Carl Ownbey, Hiking Maniac

The profile of Carl Ownbey, "Distance Denizen Doesn't Act His Age; Hiker Ownbey keeps on truckin' at age 86" in the 31 January 2008 Springdale Morning News from Springdale, AR, written by Flip Putthoff is fairly inspiring. Here's part of the opening, for example,

"In his 60s, Ownbey, of Fayetteville, through-hiked all 2,147 miles of the Appalachian Trail. He was pushing 70 when he hiked the Continental Divide Trail and completed all 3,100 miles.

"In his 80s, Ownbey, a retired farmer, ran the Dallas White Rock Marathon, one of several 26.2-mile races he has completed in his retirement years."

Ownbey is now 86 and hasn't slowed down much. A lot of us would like to be that guy.

His A.T. thru-hike would have been some time after 1984, which is when he read a book about the Trail that inspired him to go for it.