Category Archives: 19F Thru Hiking

Stuffed Bear

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Title: Stuffed Bear

General information about item:

  • Legend, Material Lore
  • Country: Spain
  • Informant: Tommy Botch
  • Date Collected: 11/05/19

Informant Data: 

  • Tommy Botch is a 24-year-old lab manager in the Robertson Lab in the Psychology and Brain Sciences Department at Dartmouth College, where he studies vision in virtual reality. He was born and raised in Los Angeles, California and completed his undergraduate education in psychobiology at UCLA. Tommy enjoys describing fine cheeses and baking sourdough bread in his spare time. He undertook his thru hiking journey when he was 20 years old.

Contextual Data:

  • Historical Context: The Camino de Santiago is a 1,000 year-old pilgrimage route that begins at numerous points around Europe and ends at Santiago de Compostela in Galicia, Spain. According to Christianity, the apostle Santiago (known in English as Saint James) spread the religion around the Iberian Peninsula (which includes Spain and Portugal). Theory says that his body was put on a boat and landed on the coast of Spain, right near present-day Santiago de Compostela. King Alfonso II wanted his body to be buried in a speciaal chapel, and ordered the building of the Santiago de Compostela Cathedral. Christians across Europe began taking this pilgrimage to worship at the Cathedral. 
  • Social Context: Recently, the route became a UNESCO World Heritage Site and was featured in the 2010 movie The Way, which helped it grow in popularity (Source). Our informant took the most popular route, the Camino Frances, which begins in Saint-Jean-Pied-de-Port, France, and over the Pyrenees. This trail spans 800 km (500 miles). 

Item: 

  • Unlike other thru hikes, people hike the Camino in order to arrive in Santiago de Compostela. However, there is one man who is notorious for hiking the trail from Santiago de Compostela towards Frances, away from the Catedral. Not only does he complete the trail backwards (and has done so several times), but he does so with a giant stuffed bear on his pack. Apparently he does this in order to bring a smile to the faces of the other hikers, who are often exhausted mentally, emotionally, and physically. Legend has it that he completes this backwards journey once a year.

Collector: Erica Busch

Goat Slayer

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Title: Goat Slayer

General Information about Item:

  • Verbal and Customary Folklore (Tradition)
  • Language: English
  • Informant: Sam Lincoln
  • Date Collected: 9 November 2019

Informant Data:

  • Sam Lincoln is a 21 year old college student studying mechanical engineering at Arizona State University. He was born in Wisconsin and raised in Arizona. He began overnight backpacking when he was 15 and hiked the Colorado Trail after he graduated from high school in 2016. He enjoys archery and playing video games. Sam is the twin brother of Rachel Lincoln, who collected this item.

Contextual Data:

  • Cultural context: Hikers give each other trail names based on notable attributes, defining events, or personality traits. From then on, you are known by your trail name. Some hikers met people and never learned their real names. Hikers often keep the same trail name their whole lives. This tradition helps immerse hikers in their experience and distances them from their real-life identity while on the trail.
  • Social context: Being named by the hiking community tightens friendships and serves as a rite of initiation into the thru hiker life.

Item:

  • Sam earned the name “Goat Slayer” on the Colorado Trail. He and his friend Justin had hiked 24 miles in an alpine area with lightning in the distance—they were the tallest things around, so they had to make camp for the night. They heard noises outside their tent and thought a bear was outside. Sam went out with a bear mace and mallet to scare it off, but it was just a herd of goats. He chased them off and became Goat Slayer.

Associated file:

Sam explains how he got his trail name.

Informant’s comments:

  • Sam likes this name. He never got one during his earlier two or three week hikes and receiving one was an important part of his experience.

Collector’s comments:

  • Trail names can be tongue-in-cheek or teasing, but all informants felt that their name was used affectionately. Sam’s name plays up the fear and adrenalin he felt to reflect his emotions in that moment, when all he really did was shout at some goats.
  • We collected trail names from all of our informants except those who hiked the Chilkoot. That trail is shorter than the other, so we hypothesize that length may be correlated with receiving a trail name.

