Mighty Blue On The Appalachian Trail: The Ultimate Mid-Life Crisis

With about 50 miles for the past three days, Steve and Emma have been making their way through the Meseta, finding gems like the town of Hontanas and its gloriously lit church.

Their middle was all about the beauty of Castrojeriz and the way it dominates its surroundings.

The weather is also starting to turn, with frigid temps in the mornings and fears of snow in the near future.

If you'd like to communicate with Steve, please email him at [email protected].

With a need to up their mileage, Steve has set a target of 15.45 miles a day to get to Santiago. They take regular breaks for coffee and beer on the way and recently saw this charming mobile bar.

The weather hasn't been great for the past few days, though they have by and large avoided any substantial rainfall. This reduces their opportunities for longer views, though a clearing cloud revealed this on Saturday.

While often hiking alongside one another, Emma's pace often takes her ahead of Steve, hence regular shots of Emma powering ahead.

If you'd like to communicate with Steve, please email him at [email protected].

This week, Emma gets stuck in an elevator, a red squirrel gets way too close for comfort and Steve continues his transformation into Old Father Time.

All the while, Steve and Emma continue to get into the rhythm of their hike. They ache a little bit more and they whinge and moan a little bit more but, underneath it all, they are improving with every day and planning an even faster hike.

Emma now wants to be at Santiago by November 10, so Steve has set a tougher schedule to see if they can achieve their desired outcome. So far, the two of them are getting to grips with the new plan. What could possibly go wrong?

Our two intrepid adventurers have been on the trail for six days and have fallen a day behind schedule. They have sustained injuries, aches, and pains but continue westward towards Santiago.

They have met fellow travelers, shared meals with others, and spent time together over a few beers, red wine, and brandy. They even met up with their very own ghost.

This trail isn't the walk in the park that some people seem to believe. The miles still need to be hiked, and the climbs and descents need to be tackled.

On the way, Steve and Emma have met pilgrim after pilgrim and this time, one such pilgrim shares his family's story. If you'd like to learn more about Kelley and his family, follow their blog at wander4purpose.com or follow them on Instagram at the same name.

This is something of an experimental podcast. We're trying out several ways of doing this so the sound won't be perfect but it should be listenable. Steve is on his way and finding it far tougher than he had ever imagined. Things can only get better!

This is a kind of crossover episode that keeps many of the "usual" parts of the Mighty Blue show but incorporates and transitions us over to the Camino show. Deanna McGregor hiked the Camino in 2017 as a truly spiritual experience and returned this year with her sons, 12-year-old Daniel and 16-year-old Jonathan.

We speak twice with Deanna; once prior to her setting out, when she tells us about her evolution as a hiker and her experiences on the Camino last year.

Once she had returned from this year's trip we caught up with her again as she reflected upon how the journey with her two boys had transpired. Needless to say, there were significant differences.

You can follow this year's hike with Deanna on her YouTube channel at https://www.youtube.com/user/LupeShoes

Also on the show, we have Dan Richards, CEO of Global Rescue. I'd originally intended to interview somebody about insurance available to hikers, as I'm aware that this is a regular topic of discussion for some people. Dan turned out to easily cover that base, even though he isn't an insurance guy. What Global Rescue do turned out to be far more interesting than just boring old insurance. Check out the website at https://www.globalrescue.com/

For Claire and Tenny, hiking the CDT had been an ambition but they soon decided that they needed to do something else. Between the two of them, they hatched a plan to walk the entire length of the Southern Border of the US, stretching from San Diego in the west to Brownsville and the Gulf of Mexico in Texas to the east. Here's Claire.

With no defined trail, the two of them set out to make their way and learn about the issues on both sides. It was an eye-opening experience for both women. Here's Tenny.

They were able to experience the kindness of strangers and the desperation of the disenfranchised. They each said that many of their pre-conceived notions were overturned by their experience.

On the way, the two women wrote an excellent blog that mapped out what they saw. If you'd like to read it, go to https://walktheborder.com/ and, for pictures, you can follow them on Instagram at https://www.instagram.com/clairetenny.walktheborder/

The last five interviewees from the Outdoor Retailers Summer Market in Denver were:

Andrew Sidel, of Four Points, selling his slow-burning energy bars. You can learn more at https://www.fourpointsbar.com/

Brandon Rodriguez showed me the Spark, a new knee support combining kinesiology taping and compression. This IS NOT currently available but will be out sometime towards the end of October or early November. The link (at that time) will be https://www.brownmed.com/spark. Once again, THIS LINK DOESN"T CURRENTLY TAKE YOU ANYWHERE. Come back in November.

Nicole Farah of Teva introduced me to a new shoe and suggested a good Teva for a long-distance hike. Go to https://www.teva.com/ for more.

Kent Hernandez of Bucklegear (https://www.bucklegear.com/) AND Bad Raccoon (https://www.badraccoonco.com/) showed me two excellent items; the Camp Gear Hanger and some old school–but new designs–handerchiefs.

