Poughkeepsie local Alexis Hozlmann share her experiences thru-hiking the famous Appalachian Trail, how Dutchess County served as the perfect training ground before the expedition and her favorite parts of the Dutchess section of the AT.
"I was 27 when I started the trail and this has pretty much been a decade-long dream for me. When I was in high school, (I went to Arlington), my friends and I were always looking for something free but fun to do. And so once we started driving, we started going on local hikes," Holzmann said. "One of them was Nuclear Lake, and I remember seeing the white blazes and that it was part of the Appalachian Trail, and that piqued my interest."
White blazes are the white rectangles painted on trees denoting stretches of the famous Appalachian Trail. There are more than 165,000 of them along the route from Georgia to Maine.
Alexis’ first experience with the AT planted a seed. Later, she was in college volunteering at a school as an art teacher when a colleague reignited this fascination. A teacher assistant came in with a clipping from a magazine, and felt spurred to share it with Alexis.
“The clipping showed this dirty, raggedy-looking girl standing on top of this sign. [My colleague] said ‘This is my daughter, she hiked the entire Appalachian Trail.’ The light switch flipped in my head when I realized that people just get up and do this,” Holzmann recalled.
She always loved hiking in the Hudson Valley and exploring nature, and felt motivated by testing the limits of what she was capable of. A curiosity became a dream, and that dream quickly became a goal.
“This is something I really want to pursue and now I believe I can actually achieve this.”
After five years, she left her teaching job in Brooklyn to hit the road and trek more than 2,200 miles on foot.
Alexis embarked on March 5, 2023 from the Georgia side of the AT. Her father joined her for the first section of the trail, and the pair called themselves “the A-team” (Alexis & Art). Appalachian Trail thru-hikers typically travel using a “trail name,” given to them by hiking companions.Of course, once he returned home and the real challenge of the thru-hike began, she needed a fresh moniker. One hiker seated around a nightly campfire observed that Alexis was “a burst of energy” on the trail, and another companion coined the trail name “Rocket” for her.
The singular goal of completing the thru-hike may have been front of mind, but Alexis eagerly awaited her arrival in Dutchess County during the summer.
“From the very moment I started my hike, I told every other hiker I met that my family would throw a giant Fourth of July party for all the hikers when we get back to New York,” Holzmann said. She crossed the border from New Jersey into New York in late June, so she had been on the trail for quite some time.
As her party grew near, Alexis’ parents performed trail magic for the thru-hikers. Trail magic is part of the Appalachian Trail community involving former thru-hikers or friendly folks that live nearby providing resources and comforts for those strolling by. Often, people will put out jugs of clean water at trailheads for trekkers in the summer. Trail magic can be as generous as volunteers providing cooked meals, snacks, cold beer and more to trekkers.
“There’s even trail magic where someone gives you a ride to a local grocery store, or someone mails something for you, or they might help you fix your backpack or help you go to a local outfitter if you need new gear,” Holzmann explains.
Holzmann family trail magic included bringing fresh cookies and water bottles to trail crossings, taking hikers to grocery stores to load up on produce for the next leg of their trek and introducing them to Dutchess County cuisine.
“I love the dill dip from Adams Fairacre Farms, so we took a group of hikers there to load up on fresh local produce and a few specialties like their dips and baked goods,” Alexis recalled. They even shared a meal at The Dutchess Biercafe.
For those looking to do trail magic, Alexis recommends researching the nearest section of the Appalachian Trail and identifying a parking lot or local road adjacent. “Bring a chair and just hang out for the day [with your supplies]. Some days there might be hundreds of hikers and some days there might be just a few, but you never know the difference that you're going to make.” Northbound hikers start passing through the Hudson Valley region around May all the way through the summer, while the southbound hikers tend to pass through in the autumn. So, there are ample opportunities to make some magic.
“An important part of trail magic is to make sure that you still leave no trace.”
Another bit of trail magic involved the kind found only in Dutchess County. It’s a tradition for many Appalachian Trail thru-hikers to use the Pawling AT Metro–North train station to visit New York City. Most of the people Alexis met on the trail had never seen Manhattan before. Participants in this tradition take pictures in Time Square with their full packs, trekking poles and other equipment. The juxtaposition of muddy, travel-weary wanderers against the video screens of the city highlights the wealth of experiences one can have in the state of New York.
“The fact that we walked from Georgia to Pawling in the woods and then you can get on a train and go to the most famous city in the world, it blows so many people’s minds,” Alexis said. “It’s such a cool thing that only exists because of our area.”
In addition to the MTA stop, Dutchess County offers other one-of-a-kind outdoor experiences, even in the context of the Appalachian Trail.
“In the southern portion of the Appalachian Trail, there’s a tree called the Keffer Oak with a sign that reads ‘largest oak in the South.’ You know why that says largest ‘in the South’?
Because we have the biggest one on the trail here in Dutchess County, the Dover Oak,” Holzmann stated proudly.
Just after the Great Swamp section of the AT in Pawling, hikers come across this old-world wonder. The Dover Oak is reportedly over 300 years old, and is the largest White Oak along the 2,180-mile AT path. Another distinctly Dutchess Appalachian Trail tradition is hugging the giant trunk, which sports a 20-foot circumference. That’s one big hug!