Collector: Rachel Lincoln

Tags/Keywords:

  • Trail Name, Colorado Trail

Vortex

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Title: Vortex

General Information about Item:

  • Verbal folklore
  • Informant: Sam Lincoln
  • Date Collected: 9 November 2019

Informant Data:

  • Sam Lincoln is a 21 year old college student studying mechanical engineering at Arizona State University. He was born in Wisconsin and raised in Arizona. He began overnight backpacking when he was 15 and hiked the Colorado Trail after he graduated from high school in 2016. He enjoys archery and playing video games. Sam is the twin brother of Rachel Lincoln, who collected this item.

Contextual Data:

  • Thru hikers typically only leave the trail for a few days at a time to resupply food or gear. Otherwise they follow the same rituals each day to cover as much ground as possible. Disturbance of their normal pace can throw hikers out of their “just keep walking” mindset.

Item:

  • “Vortex” is a slang term for the psychological experience of pausing a thru hike to return to civilization for a few days. Hikers don’t realize just how grueling their journey has been until they stop, and returning to the trail becomes a mental obstacle that looms larger with each day spent away. Sam experienced the vortex when he stopped in town for five days after 80 miles so his friend could rest an injured foot.

Associated file:

Transcript:

  • “When you’re thru hiking, if you stop thru hiking, you realize how difficult it is and how easy it is to just stop. It’s a mental obstacle you have to overcome to get back on the trail.”

Informant’s comments:

  • Sam’s friend decided to leave the trail altogether quickly after the group stopped to let him rest, which annoyed Sam because their entire rhythm and pace had been thrown off to accommodate Teddy.

Collector’s comments:

  • This term supports the theme of immersion that runs throughout our collection. Thru hiker folklore reinforces the deep thrall that the trail holds and emphasizes the separation from regular life.

Collector: Rachel Lincoln

Tags/Keywords:

  • Vortex, Colorado Trail, Verbal folklore

Colorado Trail Cairns

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Title: Cairns

General Information about Item:

  • Material and Customary Folklore (Tradition)
  • Informant: Sam Lincoln
  • Date Collected: 9 November 2019

Informant Data:

  • Sam Lincoln is a 21 year old college student studying mechanical engineering at Arizona State University. He was born in Wisconsin and raised in Arizona. He began overnight backpacking when he was 15 and hiked the Colorado Trail after he graduated from high school in 2016. He enjoys archery and playing video games. Sam is the twin brother of Rachel Lincoln, who collected this item.

Contextual Data:

  • Historical context: Humans have built cairns for thousands of years to memorialize the dead, track the calendar, and create landmarks. Now, cairns have become a fixture of hiking trails to show the way.
  • Social context: Hikers on all lengths of trails build cairns to leave a reminder of their presence. Though cairns serve practical purpose, popular trails usually have many more than necessary because building cairns is a tradition that helps hikers feel connected to the land.

Item:

  • A cairn is a man-made stack of rocks used to mark a trail route. The rocks are stacked and balanced in a manner that would not occur naturally, so they can easily be identified by hikers looking for a trail. Building cairns is a tradition across nearly all hiking trails.

Associated file:

Transcript:

  • “Cairns are just piles of rocks stacked up to mark the trail in places where you can’t really put a sign or there are no signs so people don’t get lost…Just a basic pyramid structure, just pile rocks up in a way that would not normally occur in nature so it’s pretty obvious that someone did it for, like, a purpose—which was to mark the trail.”

Informant’s comments:

  • The tallest cairn Sam saw on the Colorado Trail was about two feet tall.

Collector’s comments:

  • Unlike carving your name on trees or rocks, cairns are a memento hikers can leave that doesn’t irreversibly disrupt nature.

Collector: Rachel Lincoln

Image result for cairn

Tags/Keywords:

  • Cairn, Colorado Trail, Tradition, Material Folklore

Tour-a-grinos

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Title: Tour-a-grinos

General information about item:

  • Verbal Folklore, Taunt
  • Language: English
  • Country: Spain
  • Informant: Tommy Botch
  • Date Collected: 11/05/19

Informant Data: 

  • Tommy Botch is a 24-year-old lab manager in the Robertson Lab in the Psychology and Brain Sciences Department at Dartmouth College, where he studies vision in virtual reality. He was born and raised in Los Angeles, California and completed his undergraduate education in psychobiology at UCLA. Tommy enjoys describing fine cheeses and baking sourdough bread in his spare time. He undertook his thru hiking journey when he was 20 years old.

