GR10 Special Alert

Dateline–Banyuls-sur-Mer

The French hiking world, nay, the entire French community was shaken to its core by the events that have taken place in this tiny Mediterranean Seaside village in the last 24 hours. The French Federation of Professional Hikers has been set back to pre WWII levels with the loss of it’s top ten competitors. At the center of this international controversy is a seemingly innocuous pair of American hikers who, may, in fact, be the most diabolical couple to ever inhabit the planet.

Let’s recap the events as they have unfolded. Over 15 French semi-professional hikers completed the GR10 yesterday in outstanding hiking weather of gale force wind and freezing rain–gloriously miserable hiking weather to test these, soon to turn professional hikers. As expected, all of the hikers were finishing the last leg of the GR10 before 2p, the accepted ending time for hiking. Several hours later, however, the American couple strolled into town seemingly without a care in the world. They had just completed the GR10 in a staggering 78 days. You read correctly, 78 days.

All of the competitors were notified of the time and place for the awards ceremony to cap the end of the hiking season. This ceremony is where the American couple showed their true purpose and cunning nature.

After the majority of awards had been presented, including the induction of the new class of “French Professional Hikers 2017” the award for slowest time was presented to Pam “Bunny T” and Curtis “Easily ForGotten” Himstedt, or “the Hiking Himstedt’s” as they call themselves.

What a misnomer “Easily ForGotten” is. He will surely go down in the annals of world history ahead of Napoleon, Stalin, and Hitler as the most ruthless people to ever live. And “Bunny T” which implies speed yet she is involved in this worst speed performance of all time.

The previous record for slowest GR10 Traverse was 65 days (comparable to the Chicago Cubs World Series losing streak) completed way back in 1981 and thought to be safe for all time. The middle aged French couple whose lackluster performance led to their legally changing their names in a sealed court proceeding (where, in exchange for new identities, they donated all their hiking gear to a paraplegic hiking organization and agreed to never don a pack again in their lifetime) followed by forced emigration from France.

The “Hiking Himstedt’s” refused to read the acceptance speech prepared for them by “FoFF”, yet somehow were allowed stage time after the award presentation. Following is the speech Easily ForGotten gave.

“We would like to thank the French Federation of Professional Hikers for the recognition of our efforts crossing the Pyrenees. The GR10 was a much tougher trail than we anticipated it to be. We truly believed that we were prepared for the challenge of this trail after having completed the Pembrokeshire Coastal Path and the Camino Francais.”

So far so good, but this is the point at which they changed their tone. “When the trail got too tough for us, we would take a day off in the closest village and regroup–after all, hiking is supposed to be an enjoyable and fun experience.”

The crowd was stunned by such an outrageous sentiment. Everyone knows that hiking is a serious sport where the competitors can only better themselves through sacrifice and pain. Three people in attendance suffered brain aneurysms and were immediately rushed to the local trauma care unit. EFG acted as if he were oblivious to the catastrophe as it unfolded.

He mockingly went on to say “Next up for us is the Tour du Mont Blanc” at which point the couple calmly and smugly left the awards stage and have disappeared from public view ever since.

The statement they refused to read at the presentation follows: “We are disgraced by our poor performance on the GR10. We are a disgrace to the hiking world and we are left with no alternative other than to agree to quit hiking altogether and return to normal corporate living. Thank you for your patience and we ask your forgiveness. We are well aware of the high regard the French public holds for the sport of hiking and we hold our heads in shame at our pitiful performance.”

The current record holder of 22 days for the HRT (name withheld pending notification of family) literally died from his head exploding when he heard EFG say “hiking is supposed to be an enjoyable and fun experience.” In the aftermath of the Himstedt’s speech, the No 3, 4, and 9 hikers in the French world cut off their own legs as a sign of protest. They signed a joint statement saying “We no longer wish to be members of the sacred sport in which the Himstedt’s can willfully show disregard for the spirit and sanctity of its true nature.”

We have obtained access to the couple’s blog where they continuously complained about the expected hiking times and blatantly stated that they routinely doubled the times as their personal targets. We checked with FoFF to ask exactly how they arrived at the said times. The FoFF representative stated, “We monitor highly trained racing snails that we release on each section of trail. Each snail has a radio chip attached to it so that it’s path and time are constantly monitored. The reasoning behind using the snails is that if you can’t hike faster than a plate of escargot, you have no business on the trail.”

The newly elected President of France is now faced with the toughest crisis any elected leader has been forced to face–track down and stop this American “hiking” couple before their insidious ideology infects the whole of the French nation. They must be stopped at all costs. To this end, all intelligence communities in Europe have been retasked to track down EFG and Bunny T before their influence spreads even wider. The head of Interpol was quoted as saying “We are now engaged in the largest man hunt of all time–bigger than the hunt for Bin Laden. We expect this to be resolved much more quickly than the Bin Laden search as he had admirers and capitol resources throughout the world. This American couple has limited resources and no friends.”

How were they able to complete such a travesty of a traverse in any case? This crossing surpassed the previous slowest record by a stunning 13 days; they had to have assistance to achieve such a slow time. Sifting through the couple’s blog, we seem to have uncovered a “Paris connection” which indicates help from within the French community. We contacted a Patrick and Anne who knew the Himstedt’s on the trail. Patrick’s statement “We thought something was terribly wrong with their speed and tried to avoid them, but they routinely hiked past 2p on an almost daily basis and would catch up to us. We even left the trail for two days to try to bypass them, yet they caught us once again.” This reporter then asked if it were true that Patrick and his wife would soak their feet in mountain streams (a clear violation of French hiking standards) at which point he responded “This interview is over. Please direct any further inquiries through my legal counsel.”

Other members of the Paris cell include a Fred M. And a Stefan H. who we have not been able to reach for comment. The extent of this French connection has not been determined, but even Popeye Doyle is a suspect at this point.

Upon further investigation, a mysterious international connection has been uncovered as well. There seems to be an inordinate number of Pete’s and Peter’s involved. Whether this is a code name or a person has yet to be determined, but there is a Peter and Alaina in Australia; Peter and Marcia in Maine, USA; a Peter from the Netherlands involved with a doping scandal; and a Pete in Canada who is currently being sought as the possible mastermind of the entire operation.

When the French president contacted the American President Trump for assistance in this search, Trump responded “Build a wall to keep them out of the country.” When it was explained they are already in the country, Mr Trump responded “If they are already there, build a series of walls around the country eventually trapping them inside. I mean yuge walls in tighter and tighter circles until you have them.” When the White House was contacted for confirmation, a representative stated that Mr Trump meant use shock collars and not build walls.

A former employer of EFG was contacted. Brad B. confirmed that “Curtis Himstedt is a menace. He personally set my career back a decade and I have only known him 3 years. That’s a great indication of the range of destruction he is capable of. Hiring him was the worst professional mistake I ever made. If he shows up at my place, I’ll take care of the problem for you. I’m a member of the board of the NRA and your pansy ass gun laws have created this problem. We’ll clean up the mess for you Europeans, once again.” When it was pointed out that the Himstedt’s are Americans, Mr B snapped “Do you want my help or not?”

As of press time, contracts have been released for the construction of walls all over France.