What You Need to Hike the Appalachian Trail
Most people complicated things by over planning, over packing, over spending, and make it harder then it should be. But the truth is you only need 4 things to hike the AT (Appalachian Trail): the physically mentally and emotional grit and desire to complete the trail, about 5 to 7 months off your real life, a backpack full of mostly the right gear, and about $6,000 to $10,000 dollars to spend on trail. Keep it simply is the easiest way to have a great hiking experience and for most people, a life changing trip as you will never be the same again.
Physically, Mentally, and Emotional Health
With so many books and movies coming out in recent years, the AT has become popular not only with hikers but with the general public. A Walk in the Woods by Bill Bryson or AWOL on the Appalachian Trail by David “AWOL” Miller are wonderful books which I read and I watch a lot of Youtubers before I went on the trail. But none of these are going to help you understand the highs and lows that you will go through on the trail.
None of the Blogs or Youtube video’s will get your backpack right or complete prepare you for your trip. Watch everything, read everything but only take from those things, the things that work for you. Most Bloggers and Youtube content makers will be making money off you and are more willing to show you the dream and not the reality of the trail. Even the ones that do show a bit more of the reality are also without meaning to just showing to the better parts of the day. I found on the trail that a lot of people, did not really understand what they were getting in to and had very unrealistic expectations.
Physically
Physically, you need to be mostly healthy. If you have something, then just make sure you have your meds available and check with your doctor. One of the sadness things that I saw was a young man, i.e. mid 20s, who wanted to do the trail so badly but he had a weak heart. He realized 2 days in that he needed to go home because he could feel that he was having issues with his heart. On the trail, you might not be able to be rescued for at least a day on most of it but several days if you are in the 100 mile wilderness as it has no phone service.
You can be a bit overweight but not heavily overweight. The reason being that you have to carry all that extra weight on your body plus a pack on your back. The extra weight is not helpful and you can easily turn your ankle or really hurt yourself trying to cross a rocky stream. If you have extra weight, look at taking some of it off before you head out. Look at taking up walking or day hiking around your area until you are a few pounds lighter.
By heavily overweight, if you can’t see your feet, you most likely don’t want to be on trail because watching where you are stepping can be very important to your safety plus getting down on the ground to put your tent up can be very difficult even when you are not heavy after a full days hike. I have a bad back and it actually getting camp up at night and taking it down in the morning that are the worst parts of my day.
If you are missing an limb, you going to have a hard time but most likely, you can make it. You learned to live in the world. It will be harder but if you really want it then it is not a big deal. You can overcome it. On the other hand, if you are in a wheel chair, this is not the trail for you but try the GAP (Great Allegheny Passage) Pittsburgh to Cumberland, MD and goes into C&O Canal Towpath which goes all the way to Washington DC which both total 333 miles. It is an old rail road trail and is mostly paved. I did most of it from Pittsburgh to Cumberland, MD. I hiked all but 15 miles twice because I would have to go back to my vehicle every day but it is a bike trail. Highly recommend it to bike lovers and hikers but they only have a few places to camp that are far and few in-between as it is set up for bikers and not hikers. They even have tour groups that will drop you off in the mornings and pick you up in the evening and take you back to a hotel or Bed n Breakfast.
The main thing is you have to be able to put one foot in front of the other physically to do this trail. It is just walking, i.e. hiking, from the time you wake up until you make it to your next came several hours away. If you are in shape then the beginning of the hike is better. If you are not then you will be doing a crash course in getting into shape. By the end for the trail, you will be in shape.
The key is to learn to listen to your body. You might want to make it to a certain shelter or town but if your body is telling you no. You might want to just hit the next place to sleep and rest for the night. Pushing yourself a little is good. Pushing past your limits are just going to get you injured. If your lucky it will just be shin splints or an ankle sprain that will slow you down for a short time but not take you off trail. I saw to many people at Hiawassee only about 50 miles in that where trying to decide to wait it out or go home. Most people will only get the chance to try this once in a lifetime.
Age is not a factor for this trail. But you have to be overall healthy physically. The younger you are the better chance to have to complete this trail and at a faster rate. But as long as you can walk, you never too old or too young to be on it.
One fast note for those that are trying to get trained for the trail. Running, biking, and lightweight training can get you in shape but you are using a different set of muscles when you are doing those activity vs hiking. The best way to get up to speed is to hike or walk with your backpack on with at least your gear. Best if it is on a trail which is uneven and goes up and downhills. But even just around the block. If you can get up to 5 miles in a day that would be great but the fact is very few of us have that much time in really life vs trail life.
