Hikers trace famous steps

POINT OF ROCKS, Md. — Tom Reid, 54, sat on a wooden mile-marker and fished through his backpack for a sandwich.

Mr. Reid, who had walked 137 miles along the Chesapeake & Ohio Canal over the past 10 days, was at mile-marker 47.

“I’ll make it,” he said of the 184.5-mile trek.

Mr. Reid and about 55 hikers set out from Cumberland on April 18 and today are due to arrive at their destination — mile-marker zero in Georgetown.

The group traced the steps of the late U.S. Supreme Court Justice William O. Douglas, who hiked the canal towpath in 1954 to draw attention to its natural beauty.

He called it “a refuge, a place of quiet retreat, a long stretch of quiet and peace at the Capitol’s back door.”

When Justice Douglas first hiked along the C&O Canal it took him eight days.

“I guess Justice Douglas kept a blistering pace,” said Hold Sworth, 50, of Rockville, who was among those who took to the trail two weeks ago and averaged 12 miles a day.

“For the average mortal person, doing it in eight days is impossible,” said hiker Wayne Cerniglia, 67, also of Rockville. “You start at mile-marker 184 and by the end of the day you are asking, ’How long is this?’”

“We were questioning our sanity,” added Leo Snarr, 75, of Woodstock.

Justice Douglas’s well-publicized journey halted a congressional plan to convert the canal into a motor park.

“We are all just happy that this trail is what it is and that it is not an interstate,” said Dr. George Lewis, 60, of Landover.

The C&O Canal attracts more than 3 million visitors a year and is among the top-25 most-visited national parks in the country. The tow path, once used by mules to tug boats along the waterway, is now enjoyed by hikers, joggers and bikers.

Running along the Maryland side of the Potomac River, the C&O Canal stretches from Georgetown to Cumberland and was designed in 1829 as a state-of-the-art transportation route. Its series of locks allowed commerce to bypass the river’s turbulent falls and rapids and bring goods into Georgetown.

Architects hoped to connect the Potomac and Ohio rivers, but construction was slow. By the time the canal reached Cumberland, 25 years after construction began, the B&O Railroad already had been there for eight years.

The canal was outdated even before it was completed because commerce found little use for the mule-drawn boats. Workers, who dug the 60-foot-wide, 6-foot-deep canal by hand amid disease and for little pay, abandoned their labor in Cumberland.

Mr. Reid and the other hikers were glad for temperatures in the mid 60s on Wednesday with clear skies and a peaceful breeze — a contrast to the night before, when persistent rain soaked them and temperatures plunged into the 30s.

“That was no fun,” Mr. Snarr said.

Carol Galtay, 61, of Northwest said she suffered hypothermia Tuesday night, so fellow hikers brought her extra blankets.

And the blisters, oh, the blisters.

“Every night in the campsites all you see is people taking care of blisters,” said Sue Lipski, 48, of New Jersey.

However, Mrs. Galtay said the burden of the blisters is “overcome by the camaraderie, physical challenge and beauty of the trail.”

Most of the hikers belong to the C&O Canal Association, which works to keep the park in pristine condition and created a cushy hike, by most standards.

Buses carried all the gear, hikers found Jiffy Johns every couple of miles and anyone who wanted to could sleep in motels along the way.

When the group arrives in Georgetown today, they will be welcomed by a committee of well-wishers and reporters and pose for photos in front of the Tavern at Tidelock.