Days 22 & 23 – 7/20-7/21 – West Branch to North Cedar Rapids, IA – 44 miles
I had certain expectations for the walk from West Branch. A quick perusal of the route made it appear that I would be following some sort of rail trail the majority of the way. And maybe that will be the case someday! Instead, my expectations were defied, almost from the start. The Hoover Nature Trail […]
Day 21 – 7/19 – Walcott to West Branch, IA – 33 miles
William Henry Harrison’s tomb sits within a towering edifice, perched atop a hill, visible from throughout the valley below. By contrast, Herbert Hoover’s, along with that of his beloved Lou, rests at ground level, surrounded by nature, obscured within the larger park preserving his childhood home and presidential library. There’s something appropriate to that juxtaposition. […]
Day 20 – 7/18 – Davenport to Walcott, IA – 16 miles
As I grapple with my Americanness, one of the Manichean struggles centers on our tendency towards excessiveness, grandiosity, and gluttony. In so many regards, my lifestyle runs oppositional to those habits. I live within my means; keep my footprint small; tend–in most cases–towards the understated. When I see others engaging in such practices on an […]
Day 19 – 7/17 – East Moline, IL to Davenport, IA – 14 miles
Look, I love long days of walking through beautiful countryside. Some of those stretches along Illinois’s canals, even as they pushed double-digit miles between cold drinks, were beautiful enough on their own to keep me humming along for hours. But even then, there’s some degree of diminishing returns. It is possible to have too much […]
Days 15-18 – 7/13–7/16 – Joliet to East Moline, IL – 135 miles
Note: For full access to everything from the walk, check out my Patreon and Instagram pages. As I’ve written, my overarching goal when I set out on this walk was to understand America more deeply. I’ve spent years engaging in long-distance walks, mostly in Europe, and I came to perceive that as a sort of self-indulgent escapism, especially as […]
Day 14 – 7/12 – Matteson to Joliet, IL – 23 miles
When I walked the American Discovery Trail the first time, following the southern route between Cincinnati and Denver, I took zero days off. That’s ludicrous. I suppose, in the end, that the walk only lasted a little more than two months, and I’ve had pilgrimage summers that were equivalent. Nonetheless, the physical demands on the […]
Day 12 – 7/10 – Schererville, IN to Matteson, IL – 21.5 miles
Nacho is a man who will stop to smell the roses. Or any other kind of flower, really. The garden outside his home in Chicago Heights is bursting with flowers, all the product of his caring cultivation. In time, he needed more room, so he crossed the road to assume control of the outer edge […]
Days 9-11 – 7/7 – 7/9 – Rochester to Schererville, IN – 86 miles
I left Rochester angry. Nobody showed up to lay out the breakfast buffet in the Super 8. Don’t get in the way of a distance walker and his empty calories! I also departed with an added measure of enthusiasm. After reviewing the ADT’s route through the next stage, I rejected it in favor of an […]
Day 8 – 7/6 – Peru to Rochester, IN – 24 miles
Yesterday, I realized that the trip had been marked by a bipolar character up to that point, alternating more enjoyable days with more exhausting or challenging ones. I was pleased, then, to finally break the streak today, completing my second consecutive easy-enough day. The funny thing, though, is that sometimes the easier days become the […]
Day 7 – 7/5 – Marion to Peru, IN – 34 miles
The most common piece of well wishing that I get from people when walking is to “be safe.” On one hand, that’s an easy platitude to fall back on; when you’re walking on roads, with cars whipping past, safety is a sensible concern. On the other, more often than not, there’s a thornier issue embedded […]