{"id":208,"date":"2017-08-22T00:00:01","date_gmt":"2017-08-22T07:00:01","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.thetrailmaster.com\/?p=208"},"modified":"2017-08-22T07:25:32","modified_gmt":"2017-08-22T14:25:32","slug":"john-mckinney-my-life-as-a-hiker","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.thetrailmaster.com\/about\/john-mckinney-my-life-as-a-hiker\/","title":{"rendered":"John McKinney: My Life as a Hiker"},"content":{"rendered":"

Excerpted from John McKinney\u2019s The Hiker\u2019s Way<\/em>.<\/p>\n

The Wonder Years<\/strong> My unusual career path began when I was a Boy Scout in Troop 441 in Downey, California. I lived for the monthly hikes in the mountains, deserts and forest around California, and for weeklong summer hikes in the San Gabriel Mountains and the High Sierra. Hiking was far and away my favorite merit badge earned on my way to becoming an Eagle Scout. (It should have been a tip-off that I wasn\u2019t cut out to be a Wall Street mogul when I needed three tries to pass the test for the Personal Finances merit badge.)<\/p>\n

When I was fourteen, my parents sat me down for what they characterized as a frank discussion about my future.<\/p>\n

\u201cJohn, your mother and I appreciate how fun this hiking-camping-outdoors stuff is for you,\u201d my father began. \u201cBut let\u2019s face it, you\u2019re not going to be doing this as an adult.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen I\u2019m a grown-up, I\u2019m going to keep hiking,\u201d I declared.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat your father\u2019s saying,\u201d my mother chimed in, \u201cis nobody makes a living by hiking.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cYou need to take up a sport that will help you in the business world,\u201d my father continued in the persuasive manner that garnered him salesman-of-the-year honors at the huge corporation he represented. \u201cSo we\u2019ve decided to help you out by\u2014\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cNot another tennis racket,\u201d I whined.<\/p>\n

\u201cNo, you\u2019re going to be surprised,\u201d mother cautioned, as my father disappeared into the next room, soon re-emerging with\u2014<\/p>\n

\u201cGolf clubs,\u201d I said glumly.<\/p>\n

\u201cAnd a certificate for eight lessons at the club,\u201d Father enthused.<\/p>\n

My heart sank. I had been hoping for a new backpack. I took the golf lessons to please my parents, but my heart wasn\u2019t in it. For me, golf was a good walk ruined, years before I ever heard of the Mark Twain quip.<\/p>\n

Trails and Trojans<\/strong> My studies for a degree in broadcast journalism from the University of Southern California proved to be somewhat useful to my life\u2019s work; more so were my collegiate extracurricular activities. I helped found, and lead hikes for, the U.S.C. Hiking Club. While the cheerleaders for the football team looked good on TV, the coeds who hiked looked great on the trail\u2014and that made them the most interesting and attractive on campus\u2014at least to my way of thinking. The post-hike beers with my fellow hikers, when we talked about our next hikes and where our life paths may lead, I remember even now.<\/p>\n

Hikes in the Hollywood Hills<\/strong> For a while, I did the Hollywood hustle, working as a location scout and nature film writer by day, writing the Great American screenplay at night (If you know a producer interested in biopic about John Muir, \u201cJohn of the Mountains\u201d is a great script\u2026) Between film screenings and pitch meetings, I went for hikes in the Hollywood Hills. I discerned that the hills are blanketed with a green-leaved, red-berried native plant called California holly\u2014which gave Hollywood its name. I discovered I greatly preferred being on top of hills and looking down at Hollywood than being in Hollywood and looking up at the hills. What could this mean?<\/p>\n

Trail Write<\/strong>r While the industry never came through with those six- and seven-figure offers I thought my screenplays deserved, I was pleasantly surprised to learn that magazine editors would pay me two, three, and four figures to write about hiking and the great outdoors. Readers of California, Sunset and Los Angeles Times magazines enjoyed my hiking stories while Islands magazine sent me from Fiji to Kauai to Corfu to hike around the world\u2019s islands and write about them.<\/p>\n

My articles about hiking caught the attention of legendary California publisher Noel Young and his Capra Press, who signed me to write Day Hiker\u2019s Guide to Southern California<\/em>. This title, now Hike\u00a0Hike Southern California, A Day Hiker\u2019s Guide<\/em>, expanded from 50 trail accounts to 150, is still popular, and remains a regional bestseller.<\/p>\n

In 1986, a Los Angeles Times reporter interviewed me for a story he was writing about hiking. In mid-interview, he stopped and declared: \u201cHey, you should be writing about this subject. Let me introduce you to the editor.\u201d<\/p>\n

So began my 18-year stint as the newspaper\u2019s hiking columnist. The weekly column proved tremendously popular. Maybe the Missing Persons song lyric, \u201cNobody walks in L.A.\u201d is true; however, it seems most everybody hikes. Local parks had to assign extra staff on the weekends following some of my hike write-ups because so many hikers turned out to hit the trail.<\/p>\n