Contextual Data:

  • Historical Context: The Camino de Santiago is a 1,000 year-old pilgrimage route that begins at numerous points around Europe and ends at Santiago de Compostela in Galicia, Spain. According to Christianity, the apostle Santiago (known in English as Saint James) spread the religion around the Iberian Peninsula (which includes Spain and Portugal). Theory says that his body was put on a boat and landed on the coast of Spain, right near present-day Santiago de Compostela. King Alfonso II wanted his body to be buried in a speciaal chapel, and ordered the building of the Santiago de Compostela Cathedral. Christians across Europe began taking this pilgrimage to worship at the Cathedral. 
  • Social Context: Recently, the route became a UNESCO World Heritage Site and was featured in the 2010 movie The Way, which helped it grow in popularity (Source). Our informant took the most popular route, the Camino Frances, which begins in Saint-Jean-Pied-de-Port, France, and over the Pyrenees. This trail spans 800 km (500 miles). 

Item:

  • Though the trails are considerable in length, hikers need only hike the final 100km to receive a certificate that says they completed the pilgrimage. Thus, some people who do not want to make the full 800km pilgrimage hike only the final 100km to receive the certificate. Thus, thru hikers who complete the total journey call those short-term hikers “Tour-A-Grinos” when they pass them on the last 100km of the trail.

Transcript: 

  • “Ha, you’d be considered a Tour-A-Grino,” said Tommy during his interview with interviewer Erica, upon realizing that she actually completed the final 100km of the Camino de Santiago during a Spanish high school exchange program at age 14.

Trail Magic

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Title: Trail Magic

General Information about Item:

  • Customary Folklore (Tradition)
  • Informant: Stacy Liedle
  • Date Collected: 15 November 2019

Informant Data:

  • Stacy Liedle is a 29 year old MBA candidate originally from Texas. She now lives in Indiana and works as a professional mountaineering instructor while earning her degree. Stacy hiked the first 220 miles of the Colorado Trail in 2015 when she was 25 after being laid off from work. After witnessing a motorcycle crash and using her first-responder training to care for the victim, Stacy decided to leave the trail because the incident “messed with her mind.”

Contextual Data:

  • Cultural Context: Thru hikers’ meals are limited by how much food they can carry. Hikers often eat the same foods, such as rice, oatmeal, or protein bars, for their entire journey. “Trail magic” lifts spirits by providing a change of pace and can happen on any long trail.
  • Social Context: Past hikers of trails like to spend time with current hikers to reminisce about their experience and pass on the gifts of food that they received during their own hikes. Thru hikers get a reprieve from culinary drudgery and a chance to connect with the outside world.

Item:

  • “Trail magic” occurs when non-thru hikers go to a section of a trail to bring food to passing thru hikers. They usually bring cold drinks or a grill to cook burgers. Thru hikers especially appreciate coolers of beer. People who create trail magic have often hiked that same trail before and use the experience to

Transcript:

  • “It’s just about having a good time out in the middle of nowhere. I’ve never done trail magic, it’s usually local people, but who have thru hiked before and want to give back. I saw Goal Zero partnered with another brand to do corporate sponsored trail magic so it’s definitely a big well-known thing.”

Informant’s comments:

  • “Trail magic only happened to me once. It’s talked about way more than it actually happens.”

Collector’s comments:

  • Though I didn’t know the term “trail magic,” I actually experienced this before during Dartmouth Trips. Upperclassmen met my group on our route and brought us pizza. Trail magic is widespread and not limited to the Colorado Trail.

Collector: Rachel Lincoln

Tags/Keywords:

  • Trail Magic, Tradition, Colorado Trail

Trickster Porters

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Title: Trickster Porters

General Information about Item:

  • Legend, Verbal Lore
  • Language: English
  • Country of Origin: United States/Canada
  • Trail of Origin: Chilkoot
  • Informant: Sam D
  • Date Collected: 10-29-19

Informant Data:

  • Sam D is a 40 year old male from Juneau, Alaska. Sam grew up in Southeast Alaska, and currently works for the state government. Sam hiked the Chilkoot trail in 2015.

