In the awol post I talked about how we know where we are going in a general sense. This post is more about how we know where to go moment to moment.
The AT is one of the most well traveled trails anywhere. It is difficult to go more than a couple of hours without seeing someone. So it is also one of the safest places to hike as well. Compared to say the Pacific coast trail, or the continental divide trail, we are doing easy mode.
The first way we find our way on the trail is just using your eyes. In most places the path is obvious. There is never a time where you have to bushwhack or make your own way. Sometimes things are a bit overgrown, but the trail clubs maintain the trails really well. In fact one of the two times we got off the trail by accident we figured it out because we started seeing garbage around.
The second, more famous way to keep from getting lost is the white blaze. A blaze is a spot of paint making the trail. An official AT blaze is two inches wide by six inches tall, and white. Side trails to shelters and water are often blue blazed. These things are all along the trail. Often standing at one blaze you can see the next one down the line.
Sometimes you see a double blaze, this indicates that the trail is turning. The top blaze of the double is pushed slightly in the direction of the turn.
Blazes are marked for both northbound and south bound, often on the same tree. Blazes can be on trees, rocks, bridges, telephone poles, wooden posts, whatever is handy. In open field they often sink a wooden post just for the blaze.
There are tons of blazes, according to awol a guy with a trail name blaze counted over 80 thousand. Not all of them are perfect as you can see by the pictures. I'm a fan of the single blaze pointed right at a huge rock. As it turns out the trail made a 90 degree turn to the right.
The blazes are really reassuring. Constant reminders you are on the right path. On those rare stretches of the trail that aren't well blazed, paranoia tends to set in. There is little more scary than the idea you might have to backtrack and waste miles.
We saw a trail volunteer painting blazes one day. He was using a toothbrush! Trail secrets.
Also picture of tiny garter snake if you can see him.
This post brought to you by a zero day.
Now that you post some photos and talk about the trail markers, I think I remember seeing this kind of mark on trails in western PA. I don't recall the color being important--except, this blue trail follows a north-south route and this yellow path follows an east-west route, or something slightly more random like that. Do you suppose the phrase "what in blue blazes?!?" has anything to do with trail markers?
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