Noted hiker-author speaks at library

Someone seeing Jennifer Pharr Davis for the first time easily could mistake her for a marathon runner, carrying a super-slender 145 pounds on a 6-foot frame.

One’s second guess might be hardcore hiker, which would be spot-on since Davis has completed the daunting Appalachian Trail not once, but three different times.

This has included through-hiking the iconic route’s nearly 2,200-mile distance through forests and mountains between Georgia and Maine in the fastest-known time of 46 days, 11 hours and 20 minutes averaging nearly 50 miles per day.

But what she gained most from her treks has not been the fame or accolades accompanying such feats, Davis told a local audience Saturday afternoon.

It has been the life lessons she picked up along the way which can bear little relationship to athletic achievements.

In fact, she learned more during her first five-month hike on the Appalachian Trail at age 21 that she had during four years of college, Davis told about 30 people gathered at the Mount Airy Public Library.

“You get a lot of 20-year-olds and 60-year-olds hiking together,” Davis said regarding the most-prevalent trail pairings of young folks possessing plenty of energy and retired individuals with the time to undertake such a challenge.

“On-trail conversations are your entertainment,” explained the special speaker, an Asheville resident who is a wilderness enthusiast, conservation advocate and author.

Hearing older participants talk about their lives, accomplishments — and regrets — made her time along the Appalachian Trail spanning 14 states more of an odyssey of self-enhancement than a journey, according to Davis.

“That’s an education,” the now-41-year-old wife and mother of two observed during her weekend presentation that was upbeat and humorous at times.

Although she had taken communications courses in college, “I never learned how to talk until I got on the trail.”

Davis admits that one can get lonely and bored while hiking in isolated areas for months at a time.

“Please, just a bird or a squirrel,” she remembers wanting to see at times.

Yet this increasingly was offset by a comfort and a certain inner peace in not being around people for extended periods which she’d never experienced in the outside world — having to continually react to or otherwise acknowledge them.

That freed Davis up to think things through in her own mind.

“I felt beauty,” she said of also tapping into the wonder of nature during her treks, of which she began considering herself a part. She identified as being “wild” at times.

“Just give yourself a growl sometimes — it feels good,” the renowned hiker said she learned.

“I felt more responsible than I ever had, in a good way,” Davis commented.

“It was a wonderful way to see the world.”

Davis said another personal growth area involved learning how to manage pain, citing bouts with shin splints, hypothermia and dehydration — not to mention weather events such as sleet storms.

Hikers’ backgrounds varied

Among other pursuits over the years, Davis opened Blue Ridge Hiking Co., an outdoor outfitter shop in downtown Asheville.She also travels from place to place giving inspirational talks to corporate and other clients which stress how values including perseverance and adaptability to changing conditions can pay dividends in the workplace.

Davis also speaks to community groups such as that at the Mount Airy Public Library, saying she “jumped at” the chance to come here.

That is due to Surry County being a favorite hiking spot because of its state park and other resources.

Before Davis tackled the Appalachian Trail for the first time, she had not been a star athlete in high school or logged similar accomplishments in her background to suggest she was ready for this.

Part of her message Saturday seemed to be if she could hike the fabled pathway, others can.

“There have been a couple of five-year-olds completing the Appalachian Trail,” Davis said, along with hikers at the other end of the spectrum in their 70s and 80s.

“There’s been a couple of legally blind (people) doing the path with their service dogs,” she mentioned further.

A good number of those of all ages who were present at the library Saturday afternoon have been on the Appalachian Trail, based on a show of hands.

That illustrates how someone can benefit from it at their own pace and scope without worrying about setting records or completing the trail in its totality, Davis emphasized.

“You don’t have to hike the whole thing.”