@fortheinterested: On April 23, 2013 66 year old Geraldine (Gerry) Largay, a retired Air Force nurse from Tennessee, would attempt a thru hike of the Appalachian trail. She had previous experience and was excited for the journey. Gerry planned to hike the 2,168 mile route with her friend Jane Lee. The two trekked the first 1,000 miles on different paces with Jane having to wait on Geraldine occasionally. This led to Geraldine adopting the trail name “inchworm”, but still they had gone 1,000 miles. On June 30th, Jane had to cut her hike short for a family emergency, but Geraldine wanted to continue as they were relatively close to the end. This made sense to Jane, and Geraldine continued her hike with her husband George meeting her at accessible spots on the trail to drop off supplies. On July 21-22, two other hikers stayed the night with Gerry at the Popular Ridge lean-to,located in Western Maine 200 miles from the end of the trail. The two hikers would snap a photo of Geraldine before she left the next morning at 6:30, but by 11:00am the 66 year old was lost. She texted her husband that she had went off trail to go to the bathroom and couldn’t find her way back. Unfortunately, none of her texts ever went through and she decided to camp for the night. Authorities sent out rescue teams the next morning but extensive searches never turned up a trace of Geraldine. In October 2015 over two years later, the hiker’s remains were found at her camp. The camp was found only two miles away from the trail. It was apparent upon discovery that Geraldine had survived for nearly a month out in the wilderness, and it’s believed searchers came close to the camp earlier than 2 years. Gerry had gone off the trail at a very dense spot which made her campsite hidden from searchers. There were charred trees found around the campsite along with a journal. An entry on August 6th, a request to inform her family of the discovery of her remains “no matter how many years from now. Then the final entry on August 18th(unconfirmed date), a letter for George. It was determined that Geraldine Largay died from exposure after surviving a month waiting for rescuers. May she rest in peace #fyp

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Sunday 04 December 2022 17:53:06 GMT