- Time of past OR future Camino
- First: Camino Francés 2002; most recent: Norte/Primitivo 2019
The American Discovery Trail is the first coast-to-coast trail network across the USA, spanning nearly 7,000 miles / 11200km. It is, of course, not anywhere close to being entirely off-road, nor is it waymarked throughout. It was first scouted three decades ago, but only started to be followed about 15 years ago by a small trickle of walkers.
It's demonstrably different in concept from the more famous long-distance routes in the US, like the PCT, CDT, and Appalachian Trail. Those are best characterized as wilderness treks, deliberately avoiding the incursions of civilization. By contrast, the ADT seeks it out, actively pursuing places of historical and cultural significance, in addition to resplendent natural places. (And, of course, when you're linking together a place of this size, there are plenty of ordinary, run-of-the-mill spots and tedious sections as well.)
Much of the information is centralized through the American Discovery Trail Society. There's no formal guidebook to the route, but instead the organization offers GPS tracks and accompanying Data Books with turn-by-turn directions for each state, all available for purchase through their site. That's probably not going to be viable in the long-term--it's hard to control the flow of information these days--but, for now, I think it's a critical source of revenue for the organization to function. They do offer nice overviews of the route through each state on their site, and these are freely available. Here's Maryland's as an example.
I started to familiarize myself with the ADT by reading a bunch of trail journals written by walkers (you can find a full index of those hosted on TrailJournals.com here). Here are some that I've enjoyed:
Dave
It's demonstrably different in concept from the more famous long-distance routes in the US, like the PCT, CDT, and Appalachian Trail. Those are best characterized as wilderness treks, deliberately avoiding the incursions of civilization. By contrast, the ADT seeks it out, actively pursuing places of historical and cultural significance, in addition to resplendent natural places. (And, of course, when you're linking together a place of this size, there are plenty of ordinary, run-of-the-mill spots and tedious sections as well.)
Much of the information is centralized through the American Discovery Trail Society. There's no formal guidebook to the route, but instead the organization offers GPS tracks and accompanying Data Books with turn-by-turn directions for each state, all available for purchase through their site. That's probably not going to be viable in the long-term--it's hard to control the flow of information these days--but, for now, I think it's a critical source of revenue for the organization to function. They do offer nice overviews of the route through each state on their site, and these are freely available. Here's Maryland's as an example.
I started to familiarize myself with the ADT by reading a bunch of trail journals written by walkers (you can find a full index of those hosted on TrailJournals.com here). Here are some that I've enjoyed:
- Ken and Marcia Powers, known by their trail name "Gottawalk," were the first continuous through-hikers of the ADT, so their account is a great starting point
- Karen and Jerry's walk that spanned three years
- Boston and Cubby in 2012
- Milshake and Gumdrop in 2006
- There are some good video series, most notably Lion King (as previously mentioned!) and Mike Crowley, who is just about to finish his walk
- The ADT's Facebook page and Facebook group are reliable resources, with plenty of people sharing accounts from the road (though few at this point in the year)
- There are a few published books on the ADT. Of greatest interest to me from a historical perspective is Eric Seaborg and Ellen Dudley's American Discoveries, which tells the story of their original scouting trip. Nate Damm's Life on Foot loosely follows the ADT, though he often sticks to more direct highways. That's also true, as I understand it (I haven't read it yet) for Tyler Coulson's How to Walk Across America.
- I'm also working on a podcast series on the ADT, called Sea to Shining Sea (Soundcloud / iTunes / Google Podcasts)
Dave
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