Room at the Inn Along Oldest US Hiking Trail

Travelers stop at historic junction of Vermont's Long Trail and Appalachian Trail

31 August 2010

The Inn at Long Trail in Killington, Vermont where the Long and Appalachian hiking trails merge.

If you ask a hiker what they like most about hiking, chances are they'll tell you it's taking their boots off at the end of the day.

This is especially true for a hiker who's been on the trail for weeks or even months. In Vermont, many of these so-called through hikers will stop at a historic hotel called the Inn at Long Trail.

Owner Murray McGrath tends bar McGrath's Irish Pub at the Inn at Long Trail.

"We've had a lodge here since 1923 catering to hikers," says innkeeper Oke O'Brien. "You don't hike the Long Trail or the Appalachian Trail without stopping here."

Green Mountain Club, which oversees the Long Trail, built the lodge as a summer retreat. It burned down in the 1960s and its ruins are still visible across the street from the inn, which the club built as a winter annex in 1939.

Innkeeper O'Brien says even if hikers don't spend the night , most will at least stop in to have a beer and sign the guest book - typically with their trail names - the nicknames they pick up on their journey.

O'Brien says hearing all the back-stories is one of the best parts of his job.

"There was a hiker in here last year and his trail name was Not Yet. He was doing the Long Trail last year and the year before he'd done the Appalachian Trail and he said his first day on the trail, someone asked him if he had a trail name and he said Not Yet, and that became his trail name."