My Times readers liked my accounts of regional hikes but soon requested that I go farther afield to detail hikes. So off I hiked, around the West, across the East, and to intriguing hiking locales all over the U.S. I compiled the trails I described for The Times and other publications into a dozen guides, including Day Hiker\u2019s Guide to California\u2019s State Parks<\/em>, Great Walks of New England<\/em> and Great Walks of the Pacific Northwest<\/em>.<\/p>\n

Hiking: Isn\u2019t it Romantic?<\/strong> Meanwhile, even my social life revolved around hiking. I must confess I took my dates on (sometimes too) rigorous hikes and I\u2019m sure more than one woman not-so-fondly remembers not only a bad date but the hike from hell. Fortunately, I met a gal who could not only keep step with me on the trail, but surpasses me in every other way. Cheri and I have been together since our first hike, uh, date.<\/p>\n

Pioneering the California Coastal Trail<\/strong> Of the many lands that have called to me, spoke to me, my home shoreline and coastal mountains have called the loudest. I answered the call by agreeing to the California Coastal Trail Foundation\u2019s request to pioneer the California Coastal Trail. And so I took a little walk\u2014a 1,600-mile hike as it turned out\u2014from the Mexican border to the Oregon border along California\u2019s diverse shore, through the coast range and redwood forest. It was a life-changing hike for me, as I transformed from a sportsman with something to prove to a traveler with something to learn\u2014and share. I wrote a narrative, Hiking on the Edge: Dreams, Schemes, and 1600 Miles on the California Coastal Trail<\/i>\u00a0that chronicled my adventures and the unique people and places I encountered.<\/p>\n

Hiking Vacations<\/strong> An upscale walking vacation company headquartered in England asked me to set up a North American branch. I helped create weeklong hiking holidays from the Olympic Peninsula to Santa Fe to the coast of Maine, and let tours around Santa Barbara and Point Reyes National Seashore north of San Francisco. I thoroughly enjoyed guiding hikers form all around the U.S. and Europe and some lovely paths, getting to know some wonderful people, and learning what goes on behind the scenes in this fun and rewarding part of the travel business.<\/p>\n

Kids on the Trail<\/strong>\u00a0 I enjoyed family hikes and sharing the trail with my daughter Sophia and son Daniel. I\u2019ve learned as much from my children as they have from me, and I\u2019ve bee delighted by the opportunity to share what we\u2019ve learned together in a pocket guide, “HIKE with Kids,” and in four more books about hiking I’ve written for other publishers.<\/p>\n

Recently I\u2019ve been quite alarmed by the rise of what the outdoors recreation community calls \u201cNature Deficit Disorder,\u201d brought to our \u00a0attention by author Richard Louv in his landmark book, Last Child in the Woods. I\u2019ve been speaking out on that topic and writing books about hiking and outdoors skills for kids, including Let\u2019s Go Geocaching!<\/em> and Let\u2019s Go Hiking!<\/em><\/p>\n

Older, Wiser, The Trailmaster<\/strong>\u00a0Nearly 20 years ago, a California newspaper reporter, who shall be held blameless and left nameless, branded me \u201cThe Trailmaster\u201d after interviewing me for a story he wrote about hiker safety. Shortly thereafter, a radio talk show host picked up on the name and invited listeners to call in with their questions about hiking for \u201cThe Trailmaster.\u201d<\/p>\n

The name is easy to remember and is as good or better than any of the other names I\u2019ve been called: \u201cTrails expert,\u201d \u201cHike writer,\u201d and \u201cHiking spokesman\u201d as well as less flattering terms\u2014\u201ceco-crank,\u201d \u201ccurmudgeon\u201d and coastal access extremist.\u201d<\/p>\n

At a certain time in life, some of us feel a calling to share our calling. For me, that time is now. It\u2019s time to share the gospel of hiking, its rich tradition and its many benefits for body, mind and spirt.<\/p>\n

I make no claims to be the smartest and most eloquent spokesman for hikers, but I do have one standout ability that helps me spread the good word: I can walk and talk at the same time.<\/p>\n

Go on and scoff. But it\u2019s harder than you think to hike and impart hiking wisdom at the same time, particularly with a TV camera tracking your every move. To be sure it\u2019s an obscure talent, but one I\u2019m delighted to use to share the hiker\u2019s way.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Excerpted from John McKinney\u2019s The Hiker\u2019s Way, a not-so-serious autobiography of the author’s unusual career path and life on the trail. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetrailmaster.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/208"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetrailmaster.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetrailmaster.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetrailmaster.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetrailmaster.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=208"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetrailmaster.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/208\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetrailmaster.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=208"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetrailmaster.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=208"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetrailmaster.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=208"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}