Inspired by the lowest points of his life, Garry Harrington is on a mission to climb some of the world’s tallest peaks.
At 40, Harrington was dealing with his second divorce and the end of his tenure working as a sports editor for the Keene Sentinel. Harrington may have been an emotional wreck at the time, but one trip up Mount Monadnock changed all that.
“It was the resurrection of my passion for hiking,” said Harrington. “I began hiking new mountains and checking them off the list. There’s always a new mountain to climb.”
Harrington is coming to The Toadstool Bookshop in Peterborough on Saturday at 2 p.m. to discuss his book, “Chasing Summits: In Pursuit of High Places and an Unconventional Life.” The book chronicles some of Harrington’s various climbs and adventures across the United States over the past 16 years.
Harrington speculates that he has completed thousands of climbs in his lifetime, including all 66 of the 14,000-footers in the lower 48 states, which includes the high points in each of those states. Locally, Harrington says he holds the record for most climbs up Mount Monadnock in 24 hours with 16.
After that first climb up Monadnock, Harrington’s passion was ignited, leading him to the next climb, each one harder and/or taller than the last. After climbing many of New Hampshire’s most challenging mountains, he graduated to the mountains of New England, then across the United States.
“The changes in my life afforded me the freedom to take these trips,” said Harrington, who lives out of a van, currently parked in his mother’s yard in Swanzey. “While working, a lot of my previous hobbies had been placed on the back burner.”
Hiking was a large part of Harrington’s youth, which was highlighted by his experiences at Saint Michael’s College in Colchester, Vermont, where he could see Mount Mansfield outside his dorm window.
Turning his experiences into a book became a longer experience than Harrington had originally anticipated, taking six years from compiling information to publishing.
Harrington is constantly journaling his hiking experiences, a process that made writing a book much easier.
“It was certainly a cathartic experience,” said Harrington, who worked as a journalist and editor with the Brattleboro Reformer from 1982 to 1996 and the Keene Sentinel from 1988 to 2004. “When I’m journaling my experiences, it feels like I’m interviewing myself.”
The hardest part of writing the book, according to Harrington, was not the grueling trips up the mountains or even examining previous journal entries, but rather the process of finding and working with a publisher.
Harrington said the last three years of the six-year process was all about finding a publisher to work with him. He ultimately found with Appalachian Mountain Club Books, a company that publishes books, guidebooks, and other memoirs of outdoorsmen.
As Harrington has no shortage of adventures planned – he already has schduled trips to climb to the highest pointa in Alaska and Hawaii – his first book will most likely not be his last.
Now working as a seasonal driver for UPS and a film promoter, Harrington has the freedom to climb when he wants, as he isn’t confined to the typical nine to five work week. Recently, Harrington drove to Virginia to take part in a 100 mile race, his largest challenge to date.
While conquering the largest peaks in the United States is one of his primary goals, Harrington said he is also expanding internationally, with a planned backpacking trip to Europe on the horizon.
“There is a feeling of freedom that you experience when out on the trails,” said Harrington. “It can allow you to escape the traditional nine to five work day world.”