It’s hiking season, folks. What does that mean? Perhaps the motto of the Florida Appalachian Trail Club sums it up best. GOYASH (Get Off Your Ass, Start Hiking). Pretty good, huh. And I promise you one thing–you will never regret it. Especially this winter when you are frozen or iced in your house, if not your car. These are the good ol” days. Bill Walker is the author of the Skywalker hiking books, including...

“You should have seen how many people were at the Kickoff this year,” several people have told me. They are referring to the annual Pacific Crest Trail (PCT) Kickoff Party at Lake Morena County State Park. I went in 2009 and it was one of the most special events I have ever had the privilege to attend. Ex-PCT hikers throw this event on behalf of the current year’s crop of thru-hikers, and it is not to be missed. Besides being...

If you asked 100 Appalachian Trail hikers which was the most difficult state on the AT (Appalachian Trail), fifty would probably say Maine and fifty would say New Hampshire. That fits my attitude. In fact when I’m in New Hampshire I’m prone to say it’s the toughest state, and likewise with Maine. Having said that, most AT hikers would state their preference for Maine as being their favorite state. “It is almost 300 miles...

      Bill Walker, author of the Skywalker hiking book series, will be offering a free upload on Amazon Kindle devices, as well as other handheld devices, this weekend, May 31 and June 1st, of his popular PCT narrative, Skywalker–Highs and Lows on the Pacific Crest Trail. This is the story of his 2009 thru-hike of the 2,663 mile Pacific Crest Trail in which the 6’11” former commodities broker lost 43 pounds. He...

http://www.amazon.com/review/R2YMND3ZT5J323/ref=cm_cr_pr_perm?ie=UTF8&ASIN=B004HZXYX4 Thank you for this kind review. I’ve learned to be thick-skinned about book reviews, especially in the Amazon era. For while most of my book reviews have been positive, you occasionally get the horrible review. That’s fair enough. Heck, the reader has a million options on Amazon alone to choose from, so they can be forgiven for being demanding....

iof”Be finished by October 1st,” they told us at the annual Pacific Crest Trail Kickoff. “Anything after that is borrowed time.” That, folks, is good advice. I know. I was still racing north in early October, 2009, down 40 pounds and worried about either getting badly lost or caught in a bad snowstorm. Fortunately neither happened (both happened plenty of times before that last week), and I was able to arrive at Manning...