With 2016 drawing rapidly to a close and winter coming on, I have removed the barrel that was watering the now-leafless cottonwood tree and am prepping for the re-christening that will happen on January 1: ‘Malibu East’ will become ‘Walden West’ in celebration of the 200th birth year of Henry David Thoreau. The 19th century American literary theme will remain through the end of 2019, as we celebrate the 200th birth year of Walt Whitman. The surfboard trail register will disappear at 9pm (midnight, Walden Time) on December 31, 2016, to be replaced the next morning by two life-sized replicas of Henry and Walt, along with a twist on the traditional PCT trail register. — Now, instead of simply writing your (trail) name and the date, passers-by will be given the opportunity to share the title and a few words about a book that, in Henry’s paraphrased words, has “dated a new era in your life.” The choicer offerings will be shared on this blog.

I will be gathering with a few friends over New Year’s Eve/Day to celebrate this transition in the life of PCT Mile 145.37. The Little Free Library will continue to offer a selection of paperbacks and reference books, but will now also sport self-printed copies of Thoreau’s Walden, “Song of Myself” (from Whitman’s Leaves of Grass) and Emerson’s Essays. A new Flora and Fauna of Table Mountain is also in preparation by me. I hope to have that completed by January 1, so that it can also be printed up and available for take away. — There is much to do.