George Steffanos
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George Steffanos
@gsteffanos.bsky.social
1K followers 980 following 7.8K posts
Author of Then the Hail Came, a book about my 1983 Appalachian Trail thru-hike, available on Amazon in both paperback and Kindle. https://www.georgesteffanos.com
www.georgesteffanos.com
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George Steffanos @gsteffanos.bsky.social · Aug 27
🧵1/3
View from Jug End, Taconic Mountains, Massachusetts. August 25, 2025.

A hard fall on the steep descent from Jug End and a deep bruise to my right shoulder. I'll be fine in about a week, but it did cut short my plans for a 6-week hike after one great week.

#hiking #outdoors #nature #mountains
We are on a mountain standing atop a rock outcrop of light gray rock marbled with darker gray. There is a pine tree to our right. Some hardwoods to our left are already showing signs of autumn, several have leaves of gold and orange. We are looking across a broad valley hundreds of feet below filled with the greens of late summer. Most of it is covered with deep green forests broken by emerald green pastures and farm fields. A small pond is not far away near the middle of our view. A line of blue green hills and mountains runs along the far horizon. A morning of clouds is just giving way to bright sunshine. The sky is a soft blue filled with lines of clouds.
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George Steffanos @gsteffanos.bsky.social · 1h
I'm disappointed, but I learned a lot for the next hike. I have lots of great pics and some stories to share. This will put off my sequel AT hike until 2027, but there will be new hikes next year.
George Steffanos @gsteffanos.bsky.social · 1h
Note: I'm finally starting to work on my hiking blog for my aborted August hike. I'll have a link soon. A hard fall on the steep descent from Jug End did some damage to my right shoulder. I'll be fine eventually, but it did cut short my plans for a 6-week hike after 1 great week.
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George Steffanos @gsteffanos.bsky.social · 1h
🧵8/8
That is depressing. I have not hiked that slow a pace in hundreds of miles. Good thing I have two fourteen-mile days planned. They will allow me to ease myself back into shape.

More of My 1983 Appalachian Trail Hike in Photos at www.georgesteffanos.com/places-i-ve-...
Places I've Been | Then The Hail Came George Steffanos
My 1983 Appalachian Trail Hike in Photos. There are around 750-800 photos here scanned from my 1983 slides. I believe this to be one of the oldest thru-hikes on the Internet to be documented in photo...
www.georgesteffanos.com
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George Steffanos @gsteffanos.bsky.social · 1h
🧵7/8
The trail was not much help, either. Two long, vertical rock climbs welcomed me back to the Appalachian Trail. Thanks to a combination of all these factors, it took me three-and-a-half hours to hike those six miles, even though I took no long breaks.
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George Steffanos @gsteffanos.bsky.social · 1h
🧵6/8
I could hardly breathe on the steep climbs, my legs felt weak all day and my feet were suddenly tender again. On top of that, it was another oppressively hot, steamy day, which felt all the worse after spending five days in air conditioning.
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George Steffanos @gsteffanos.bsky.social · 1h
🧵5/8
to cover the distance he claims to have covered today, he would have needed to average better than four miles per hour all day, including breaks, over a stretch of trail that included the climb up Wawayanda Mountain and those rock climbs on Bellvale Mountain, among other insanities.
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George Steffanos @gsteffanos.bsky.social · 1h
🧵4/8
Therefore, he must make up these stories to explain his sudden thirty-five and forty-mile one-day leaps. Not having hiked these stretches, he is unaware of what an idiot he sounds like. For instance,
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George Steffanos @gsteffanos.bsky.social · 1h
🧵3/8
while my brother and I just looked at each other and tried not to laugh.

It quickly became obvious that Charlie was one of those guys who constantly hitchhike around large stretches of the Appalachian Trail. Unlike most, he refuses to admit it.
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George Steffanos @gsteffanos.bsky.social · 1h
🧵2/8
For the purposes of this tale, let’s say that his trail name was Crazy Charlie, and he was just possibly the biggest bs artist I have met on this trail of bs artists. He spent about fifteen minutes regaling my family and myself with tall stories about hiking 45-mile days with a 75-pound pack
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George Steffanos @gsteffanos.bsky.social · 1h
🧵1/8
August 6, 1983: They dropped me off at 4:00 this afternoon, at the point where I left the trail on Monday. While I was getting my gear ready to resume my hike, a thru-hiker came by.

#backpacking #hiking #AppalachianTrail
We are in a field of waist-high weeds atop an otherwise open ridge crest. At the edge of the field ahead, the forest begins. Several of the trees at the edge of the field and beginning of the forest are dead. Several taller larger wooded hills rises above us ahead. The sky is very light blue, almost white. The angle of shadows and the golden hue of the light tell us the sun is close to setting, offscreen to our left. A series of other ridges cascade into the distance, gradually dissolving into the thick haze.
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George Steffanos @gsteffanos.bsky.social · 14h
Hiking over St Sauveur Mountain, Acadia National Park on Mount Desert Island, Maine from April 1981.

#hiking #ocean #seacoast #mountains
A beautiful sunny early spring day, the ocean is a deep blue. Atop a naked rock ledge hundreds of feet above an arm of the ocean running inland from our right to left. Across this sound is a peninsula with a small port village. The majority of the visible land below is wooded, mainly pines and other evergreens. The hardwoods are still leafless and the grass is just starting to turn green. Several flattish wooded islands with some buildings are in the ocean just beyond the peninsula.
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George Steffanos @gsteffanos.bsky.social · 21h
Mesquite Flat Sand Dunes, Death Valley National Monument, California from April 1984.

