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The idea to build a hiking trail through the northern Appalachian Mountains was proposed at a news conference on April 22, 1994, in Portland, Maine, by former Maine Governor Joseph E. Brennan, with technical support provided by Maine conservationists Dick Anderson and Don Hudson. It was designed as a project that would give Mainers an opportunity to work with and get to know their Canadian neighbors. The plan was to work with folks in New Brunswick and Quebec to develop a hiking trail that followed the Appalachian Mountains, from Maine’s Katahdin to Mont Carleton in New Brunswick and then on to Mount Jacques Cartier in Quebec’s Gaspé Peninsular.
On June 25, 1994, a delegation from Maine met with a group of hiking advocates from Quebec and New Brunswick in New Brunswick’s Mount Carleton Park and decided to move forward with the development of an international trail. Later, after much discussion, it was decided that the name of the trail would be the International Appalachian Trail (IAT). Several more international meetings were held during 1995 and 1996 to further develop the trail plan. During meetings and at social events, held in conjunction with each meeting, the international partners discussed the idea of extending the principle of “ Thinking Beyond Borders” to other eastern Canadian Provinces whose landscape included part of the ancient Appalachian Mountains, formed 300 million years ago. The first extension, approved in 1995, was for about 150
miles from Mont Jacques Cartier to Cap Gaspé, at the eastern tip of the Gaspé Peninsula. Discussion of the idea of further expansion continued, and in 2002 the IAT was extended to the Province of Newfoundland and Labrador’s Appalachian terrains. Trail sections through the provinces of Nova Scotia and Prince Edward Island were added in subsequent years.
In October of 1997, John Brinda became the first person to hike the whole of the IAT (Katahdin to Cap Gaspé at that time) and the first person to hike the entire east coast of the North American continent, in his trek from Key West, Florida to Cap Gaspé, Quebec. Brinda’s feat was repeated in 1998 by legendary long-distance hiker, Eberhart “Nimblewill Nomad”.
With roughly 1800 miles of trail located from Maine’s Katahdin to Newfoundland and Labrador’s Crow Head, social hour talk turned to the ancient Appalachian Mountains located on the other side of the Atlantic.
In June 2009, representatives of the IAT were invited by Hugh Barron of the British Geological Survey in Scotland to come to the British Isles to explore interest in extending the IAT to the Appalachian terrains of Scotland, Ireland, Northern Ireland and Wales. The visiting delegation was made up of six members of Maine’s IAT chapter board of directors and four members from the Newfoundland and Labrador chapter. This group met with public officials and hikers and made several public presentations throughout the British Isles that generated a great deal of interest.
In April 2010, after visits by IAT Maine's Will Richard, Greenland became the first IAT chapter outside of North America. This was followed in June by Scotland, when the West Highland Way was welcomed to the IAT at the Grand Opening of the Appalachian Trail Museum in Pine Grove State Park, Pennsylvania.
In October 2010, at an IAT Europe meeting in Aviemore, Scotland during the Adenture Travel Trade Association World Summit, IAT Council Chairperson Paul Wylezol welcomed seven new European chapters to the IAT, including Norway, Sweden, Denmark, the Netherlands, England, Ireland, and Wales.
In March 2011, after a visit to Maine by Spanish geologist Ruth Hernandez, the Maine chapter sent a three-person delegation (Don Hudson, Bob Marvinney & Thomas Urquhart) to Spain, Portugal, and Morocco to explore the interest in forming IAT chapters in those countries. That visit resulted in a chapter being formed in Spain and a good deal of interest being generated in the other countries.
In September 2011, in the wake of visits by IAT~Vice-Chair~Eric Chouinard, France joined the IATafter representatives of the 200,000 plus member French Rambling Association attended the IAT AGM in Gaspésie National Park, Quebec. During the AGM, Magne Haugseng was elected the first IAT Europe Vice-Chair, while Hugh Baron was elected first IAT Europe Geologist. That was followed in October by the IAT becoming the first member from the Western Hemisphere to join the European Ramblers' Association.