Finally, Tim Richard shared the story of Oboz and how they give back to the outdoors. https://obozfootwear.com

As a writer, Cindy Ross must be feeling fulfilled. She has published seven books about hiking and educating in the outdoors. However, it is as a hiker that she established her bona fides to write these books. She has completed the Triple Crown and realized the value of educating her children while on these trails.

Memorably, Cindy and her husband, Todd Gladfelter, spent five summers completing the Continental Divide Trail with their two children–on llamas.

Cindy's bio says "Cindy and her husband learned how experiences can generate extraordinary learning" and they put that realization into practice by providing their own children with the platform to learn in the outdoors.

You can reach Cindy via email at [email protected] and read more about her on her blog, http://www.cindyrosstraveler.com/.

If you'd like to read her latest book, check out http://www.theworldisourclassroombook.com/. For ALL of her books, just click on her author's page in Amazon, https://www.amazon.com/Cindy-Ross/e/B001IZTEJE/ref=sr_ntt_srch_lnk_1?qid=1537396207&sr=8-1

This week in our Outdoor Retailers Summer Market roundup, we spoke with the following people:

Sourya Ghosh and Dale Pendleton of Soul Inventions, who had brought their Solar Scroll, an innovative solar charger that will shortly be available. You can check out this fascinating device at https://soulinventions.com/

Hugo Davidson, of Knog, introduced me to the Bandicoot Headlamp, after an astonishingly successful Kickstarter campaign. The best way to see this is through their Kickstarter page at https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1951570531/the-bandicoot-headlamp, though you can learn more about Knog at https://www.knog.com.au/the-bandicoot

Tiasha Renganathan introduced me to some of the stuff that she is working on with Twinery, including their Phoenix Active Heating Platform. Learn more about the exciting innovations at Twinery at http://twinery.co/

The story of the Crawfords has been one of the most prominent Appalachian Trail stories of the year. Their seemingly quixotic adventure didn't seem in the least bit strange to them. After all, they had been hiking as a family for some years so the AT appeared to be a natural extension to that as they tried to capture one last hike together before the children started to leave home.

As YouTube viewers, this adventure divided us, with some critics castigating Ben and Kami, while others embraced them with an equally ferocious love. We watched them spend the night in the snow-covered Smokeys on a bathroom floor, only to be confronted by the child protection services the following morning. We saw them grow as a family as each child assumed tasks to help take their journey to fruition.

By the time they reached Katahdin, most had come to applaud their resilience, with almost unheard-of support through the 100-Mile Wilderness. Baxter State Park refused to allow an exception to their rules of taking children under a certain age up to the top of Katahdin, so the family decided–unanimously–to finish the way they had started, as a family.

You can follow their vlog on YouTube at https://www.youtube.com/c/FightforTogether and their Instagram account at https://www.instagram.com/fightfortogether/

This week's segment from the Outdoor Retailer's Summer Market from Denver concentrated upon the claims made by manufacturers and the applicability of science to the process.

I spoke with Dr. Jan Beringer of Hohenstein. You can find out more about their textile testing by visiting https://www.hohenstein.de/

You can reach Dr. Jan at [email protected]

There is a translate button on the site for English speakers.

Dr. Jan directed me to Shawn Flavin of Coolcore, who is a strong proponent of these stringent tests. As the Director of Textile Engineering, he explained some of the processes that they use. To find out more, go to https://www.coolcore.com/ where you'll find some cool products. You can reach Shawn at [email protected]

Jennifer Pharr Davis is a woman on a mission. She wants to get people into the outdoors and, not only does she want to do it, she actually gets it done. Her Blue Ridge Hiking Company provides guided trips into the woods and over mountains, bringing many people who would never have considered going onto a trail before they came to her.

She has hiked over 14,000 miles of long-distance trails all over the world, including what was then the Fastest Known Time on the Appalachian Trail of 46 days, 11 hours, and 20 minutes. She has been the National Geographic Adventurer of the Year and written five books. Between this frenzy of activity, she also finds time to be a wife and a mother.

As you'd imagine, Jennifer is everywhere, so connect with her on Instagram at https://www.instagram.com/jenpharrdavis/?hl=en, or learn about her guided hikes at http://www.blueridgehikingco.com/.

She tweets at https://twitter.com/jenpharrdavis?lang=en and https://twitter.com/blueridgehiking, while you can find her on Facebook at both https://www.facebook.com/jennifer.p.davis.3/ and https://www.facebook.com/blueridgehikingco/?ref=hl.

If you'd like to see a short YouTube video about her new book, The Pursuit of Endurance, click here. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b-g9kyzWP6o

From the Outdoor Retailer Show in Denver, this week's guests were Douglas Ruchevsky of Case Knives. Douglas showed me several camping knives, including the Kickstart Knife and the Southern Grind. You can find these at https://caseknives.com/

Matt Fitzgerald of Cauldryn showed me his "Swiss Army Knife of Travel Mugs," an impressive device that controls the temperature of your coffee through your Bluetooth-enabled phone, as well as performing a bunch of other tasks. See what Matt was talking about at https://cauldryn.com/

Claire Kooperman very kindly gave me a pair of Injinji toe socks. These turned out to be exceptionally comfortable. You can find more about these at https://www.injinji.com/