#hiking #mountains #dunes #desert
A deep blue cloudless desert sky. Pale beige sand dunes showing the tracks of many small animals. A large green leafy shrub to our left, 2 more atop a dune ahead in the near distance. Rugged dark gray naked rock mountains rise from the edge of the valley floor beyond.
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George Steffanos @gsteffanos.bsky.social · 1d
You can read or listen to my book for free if you are a Kindle Unlimited eBook or an Audible Plus audiobook subscriber. Both options are available from Amazon, where the paperback, eBook or audiobook can also be purchased.
George Steffanos @gsteffanos.bsky.social · 1d
🧵9/9
finally dropped below the clouds. I got one photograph of a lush, green valley speckled with daubs of white mist.

From my book Then the Hail Came (A Humorous and Truthful Account of a 1983 Appalachian Trail Thru-hike). Available in paperback, audiobook and eBook: www.amazon.com/dp/B09QFG4ZR6
Then the Hail Came: A Humorous and Truthful Account of a 1983 Appalachian Trail Thru-hike
Then the Hail Came: A Humorous and Truthful Account of a 1983 Appalachian Trail Thru-hike [Steffanos, George] on Amazon.com. *FREE* shipping on qualifying offers. Then the Hail Came: A Humorous and Truthful Account of a 1983 Appalachian Trail Thru-hike
www.amazon.com
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George Steffanos @gsteffanos.bsky.social · 1d
🧵8/9
The half-mile climb up to the actual summit was followed by a four-mile descent into the Tye River valley. The path was rocky and steep in many spots, the trail elevation dipping from 4063 feet at the summit to 997 feet at the river crossing. The final viewpoint on the mountain was reached as I
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George Steffanos @gsteffanos.bsky.social · 1d
🧵7/9
I passed some promising viewpoints, but all were completely socked-in, opening into a vast white void swirling with light grays. The landscape was thick undergrowth, gnarled oaks, and great boulder formations. I appeared to be following a thin green supernatural land bridge through clouds.
We a looking down from a mountainside to a large green valley hundreds of feet below. The air is hazy, the sky is completely overcast with low clouds and some fog below us. Our view is framed by forest on the bottom, left and right. The lower slopes visible below us are mostly forested. The valley is relatively flat except for several rugged wooded ridges. Most of it is green pastures and farm fields, with also large strips of forest.
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George Steffanos @gsteffanos.bsky.social · 1d
🧵6/9
My new friends were still asleep, so I left a sincere thank-you in the register as I headed out on the trail.

The long crest was very narrow, and the flanks fell away precipitously.
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George Steffanos @gsteffanos.bsky.social · 1d
🧵5/9
Having no fuel, I breakfasted upon those two cans of cold spaghetti the kids had given me and started packing my gear — slow work with all of those sleeping bodies hemming me in. My backpack was finally loaded, and I was decked out in all my rain gear at 7:45.
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George Steffanos @gsteffanos.bsky.social · 1d
🧵4/9
Ironically, the open end of the building faced the gap, and a bitter easterly blast howled through all night. Shivering was an enjoyable experience after all the sweltering heat and humidity I have endured lately. A lingering chill drizzle greeted me at 6:30 this morning when I awoke.
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George Steffanos @gsteffanos.bsky.social · 1d
🧵3/9
A shallow little spring beside the shelter fed into a flat area, forming a small bog which grew by leaps and bounds during the night’s monsoons. The elbow formed by the joining of the two ridges sheltered the structure from north, west and south winds.
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George Steffanos @gsteffanos.bsky.social · 1d
🧵2/9
A large clearing surrounded by gnarled and rather sparse trees just below this junction is the site of the shelter where a large group of kids, three adult chaperones, and one slightly-used thru-hiker spent a night of rain, fog, and unseasonable cold on the second-to-the-last day of June 1983.
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George Steffanos @gsteffanos.bsky.social · 1d
🧵1/9
June 30, 1983: In the Virginia Blue Ridge, high atop a shoulder of a mountain called The Priest, not far from the 4063-foot summit, a spur ridge makes a perpendicular intersection with the main crest.

#backpacking #hiking #AppalachianTrail
We a looking down from a mountainside to a large green valley hundreds of feet below. The air is hazy, the sky is completely overcast with low clouds and some fog below us. Our view is framed by forest on the bottom and left. The valley is relatively flat. Most of it is green pastures and farm fields, with also large strips of forest.
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George Steffanos @gsteffanos.bsky.social · 1d
Quiet summer sunset at Lost Ponds. Mattatuck State Forest, Plymouth, Connecticut. July 5, 2021, 7:00 PM.

#sunset #hiking #forest #lake
The hazy evening sky is a soft pale gold with some gray clouds near the horizon. A strong summer sun is burning through the clouds and haze, creating a more intense gold and orange aura mirrored on the very slightly rippled surface of a pond below. The pond is surrounded by a lush forest of leafy hardwoods. We are looking out from a small shady patch of rocky, mossy ground between the trees along the shore.
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Reposted by George Steffanos
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range dan @rangedan.bsky.social · 1d
misty morning
To the east this Misty morning. Large fir trees on the left in silhouette. The fence off areas of the yard down low and mist in blue skies above
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George Steffanos @gsteffanos.bsky.social · 1d
Vacant until spring. Empty bird house on state forest field in late autumn at sunset. Mattatuck State Forest, Plymouth, Connecticut. October 21, 2020, 5:28 PM.

#hiking #autumn #forest #meadow
A large field of recently mown grass beginning to turn golden brown with autumn. The field is surrounded by forest. Many of the trees have lost their leaves, the remainder have past peak foliage of brick red, golden brown or burnt orange. The sky is mostly cloudy with some of the cloud bottoms tinted with gold from the setting sun. A wooden bird house on a metal pole and base is in the foreground on the left. A small patch of longer grasses not reached by the mower encircles its base.
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