Walking thirty miles in a day

Finding my trail legs on the SHT

Sep 05, 2023

Each hiker has their own motivator, for some people distance and time are not goals but consequences of the desire for the next vista. For others distance and time is a goal, the journey itself being the purpose, the vistas being an uplifting fringe benefit.

The reason why, the motivation, for my hike, was a combination of the Malloryesque “Because it’s there”, and a need to find out if I could cope with being alone with myself again. Adventuring alone by kayak during the depths of my untreated depression I had learned that I didn’t like that state. The state of only having my own thoughts for company. The state of having to confront my own actions without the protection of distractions. Almost a decade later it was time to find out if the hard work had paid off.

So, what was my goal? It started with ten-by-ten. I had been watching a young hiker on YouTube, she was hiking the AT, and mentioned hitting her ten-by-ten goal. Her channel epitomized the side of YouTube that I have grown away from, the “hey guys” intro, the endless talking without a real message or learning. However, I did learn what ten-by-ten meant.

Ten miles by ten am. There is a Slovenian proverb that my father often quotes “Early hour – Golden hour”. The first hours of a day of hiking are an opportunity to exploit freshly rested muscles, to take advantage of the day’s cooler temperatures before the noon sun burns through the calm morning air and evaporates the dew from the path. Rising with the dawn chorus, minimizing the morning routine to just the necessities, I found myself walking by 6am. The terrain of the Superior Hiking Trail (SHT) varies considerably, my pace varied accordingly, but twenty-four-minute miles was about where I found a sustainable groove. Two and a half miles an hour, four hours of hiking, ten miles under foot by ten am.

The decision of when and where to stop each day was sometimes a physically motivated one. Tired thighs, aching feet, or just holistic fatigue necessitated a natural end. The SHT requires camping at designated sites, these sites are spread apart from as close as a quarter mile to as far as ten miles at times. The day’s terminus was dictated by these locations, combined with my body’s demands and the goals I had set. With a little forethought it was possible to plan a couple of days at a time, picking destinations to allow steady, sustainable, progress towards the Northern Terminus.

As my hike progressed my ten-by-ten became fifteen-by-noon then twenty-by-two. I had read about the concept of trail-legs; the adaptation of your body as it becomes accustomed to the repetitive days on the trail. The first time I noticed this phenomenon was towards the end of my thirteenth day of hiking. I was approaching lake Agnes, twenty-four miles underfoot so far that day, and I was still feeling fresh, I felt I could easily have carried on the remaining twelve miles to Cascade River wayside trailhead. However, I stopped. I stopped because of the view, and a promise I had made to myself years prior that I would spend a night at the campsite on the lake shore that I had fallen in love with on the many hikes Jacquelyn and I had taken in the area.

A hundred miles or so later I had a long day ahead of me. The trail from Judge Magney State Park Trailhead to the Northern Terminus was approximately twenty-nine miles. Add to that the need to walk back from the terminus to the Trailhead to catch my ride, and I had the potential for a thirty-mile day.

Prior to starting the trail, I had posted about my goals on the Superior Hiking Trail Facebook group. One group member had posted their disbelief at my average pace goal (fifteen to twenty miles per day) and ridiculed my belief that I could do thirty miles in a day. I guess this stung and stuck with me. My wounded ego needed me to prove them wrong.

There was absolutely no necessity to complete this section in one day, other than ego. I still had five days before we were due to head home. There were half a dozen camp site options along this section of the trail. But in my heart, I wanted to prove I could do it. The United States has normalized a level of unhealthiness that probably makes a thirty-mile hike seem a dauntingly impractical prospect to the average person. I had trained for this day. I had worked through a twelve-week program with an Australian coach who specializes in preparing people for long distance hikes. My pack was light, slack packing, with shelter, water and only enough food for two days. I had already hiked two hundred and seventy miles. My previous longest day was the twenty-four miles to get to Lake Agnes, how much harder could six more miles be?

I started out from Judge Magney State Park at just before 6am and worked my way along the path next to Brule River. Many trees, downed by previous storms, were still blocking the path, diversions abound until I climbed up the side of the valley and vanished into the woodlands. The early pace was slow going, but as the trail rose it flattened out, with some fast flat sections of backcountry roads and easier woodland trails. I stopped for lunch at Caribou Pond with eighteen miles under my belt. As the hours passed by the trail rose, eventually reaching the highpoint at Rosebush Ridge, one thousand eight hundred and twenty-nine feet above sea level. As the trail descended, I started watching the clock. Jacquelyn was scheduled to meet me at around 5pm I had just over six miles to reach the terminus and just over another mile to get back to the car and it was two thirty in the afternoon, I started increasing my pace, twenty-minute miles should see me comfortably to my goal.

At Andy Creek I came across two young hikers sitting forlornly on a bridge pumping water. Well, they weren’t pumping water and that was the problem. Their filter was clogged. I am a dad, there is no way I wasn’t going to stop and help these young hikers, so pushing my personal goal aside I jumped down into the stream and filtered six liters of water for them, more than enough to see them to the trailhead, their destination. Once I was confident that they would be safe and ready to continue I restarted my hike and reset my goals. By now I have four miles to go and an hour until my wife was due to arrive at the Trailhead.

So, I went for it. The last four miles flew beneath my feet, 14 minutes and 47 second miles on average. I gave myself a few minutes at the terminus to celebrate the end, I took a few photos and headed back down the trail, to meet Jacquelyn who was walking northwards to meet me. We were only allowed a brief hug and celebration as we were swarmed by mosquitoes prompting us to book it to the car.

That evening and into the next days and weeks I felt the consequences of the exertion, stiff muscles, aching knees, all offset by the satisfaction of having completed not just the three hundred miles of the Superior Hiking Trail but capping my hike off with a thirty-mile day.