Contextual Data:

  • Historical Context: First used by the Tlingit people of Alaska as a trade route, the Chilkoot became an important trail for miners and prospectors coming to Alaska during the Klondike gold rush in the 1890s. The trail was mostly abandoned after the end of the gold rush in 1898, until the trail was restored for recreational hikers in the 1960s. Currently, the trail is a popular recreational hike, and stretches between Skagway, Alaska, and Bennett, British Colombia. (Source) Dyea is a small town a north of Skagway, between the residential part of Skagway and the entrance to the Chilkoot trail.
  • Cultural Context: During the Klondike Gold rush, many communities were founded using the money brought in by the gold rushers. People who lived in those communities offered many goods and services to the miners and prospectors coming to Alaska for the gold. Many unprepared people died on the trail, so the Canadian Government restricted the trail only allow hikers along the Chilkoot if they had adequately prepared, carrying a total of 1 ton of gear with them. So, the hikers were forced to hire porters to help them transport their gear.
  • Social Context: Sam provided this story when asked about stories involving the gold rushers on the Chilkoot trail, that he heard while hiking the trail, and growing up in Southeast Alaska.

Item:

This is a story about porters tricking miners and prospectors into paying them more money than originally agreed upon, at the threat of abandonment.

Transcript:

  • “I remember one thing [the Park Rangers] told us about was the [local] people in the area did a lot of packing. They acted as porters. The park service people told us the porters had a reputation for bringing stuff to a certain point along the trail and then demanding more money. They would get them in the middle of nowhere and say ‘If you don’t pay me more, then good luck!’ They were smart enough to know the people [miners and prospectors] didn’t have another option.”

Collector’s Name: Soren Thompson

Tags/Keywords:

  • Trickster
  • Chilkoot Trail
  • Thru Hiking

Hiking in the Morning

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Title: Hiking in the Morning

General Information about Item:

  • Superstition, Tradition
  • Language: English
  • Country of Origin: United States/Canada
  • Trail of Origin: Chilkoot
  • Informant: Sam D
  • Date Collected: 10-29-19

Informant Data:

  • Sam D is a 40 year old male from Juneau, Alaska. Sam grew up in Southeast Alaska, and currently works for the state government. Sam hiked the Chilkoot trail in 2015.

Contextual Data:

  • Historical Context: First used by the Tlingit people of Alaska as a trade route, the Chilkoot became an important trail for miners and prospectors coming to Alaska during the Klondike gold rush in the 1890s. The trail was mostly abandoned after the end of the gold rush in 1898, until the trail was restored for recreational hikers in the 1960s. Currently, the trail is a popular recreational hike, and stretches between Skagway, Alaska, and Bennett, British Colombia. (Source) Dyea is a small town a north of Skagway, between the residential part of Skagway and the entrance to the Chilkoot trail.
  • Cultural Context: Currently, there are a number of public cabins and campgrounds located along the Chilkoot trail, maintained by the US and Canadian governments. These are areas where hikers will often congregate, and rest for the night. Sheep Camp is one such area.
  • Social Context: Sam mentioned this superstition when asked about his experience hiking the Chilkoot, and any advice he would give to someone hiking the trail for the first time.

Item:

This is a superstition about the time of day to hike the section of the Cilkoot Trail leading to the Chilkoot summit, colloquially known as The Golden Staircase.

When you hike the summit of the mountain, there is avalanche danger, unless you hike in the morning.

Transcript:

  • “They [the American Park Rangers] make everyone leave [Sheep Camp] at about 5 AM the day they hike the Golden Staircase. The earlier in the day you do it, the less likely it is for avalanche problems. It’s not much of a problem in the summer, but they have a routine of it.”

Collectors Note:

This is a magic superstition, that uses the law of similarity. The hikers climb the mountain in the morning, like the sun rising to the top of the sky in the morning.

This may also be a practical piece of advice that extends beyond the law of similarity. During the day, snow exposed to the sunlight melts, creating a heavy, unstable slab of snow that is more likely to break off in an avalanche.

