And here is the answer… “None Of The Above”. It actually came from a line in a book about Earl Shaffer who was the first thru-hiker to complete the Appalachian Trail in 1947. I figured I’d rather name myself than risk getting dubbed with a trail name that I didn’t like. BirdShooter sounded cool and was derived from the hiking boots that Earl Shaffer walked in during his thru-hike. I figured it would inspire me to keep walking regardless of how tough things got during my 1994 thru-hike. It worked. I finished the hike on October 15th, 1994 and BirdShooter has been my trail name ever since. Here’s the paragraph from the book that was the inspiration for the trail name. I read it only months before starting my six-month hike on the A.T.:
“The launching of the “Long Cruise”
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