Diary of a Trail

Tom Floyd tells the story of the people who struggled to build the Tuscarora Trail, a 250-mile hiking trail, to serve as backup or replacement for a lengthy section of the Appalachian Trail threatened by encroaching development. With the passage of the National Scenic Trails Act of 1968, the trail had protected status and its continuity was assured; nonetheless, the Keystone Trails Association and the Potomac Appalachian Trail Club determined to complete the work they had begun. This is the story of how the two trails - the Tuscarora Trail in Pennsylvania and Maryland, and the Big Blue Trail in Virginia and West Virginia - became the Tuscarora Trail. Floyd recounts the long quest to this end that began in Shenandoah National Park and George Washington National Forest, and then headed north to the top of Blue Mountain just west of the Susquehanna River and Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. In the story he tells, no part of planning or building the trail was easy; it entailed long months of scou