mountain, Georgia, there is a nine mile approach trail at Amicalola Falls and this is where we started. The photos of us at the trail head suggest a happy, if unusual, group of backpackers. Jeff’s mom, Edna, her red hair cut short as always, looked sturdy and ready. Her photochromatic lenses hid any nervousness that might have been in her eyes. After all, it was her spectacular but uncharted idea that had brought us to that moment. Her friend Beverly smiled genuinely, her wild hair framing a round face. Beverly’s pack appeared perilously overfull (it was). In my khaki shorts and sneakers, I looked like a day hiker aiming far out of her league. Jeff stood taller than us all, a bandana wrapped around his head, a hefty pack filled with shit I should have been helping to carry. His posture reflected his self-assigned role: the guardian of this unlikely harem.

After snapping a few pictures, Jeff’s dad hopped in his car and drove away. It felt abruptly final.

“Well,” said Edna. “Shall we? Here’s to us, and the Appalachian Trail.”

The ladies clicked their walking sticks, like a champagne toast. I wished for champagne.

We started walking. The first steps of any backpacking trip have a certain feeling. I know it well now, it was foreign then. Your packing and preparation are done. It’s all on your back, or at least you hope it is. The trees that looked like a dense mass before now prism with light. When you step into the woods, especially with the intention of living in them for a time, a door to your previous world closes and this new, green, breathing place folds you in. And you trust it.

I don’t remember many details of that first day walking in the woods. But I remember how I felt. I began to learn how forests have their own type of silence. One that holds rustling of leaves, thumping of falling pine cones, twittering of birds, wind in grass, but still feels utterly complete. I felt disconnected from what I’d thought was reality, only to discover this new one and wonder if I liked it more. I felt an unspoken camaraderie with my group. I noticed how it became easier to ask for and divulge deeper thoughts when a conversation partner was walking in front of or behind me on a dirt path, rather than face to face. I felt the woods as different places in each passing hour of light. I started to fall a little bit in love with them.

Edna was anticipatory and organized, a woman of systems and great detail. It’s true that any backpacking venture greater than a week or two requires planning — towns to re-supply in, mail drops for more specific provisions. But she was a sorcerer about it. Edna knew how many miles we’d hike each day. Where the elevation gains were, and when our lungs would get reprieve as our knees navigated rocky descents. She had mapped the shelters and water sources, even knowing which were expected to be plentiful. The three of us were spoiled, really. We rode the coattails of the logistical gymnastics she’d done weeks ago. I didn’t fully appreciate this until I started planning my own backpacking trips years later.

Backcountry camping is an endeavor of industriousness. There is always something do in order to keep the whole operation afloat: setting up or taking down tents, starting fires, checking the map, washing dishes, finding places to pee, hanging bear bags, filtering water, jimmying everything back into packs when it’s time to walk again. All are to be done without leaving a trace. This is not to say there weren’t times for reading on your mat under the trees, sitting in a creek eating pineapple, or talking around the fire after dinner. These moments were had too, and they were delicious. But overall, it could be considered a tight ship.

Going into it, I was naive to this element of tasks. But I loved it. I quickly learned what needed to be done once we arrived at a campsite and wordlessly joined the operose rhythm each day. As it turned out, I was pretty adept with the water filter. I liked seeking out sources and watching everyone’s bottles fill up with chilly mountain water, even as my arms turned slack from the pumping. No one else seemed to like this job, so it was satisfying to have found a way to contribute. And damn if there isn’t better tasting water than that pumped fresh out of a mountain stream.

A night I remember clearly was an early one on the trail. We set up at the Plum Orchard Gap shelter. It was fairly busy with other hikers, the atmosphere ebbing and flowing between people having conversation with other groups or quietly toiling with their own. A storm was predicted that night and it delivered. Fortunately it was a large shelter, and even had an upper level, so everyone was able to set up their mats and sleeping bags inside. Rain beautifully pounded the tin roof. We fretted a bit about our food hanging in the bear bags outside, but it would have been foolish to keep it with us.

Laying in my sleeping bag, it felt like a sleepover from childhood. Except damper and with strangers. And mice! No, it can’t be, I thought the first time I heard the faint scratchy pattering along the edges of the loft. I curled my body into a fetal position in the bag, as if that might help, and strained my ears. I heard it again.

“Jeff!” I loudly whispered to my right. “Did you hear that?”

“Yeah.”

“Are those mice?”

“Sorry, I guess I forgot to mention that. They hang out in the shelters sometimes. You know, for the food. They’re probably coming in too because of the rain.”

Well this was rich. If I’d had any sense I would have known to expect the critters, but the fact was that I didn’t and I started to steam at this withholding of information. Just then I felt one scamper across the foot of my sleeping bag. I let out a muffled screech that turned into a giggle, which in turn, got my neighbors laughing too.

Jeff was really enjoying this. Between laughs, he asked, “You going to make it?”

“Yes, I’m going to make it.” The mice never left, but I eventually came to peace with them and fell asleep, the rain still clattering above.

The next morning, it continued to rain. The hikers rustled around the shelter, making breakfast, filling their packs, eager for a break in the rain so they could get on the trail. Hiking in the rain isn’t so bad when you’re already out and have no choice. But taking that first step out from dry ground is tough.

We lingered too, taking our time getting ready in hopes we might set out under a sky that was not leaking. Beverly was having difficulty getting all of her wares back into her pack. We quietly watched for a bit before Jeff asked if we could potentially take some of it for her. She was, after all, a woman in her 60s, with bad knees and a pack that suggested a relocation rather than a camping trip.

“That would actually be very nice,” she said and began sorting her things. As we paid closer attention to what she had actually brought, a wave of relief washed over me. Beverly had scores of completely unnecessary items. I was not alone.

She pulled out some food, a fuel tank for the stove, and a full size first aid kit, which she looked especially sheepish handing over. Jeff and I divvied these up as Beverly struggled to arrange the monster, as I’d come to think of her pack, on her back.

Eventually the sky cleared and we set out. How quickly Mother Nature redeems herself! We forgot about the long rainy night and how all of our things were damp. The forest looked anew, even greener than before. Glittering almost, as if antsy to show us what it had in store.

This first week spent in the woods unexpectedly revealed what would become part of my identity: a person who thrives among the trees and creeks and quiet of the mountains. One who gathers energy and finds peace when surrounded by other life systems. A woman who strives to put things in perspective. It took some time for me to fully realize this; driving home after the hike, I felt the excited exhaustion of just having been on a fun adventure. Which it was. But later I saw that it was deeper, perhaps more ingrained in my self. And I have sought the woods ever since. Whether it’s minutes, hours, or days that I can spend in them, they continue to call to me. And I return.