Collector’s Name: Soren Thompson

Tags/Keywords:

  • Landslide
  • Superstition
  • Chilkoot Trail
  • Thru Hiking

Chilkoot Pass Landslide

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Title: Chilkoot Pass Landslide

General Information about Item:

  • Language: English
  • Country of Origin: United States/Canada
  • Trail of Origin: Chilkoot
  • Informant: Sam D
  • Date Collected: 10-29-19

Informant Data:

  • Sam D is a 40 year old male from Juneau, Alaska. Sam grew up in Southeast Alaska, and currently works for the state government. Sam hiked the Chilkoot trail in 2015.

Contextual Data:

  • Historical Context: First used by the Tlingit people of Alaska as a trade route, the Chilkoot became an important trail for miners and prospectors coming to Alaska during the Klondike gold rush in the 1890s. The trail was mostly abandoned after the end of the gold rush in 1898, until the trail was restored for recreational hikers in the 1960s. Currently, the trail is a popular recreational hike, and stretches between Skagway, Alaska, and Bennett, British Colombia. (Source) Dyea is a small town a north of Skagway, between the residential part of Skagway and the entrance to the Chilkoot trail.
  • Social Context: Sam provided this story when asked about stories involving the gold rushers on the Chilkoot trail, that he knew about from hiking the trail, and growing up in Southeast Alaska.

Item:

Sam told the story of a landslide that killed many people at the pass of the Chilkoot Trail. There is now a cemetery in memorial of the victims located in Dyea, Alaska.

Transcript:

  • “One of the interesting things to me was a bad landslide. I think it was in 1898 and a bunch of people died at the base of the Chilkoot Pass. It was a snow avalanche. There is a cemetery down in Dyea for the victims. We went to the cemetery to check it out. Dyea is worth going to in general, I don’t think most people do.”

Collectors Note:

This story illustrates the danger associated with the section of the Chilkoot Trail leading up to the mountain summit. This danger may explain the increased significance of this portion of the trail, and the multiple pieces of folklore associated with it, including a colloquial name, and superstitions.

Collector’s Name: Soren Thompson

Tags/Keywords:

  • Landslide
  • Chilkoot Trail
  • Thru Hiking

Trump Family Origins

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Title: Trump Family Origins

General Information about Item:

  • Legend, Verbal Lore
  • Language: English
  • Country of Origin: United States/Canada
  • Trail of Origin: Chilkoot
  • Informant: Ian Andrews
  • Date Collected: 10-29-19

Informant Data:

  • Ian Andrews is currently a graduate student at MIT. He grew up in Juneau, Alaska and hiked the Chilkoot Trail after finishing his undergraduate studies. Ian hikes recreationally, from trails in his hometown, to spending a week hiking in the Olympic Mountains in Washington State.

Contextual Data:

  • Historical Context: First used by the Tlingit people of Alaska as a trade route, the Chilkoot became an important trail for miners and prospectors coming to Alaska during the Klondike gold rush at the end of the 1800s. The trail was mostly abandoned after the end of the gold rush in 1898, until the trail was restored for recreational hikers in the 1960s. (Source)

Item:

  • The informant relayed a story about the origin of the Trump family fortune. During the Klondike Gold Rush, Fred Trump (President Donald Trump’s grandfather) moved to the Klondike and opened a hotel that also served as a brothel. Trump thrived as prospectors and miners passed through the area and paid for the services of his business. The fortune Trump made in the Klondike allowed him and his family to establish the many companies they now own today.

Transcript:

  • “You think of the gold rushers as being the people making all the money, but there was a whole industry providing services to the gold rushers. Some of those people made as much or even more than the gold rushers… The other notorious family who started their way to wealth on the Chilkoot was the Trump family by providing brothels and hotels. Fred Trump started there.”

Collector’s Comments:

  • The informant suggested that this story should be fact-checked for accuracy. According to the an article published in 2016, this telling of the story is historically accurate. Fred Trump owned a combined bar, brothel, and restaurant in Bennett, British Columbia. Bennett is the small town located at the Canadian end of the Chilkoot, generally considered the end of the trail.

Collector’s Name: Soren Thompson

Tags/Keywords:

  • Legend
  • Chilkoot Trail
  • Thru Hiking