Where Less the Path is Worn: First Trek O'er Appalachians of North America

by M.J. Eberhart

This book is a true story about a 347-day trek by foot covering well over 5,000 miles, from the Cliffs of Forillon, Cap Gaspé, Quebec Province, where the St. Lawrence meets the sea, to the southernmost point on the eastern North American continent in Key West, Florida.

Interestingly, the journey doesn’t end there, but returns north again, all the way to the island of Newfoundland, to continue among the Long Range Appalachian Mountains as they rise to meet the tundra, clear to the tip of the Great Northern Peninsula where the Vikings first landed over 1,000 years ago. Journey’s end is on Belle Isle, the remaining mountaintop, the final bastion along the majestic Appalachians to hold its head above the Labrador Sea.

As part of this adventure, and as a distinction, this is the first known trek to cover the entire Appalachian Mountain Range, at least as we know it to exist on the North American continent.

This odyssey is narrated in first person (journal entry) format, in hopes you might enjoy journeying along from day to day. Though vicarious your quest, be prepared to experience the joy, feel the pain, and test the loneliness and toil that only a trek of such magnitude could ever offer up. As it has been for the Nimblewill Nomad, it is hoped this adventure will also prove a journey of inspiration and discovery for you. Indeed, the eastern North American continent is grand, such an expansive and magnificent place, with its natural beauty, its beautiful people. The delight of such discovery can be neither realized nor least understood by those comfortably riding along. One must walk to truly see and understand.

Where Less the Path is Worn will take you along that way. A warning, though. This journey, unfortunately, will require that you endure the doggedness of it, the seemingly countless miles, the countless days, the countless journal entries. You, too, must endure, as did the old Nomad. But your reward, your payoff, it’s here, the magic of discovery, it’s here among these pages.
[N. Nomad]

376 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 2004

About the author

After retiring first from the armed forces, and then from a busy optometric practice, I started hiking and backpacking in the early eighties. During that time I managed to hike a good bit of the Florida Trail and about half of the Appalachian Trail, from Springer Mountain Georgia to Duncannon Pennsylvania, all in jerks and starts over a period of fifteen or so years. In January 1998, I set out on my first uninterrupted long distance hike. That trek began on the Florida Trail, thence continued to the Cliffs of Forillon, Cap Gaspé Quebec, a distance of over 4,000 miles. During that time I took on the trail name: Nimblewill Nomad. The years 2000 and 2001 brought about nearly that same hike in reverse, the first known trek o’er the entire Appalachian Mountain Range, at least as we know the majestic Appalachians to exist on the North American continent. That journey lasted 347 days, covered a distance of over 5,000 miles, and included a hike through the Long Range Mountains of Newfoundland. 2002 brought a cross-continental trek, an adventure-filled journey that lasted 147 days, over 3,000 miles, from the old lighthouse at Cape Hatteras North Carolina, to another old lighthouse at Point Loma in San Diego California. In 2003, in preparation for a trek up the Lewis and Clark Trail that runs from St. Louis Missouri to Fort Clatsop on the Pacific, a journey, God willing that I’ll attempt at age 66, I loosened my legs by hiking the Natchez Trace Trail, from Nashville Tennessee to Natchez Mississippi.

Reviews

[janeann fessler · Rating 5 out of 5]

The story of the first person to walk the 5000 miles from the most northern tip of Canada to the end of the Florida Key's return trip. He has now done it twice and at 83 now plans to do it again.