Blood Mountain

Hiking four miles in three hours, my legs screamed for rest, my throat was parched, and a 50-pound backpack was rubbing a fast-rising blister on my shoulder. My hiking buddy and I were making a steady ascent up Springer Mountain, where we hoped to spend the night. We were also discovering that a week’s hiking was going to be tougher than we thought.

The top of Springer was still a mile away, and the finish line of our journey an incomprehensible 32 miles beyond that.

Watching the sweat fall from my brow, it occurred to me that I was going to a great deal of trouble to get away from my ministry obligations for a few days.

The idea to hike a portion of the Appalachian Trail had come to me on one of those weeks when the phone rang incessantly, when a long list of administrative duties and counseling needs filled my Daytimer, and when Sunday’s unfinished sermon was bearing down like a line of thunderstorms toward my Central Georgia home.

Dream big, plan well, choose companions carefully

You can only take so many thunderstorms before you look for cover.

Day One:

“Darrell,” I said to a member of the church, “what would you think about spending a week on the Appalachian Trail?”

Darrell is a Master Sergeant in the U.S. Air Force. He has sleeping bags, backpacks, and food for the trail. More important, he has years of camping experience.

Calling Darrell was like packing extra confidence in my bag. With him along, I would not likely go hungry, die of thirst, or lose a battle with a bear.

For the next several weeks, we gathered all we’d need for the journey. We drank in the details of the maps. We talked of hiking America’s most famous trail. We dreamed of sleeping under the stars and being

refreshed with the vigorous exercise. I was ready to leave the rigors of the pastorate behind, if only for a while.

After four hours of climbing that Monday afternoon, I realized my dreams hadn’t been hot enough. The higher we climbed, the closer we got to the unseasonably warm sun.

We had only enough water for the day and we were trying to ration it carefully. The maps told us that our first chance to refill the canteens would come the next day, on the opposite side of Springer.

As the sun began to set, we still couldn’t see the top of the mountain. Darrell had hoped to make the summit before nightfall. The air chilled, and we got too cool too fast. Leg cramps set in with a vengeance. Darrell and I had been climbing relentlessly for eight hours. I secretly wondered if we were going to make it.

“Can we stop for a minute and pray?” I suggested, feeling a little pastorly. The master sergeant agreed. The prayer was simple. “Lord, please quench our thirst, give us the ability to walk without leg cramps, and we need a place to lie down on level ground!”

That may have been the most honest, uncomplicated prayer of dependence I had prayed in a long time. No theological struggling or stained-glass delivery, it was a prayer from the gut. I would take that kind of praying home with me, if I made it home.

“Let’s go,” Darrell ordered, and we were off again.

Spot sure footing, then jump

Finally, we topped Springer Mountain. With plans for a more leisurely ten miles the next day, we crashed for the night.

Day Two:

Two fishermen waved at us as they practiced fly-fishing from the middle of the stream. They seemed unconcerned that the fish weren’t biting.

We called it an early day at the foot of Sassafras Mountain, and prepared for our only meal of the day. Darrell built the fire while I went in search of fresh water.

Two hikers headed in the opposite direction had told us that the only water within four miles was a quarter-mile up Sassafras, so I headed up one of the steepest climbs I’d seen yet. The water was just where it was supposed to be; catching it would be a challenge. This was no rushing stream. A wall of wet black rocks towered above the path, and at the top of the wall was a steady trickle. I could see there was just enough space at the top of the rocks to hold a canteen under the drops.

We were out of water, so I had no choice but to climb the sheer face, hold onto the cliff’s edge, and wait for the canteens to fill.

I was up the wall and in position in a few minutes, but it took at least 20 minutes to fill both canteens. By that time, two days of hiking had done a job on my legs, and I discovered I couldn’t move. I was frozen in place.

Hanging onto the rocks, I surveyed the situation: My companion was too far away to hear my call for help. My legs and arms were quivering from exhaustion, and every path of descent looked slippery and dangerous. Suddenly, my fear of heights became my greatest enemy. One wrong step might be my last.

