2014 AT Thru-Hike

MStudt

Adventurer
The time has come, well kind of. Come this time next year we'll be a month out from our big journey hiking the AT from Georgia to Maine. My wife and I have been talking about do this for the past couple years now. We originally planned on doing this in about 10 more years when she would be eligible for early retirement from the school she teaches at. Over the last couple years, being in public education has gotten a lot more stressful in her district (I'm sure it's everywhere). About a month ago we said screw it, it's now or never. At that point I got to work on our blog, sponsors, and food drops. Sure we're more than a year away, but planning for what we intend to do goes beyond just hiking.

My wife is a high school English teacher with a strong passion for teaching her students about the outdoors. She started an outdoor education club several years ago when she started at her school. Year by year her club has grown in, and in the number of ways they get involved locally. The past two years her club has been working with the Missouri Conservation Department and helping on various projects with them. They have helped build a trail, they build a wigwam for a festival, and helped plant a new field of trees. We're going to document our journey so she can use what we're learned for an educational tool that she can provide students to come. She'll be working with another teacher at her school to develop an interactive while we're hiking. The website is going to be developed by the students for the students. She calls it a modern day Oregon Trail game.

My wife had spinal surgery when she was in 5th grade for scoliosis. This has kept her from doing a lot in her life, and really limits what she can do. Because of this condition, we're reached out to three scoliosis organizations and are hiking on their behalf to spread awareness. We'll be working with the National Scoliosis Foundation, Scoliosis Research Society, and Curvy Girls Support Groups. We're currently debating about doing a pledge hike for these foundations, or taking donations during our trip. Of course if we did this, all proceeds would go to these three wonderful organizations.

The trip starts after Christmas of 2014. My wife, our 5 year Dachshund and I will most likely finish in 5-7 months. We know that is a pretty wide window, and we aim to be done sometime in July. We have no really time frame to finish this trip since we'll have nothing to come home to. We're going to walk away from our jobs, hopefully sell our house before hand, and pretty much have nothing to come back to. That being said, we'll have nothing binding us down in St. Louis, then the next adventure begins.

Anyways, for anyone on here that would like to follow us; our blog is posted in my signature. If people would like, I could continue to update this thread as things change, and as our year progresses.

Thanks,
Mike
Boots and Backpacks
 
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MStudt

Adventurer
Have a great trip and I will be following along. It's one of the things on my bucket list!

Good luck!

I'm looking forward to see about how many followers we can get. Hopefully we'll be able to inspire a few people along the way as well.
Thanks
 

Flagster

Expedition Leader
Cheers to a great trip...My brother did the AT in 2012 and had the time of his life...we are now planning a PCT thru hike...
Watch out for the ticks...he got lyme or rmsf...something awful and it put him down for a month...
I heard the trail magic early in the season is way cool...
 

MStudt

Adventurer
Cheers to a great trip...My brother did the AT in 2012 and had the time of his life...we are now planning a PCT thru hike...
Watch out for the ticks...he got lyme or rmsf...something awful and it put him down for a month...
I heard the trail magic early in the season is way cool...

I've read about people getting lyme in late spring to early summer along the trail. We'll need to figure something out for that prior to the trip for sure. I've also read about the early season trail magic. Seems like a lot of locals are at trail heads with hot food and drinks for the thru-hikers.
 

Quest4ADV

Adventurer
I use to live just outside Asheville NC and have hiked parts of the AT from Springer up to Max Patch. One spring I got into the Trail Magic and setup stuff at Max Patch and up at NewFound Gap. Gave out drinks, snacks, and rides in the Gatlinburg. I had a blast and will try to do it again soon.

Are you going to have a journal on TrailJournals.com?
 

MStudt

Adventurer
I use to live just outside Asheville NC and have hiked parts of the AT from Springer up to Max Patch. One spring I got into the Trail Magic and setup stuff at Max Patch and up at NewFound Gap. Gave out drinks, snacks, and rides in the Gatlinburg. I had a blast and will try to do it again soon.

Are you going to have a journal on TrailJournals.com?

