“I hung up again and looked at Katz. "What is it with this town? I've blown more intelligent life into a handkerchief.”

“What is it about maps? I could look at them all day, earnestly studying the names of towns and villages I have never heard of and will never visit...”

“You have three chromosomes, Bryson. X, Y, and Fuckhead." -- Katz”

“Everyone has a supremely low moment somewhere along the AT, usually when the urge to quit the trail becomes almost overpowering. The irony of my moment was that I wanted to get back on the trail and didn't know how. I hadn't lost just Katz, my boon companion, but my whole sense of connectedness to the trail. I had lost my momentum, my feeling of purpose. In the most literal way I needed to find my feet again.”

“Beulah has a husband?'I know. It's a miracle. There can't be more than two people on the planet who'd be willing to sleep with her, and here we are both in the same town.”

“Every twenty minutes on the Appalachian Trail, Katz and I walked farther than the average American walks in a week. For 93 percent of all trips outside the home, for whatever distance or whatever purpose, Americans now get in a car. On average, the total walking of an American these days - that's walking of all types: from car to office, from office to car, around the supermarket and shopping malls - adds up to 1.4 miles a week...That's ridiculous.”

“Four times I was honked at for having the temerity to proceed through town without the benefit of metal.”