At the end of 2011 there were IAT chapters in the following jurisdictions: Maine, United States; New Brunswick, Canada; Quebec, Canada; Newfoundland and Labrador, Canada; Nova Scotia, Canada; PrinceEdward Island, Canada; Greenland; Scotland; Ireland; Wales, England; Netherlands; Denmark (Faroe Islands); Sweden; Norway; Iceland; Spain; France.
As this is being written, the IAT continues to expand into new areas of Appalachian Terrains, always based on the original premise that the trail will eventually connect all of those mountains that were created when the ancient continent Pangaea was formed 300 million years ago.
OVERVIEW |
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The Appalachian Mountains of North America lie between Flagg Mountain, Alabama, USA and the north end of Belle Isle in the Province of Newfoundland and Labrador, Canada. The Appalachian terrain continues as the Caledonides of Ireland and Scotland and terrains of western Europe and North Africa.
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The famous and long established Appalachian Trail (AT) in the United States extends from Georgia to Mount Katahdin in Maine. The IAT/SIA adds an additional 1,350 miles of hiking trails through breath taking views along the remainder of the North American Appalachian Mountains.
In Maine, the IAT/SIA connects with the terminus of the AT at Mount Katahdin in Baxter State Park, then heads northeast in the direction of Mount Chase and continues on north to Mars Hill Mountain in Maine’s Aroostook County. It follows the United States and Canadian international borders northward to Fort Fairfield and crosses into Perth-Andover, New Brunswick. The trail then heads up the Tobique River through the village of Plaster Rock to Mount Carleton and Mount Carleton Park and then on to St. Quentin, Kedgewick and Upsalquitch Valley, crossing the Restigouch River into Québec at Flatlands, New Brunswick. The trail enters Québec at Matapedia
and proceeds north-eastward to Amqui then through the Reserve faunique de Matane to Mount Logan in the western portion of the Parc de la Gaspésie. The trail then turns eastward to Mont Albert, Mont Jacques Cartier and the legendary cliffs of Cap Gaspé in Forillon National Park.
After crossing the Gulf of St. Lawrence by ferry, one begins the Newfoundland Labrador section of the IAT/SIA at Port Aux Basques. The trail proceeds northward to Corner Brook, Cape Bauld. The IAT/SIA connects two countries, three provinces, one state, the English, French and Celtic cultures of North America, and some of the most spectacular landscape one could possibly imagine. Bus and train transportation is available from the city of Gaspé to all points in Nova Scotia including the North Sidney Ferry terminal.
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MISSION STATEMENT |
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The International Appalachian Trail/Sentier International des Appalaches is a symbol of US-Canadian commitment to work together as neighbors, to sustain our common environment and to celebrate the grandeur of our common landscape. It connects mountains, crosses rivers, threads through spruce and fir forests and connects the people and cultures of the state of Maine with the provinces of Québec, New Brunswick, and Newfoundland/Labrador and Nova Scotia. Volunteer driven, the IAT/SIA is making considerable progress working with landowners, hikers, outdoor conservation organizations and with local, regional and international governments to maintain, upgrade, and improve the trail system.
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APPALACHIANS |
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Recent geological research reveals that for many millions of years continents and ocean basins have been moving over the surface of the earth on rigid plates of rock. About 260 million years ago, drifting continental land masses on Earth’s surface collided and merged to form a single, unified continent called Pangea.
The Appalachian Mountains formed as a result of this collision and uplift along the margin of the closing ancient continents. 200 million years ago, forces deep in the earth caused Pangea to break up and disperse into the continents we see today, separated by the newly formed Atlantic Ocean. The ancestral Appalachian Mountains are shown in blue on the map below which shows the North Atlantic region as it would have appeared at that time.
Each of the newly formed continents carried a piece of the original Appalachian Mountains with it. This origin and dispersal of the ancestral Appalachian Mountains confirms the truly international nature of an “Appalachian Trail” |
Pieces of the original Appalachian Mountains exist with their own trail or mountain names in many countries around the North Atlantic. The long-term goal is to locate sections of the IAT/SIA in all the terrains that were once the Appalachian Mountains of Pangea. A partial list reads as follows: United States • Canada • Denmark • Greenland • Norway (Svalbard Islands) • Western Norway • Ireland • Scotland • England • France • Spain • Portugal • Algeria • Other West African Countries
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