Don't even mention the name Gatlinburg to us, and the sad thing is we got married there! lol

We plan on hiking as fast as we can to get through the Smoky's. We've hiked this section before, and absolutely hate all the stupid people on the trail, and the gawkers at Clingman's. We had a horrible experience at Icewater Shelter the last time we were in the part. There was a group of backpackers there, four in our group, another group of three, and two thru-hikers. That's 18 people in one shelter, that only sleeps 10. The group of 8 proceeded to tell us they had a permit, funny thing is that permits are limited to a max of 6 people. Late they told us they didn't have a permit, and did need a permit to stay in any of the shelters. By time we got there, the shelter was completely full. We ended up hiking another 7.7 miles to reach Pecks Corner around 11pm that night. I'm expecting to have some weather issues on this part of the trail, but at least we know this section is going to be well traveled. The best thing about Gatlinburg is the Smoky Mountain Brewery. We're hoping to be out of the park in six days at the most. The hike from Fontana to Clingman's is a SOB, but from there to Davenport isn't to bad. Hopefully we can make it to Standing Bear on day six to meet my parents and pick up our dog. They're going to meet us at Fontana to pick her up since we can't take her through the park. We might stay a night at Standing Bear, or just bust azz for 2 more days until Hot Springs. We love Hot Springs, and might make that our first zero day so we can relax in the soothing hot tubs!

Not really sure about the trail journal. We've got a lot going on with a blog, plus what my wife needs to for her school's site. I thought about getting something on Whiteblaze, but nothing as of yet. I'll have to look into the trail journal site, as that might be a good resource for us.
 
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WininUtah

Adventurer
I hope you keep the blog going and complete you adventure. I'm never doing the hike but did really enjoy Bill Bryson's book "A Walk in the Woods", as funny as a book can be.
 

precision powder

Backwoods Explorer
I live in central Maine and I pass by the trail in Caratunk every weekend so if you need something when you are going through there give me a shout I can drop stuff off for you at the trail head or bring you into town to resupply. The Maine portion is definitely the best part of the whole trip I think. Just a warning though, if you can push it back another month. We still have snow well into may here in the mountains. It is not unusual for me to see several inches of snow in the woods at my cabin which is about 45 north west of there.
 

MStudt

Adventurer
Are you still doing the AT this year?

Yes we are. We're currently getting everything together and getting our final plans figured out. Hoping to be on the trail between 12/28-12/31, but not sure on the exact date.

I hope you keep the blog going and complete you adventure. I'm never doing the hike but did really enjoy Bill Bryson's book "A Walk in the Woods", as funny as a book can be.

The blog will be updated as much as possible along the way. We might be limited to updating in towns only since cell signal on the trail might not be there.

I live in central Maine and I pass by the trail in Caratunk every weekend so if you need something when you are going through there give me a shout I can drop stuff off for you at the trail head or bring you into town to resupply. The Maine portion is definitely the best part of the whole trip I think. Just a warning though, if you can push it back another month. We still have snow well into may here in the mountains. It is not unusual for me to see several inches of snow in the woods at my cabin which is about 45 north west of there.

If we hike based on what orders are doing, that is finishing in about 145-170 days. That should put us finishing around the beginning of June. We're ultimately shooting to finish around mid to end June.

I'll try to keep this updated as much as possible. You can also follow us on the blog and there's a link to our Facebook page as well.

Thanks!
Mike
 

libarata

Expedition Leader
I live in Shenandoah County(New Market), VA. If you need anything while passing near by, just let me know!
 

MStudt

Adventurer
I live in Shenandoah County(New Market), VA. If you need anything while passing near by, just let me know!

There are a couple people on here as well as another forum I'm on that have offered to help. I can foresee us needing some assistance in a couple places for sure. It's also nice to catch up with fellow members though.
 

MStudt

Adventurer
It's unfortunate that I never stayed on top of this. As of July 9th we finished our 2189.2 mile hike from Georgia to Maine, were back in St. Louis on 9/12, and I was back to work on 9/13. Here's a link to our Instagram account if anybody wants to check out some pictures.
 
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