It was time for an assessment of faith. The path I’d chosen on the way up seemed safest from the view underneath the cliff, though now it looked like certain catastrophe. From this angle, I could see a surer way down on the other side of the trickle. My future hinged on one giant step across the slippery rocks, but did I have nerve enough to jump? I prayed another short, honest prayer, and with a lunge, I went for it. My shoe gripped the wet rock, and held! In a few moments, I was on my way back to camp, fresh water in hand.

The leap was terrifying in some ways, inspiring in others. I found myself thinking about my call to the church in Warner Robins. That had been a faith move at a time when our options were to cling to a painful but certain future, or to trust God and leap into uncertainty. And I wondered about a new ministry possibility we were discussing at church. If we leaped, would we find sure footing? Darrell interrupted my application of this hillside lesson.

“How did it go?” he asked, warming himself by the fire as I returned.

“It was rough,” I said, trying to explain my fear on the cliff.

“That’s something,” he said blandly. “Let’s eat.”

Enjoy the respite, however brief

Near-death experiences are never as tasty on the second telling.

Day Three:

We made our best time, found a new spring in our steps, and by nightfall, realized that we were only 10 miles from the end of the trail and, after that, a short car trip home.

Watch the path closely; if you lose it, wait

We had new energy. We could climb anything.

Day Four:

We packed quickly and headed toward Blood Mountain, the last great peak before we would descend to the valley and take the car ride home.

The weather worsened with every hour. The sprinkling became a driving rain. A thick fog enveloped us. The hard soil on the Appalachian Trail has been hollowed out by decades of hikers’ steps. During a storm, the trails become gullies as the rainwater rushes off the slopes. The rain increased and the trail became a creek. Most of our steps were under water. Lightning cracked all around us, but we kept walking. The Appalachian Trail had become our Appalachian trial.

Despite the conditions, we made good time and arrived at the peak of Blood Mountain before we expected. We even took a photograph for the scrapbooks. Our excitement built as we sped toward the valley. All I could think about was a hot shower, a good meal, and a comfortable ride home.

That’s how we lost the path.

We talked and laughed our way right past the trail markings, and suddenly we were standing on an outcropping of boulders, more than 4,000 feet above sea level.

“I’ll see if I can find the path,” the master sergeant said.

He disappeared over the rocks.

“Do you see it?” I asked.

“No, not yet.”

“See it yet?” I yelled through the sheets of rain.

“No,” he called back from a distance. “I’m going to try one more place.”

And then I heard from Darrell no more. There was nothing on top of Blood Mountain except rain, silence, and fear.

I have never felt more alone than in that moment. Except after a bad church conference. Or before a sermon I didn’t want to deliver.

I could only wait. A few steps forward, and I would go over the cliff, too. A few steps back, but that promised no path. I prayed for my guide to return.

Some minutes passed before I saw a hand grasping the rocky ledge from the other side. I rushed to the edge as Darrell appeared again, climbing back to safety with an ashen face and trembling hands.

He had almost fallen, he said, and it took every ounce of strength to hold on, and then inch back toward safety. This time the near-death story was his to tell.

Backtracking together, we found the path and strained ahead the final two miles.

For weeks we had wondered what it would be like to start and then complete our journey together. For four days and 40 miles we had talked about the joy we would have when we reached the finish line. Would we shout? Would we dance? Would we trade high-fives?

I cried.

Never in my life had I been so glad to be through with a vacation. A hot shower was just around the bend, and our first real meal in four days was a half-hour away. By nightfall we would be home with our families: safe, well-fed, and dry.

Ministry didn’t seem so hard when I came back to the office a few days later. A week of fresh air had cleansed my brain, and the exertion had eased the tensions of church leadership.

Applying my hiking lessons, my dreams would be tempered by reality, my endurance strengthened by faith. The complexities of ministry seemed surmountable now: pray simply, wait sometimes, stick to the path.

They call the hikers making the entire, 2,100-mile journey along the Appalachian Trail “thru-hikers.” Darrell and I call ourselves “through-hikers.” We don’t plan on returning to the Trail anytime soon.

Next summer, we’re going to get in a canoe and float for a few days.

Andy A. Cook is the pastor of Shirley Hills Baptist Church in Warner Robins, Georgia.

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