Mentally and Emotional
Mentally and emotional healthiness is a hard thing to think about before the trail as we generally are to busy and have lots of distractions. The younger you are on the trail, you tend to grow up and see the world differently. The older you are the harder this is. You get to spend a lot of time with yourself. The beginning of the trail, you have a lot of people hiking around you and are almost never not seeing someone every 15 mins or less. If you get a half hour alone your lucky. You mostly camp with a lot of people at the camp approved areas and shelters. You have a lot of thing to distract you when you get to camp and are setting up and socializing. Plus you are so tired that you fall into a deep sleep at night unless all the aches and pain from pushing your body are keep you up.
But as you move down the trail, you have less and less people except on the weekends and/or holidays. Then you have to get to know yourself better then you ever had to before. You get to self examine every life choose and conversation that you can remember and even those that you have forgotten that you remember. For women, this is generally easier because we do this all the time any way. But it can be very emotionally demanding on you. The distractions that we use to avoid this are not available. It can be overwhelming at times.
This is truly the hardest part of the trail not the physical part but the mental part. If you don’t like yourself, this self reflection can be a real life changing experience. The tail pushes you to come to terms with who and what you are and who and what you want to be in the future. To come to terms with your past, forgiving yourself for past mistakes, and plan how to do better in the future. For younger people, they don’t have as many things to come to terms with in most cases and it is a growing experience and time to think about the future and what direction that will take. But the older you are, the more you have to come to terms with the choose you made in life. It is loneness in a way but it is meeting your new best friend, yourself!
There is a saying on the trail that you carry your fears on your back. For me, it is lack of food. I over carry food due to having food insecurities as a child. I am hoping that I will get over this as time goes by this next year. Growth is hard at any time but especially on the trail. But this is what makes this trip life changing for most people. You learn lessons on self reliance, how far you can push yourself, and most importantly, you get the time to reflect on your future and which way you want to go in the future. A good outcome is becoming a healthier and happier individual and getting clarity about who you are and what you want to become and/or due in the future.
At some point on the trail, everything is going to go wrong. A down pour that get everything in your pack wet and it is still raining so you can’t get dry. You just have to sit there in your tent and make due because the closest town is two days away. Or you leave your trekking poles back 10 miles and you have to either back track or buy new ones at the next stop. If you have a trekking pole tent, generally you hike back or better have to find a stick to use. You run out of food because you had to stay in your tent for an extra 2 days because the weather was just two bad to move on as your in a storm or it is just too hot to travel. You are going to be kicking yourself because you missed a water source and have to turn back to get water or move ahead more then you wanted to without water. It might not even be your fault but the fact that the water source was dry.
These things built character. They are not fun at the time but these are the stories that you will tell in the future. These are the stories that become part of your trail story. But these stories are also the reason so many people leave the trail. Just remember to wait at least 24 hours before quitting or take a few days off the trail to relax and have a vacation from your vacation. Hiking the trail is a life style and a few days off can make all the difference in the world.
If you find that you are struggling on the trail past a bit of inconvertibleness with your mental health. Talk to someone. Go home if you need too. Time will heal you. But being out on the trail without the ability to get help is not the place to be.
Time
Getting the time to hike the trail is very hard. Most of us have to work and taking 5 to 7 months off is just not an option. The trail is littered with people of all ages but overly so with people that are under 25 and over 55 year old. They come from all walks of life but I find that a lot are ex military. Most states, if not all, are represented each season. But also a lot of foreigners especially Europeans. It also tends to be filled with men and a lot less women.
The reasons behind this are that most people under 25, don’t have the responsibility of children, households, and might be able to save up while living with their parents or move back in with their parents when they complete the trail. If you child wants to do this, I would highly recommend it. But make sure they do a week long hike before committing it. They would only miss one semester of school, i.e. Spring to start North in April or Fall to start North or South or do a flip flop. Or they can start the day after they leave for Summer Break and could possible make it before the fall semester or might be off trail for other reason before the start of Fall. It is a life experience that could be wonderful for them. But they have to want it.
Older persons tend to have retirement or other avenues to allow them to do it. The military person tend to be younger as they are retired after 20 years in service. Or they had a break in employment or a divorce and just choose to take the time off before diving into the job market again or life. The stories are all the same and all different at the same time.
Less women are on the trail at that comes down to a few things but children and fear are the biggest. It is harder for women to leave the household for several months without effecting the household in a negative way. Plus the guilt that is placed on them. It is hard to stay on trail with all the phone calls that come in. Mine are all out of the house and this was still true.
But fear is the over riding reason for so many women. The fact that women have been told horrific stories about not being alone or this or that horrific event could happen. The truth is this can happen and does happen every day to women but statically bad things such as rape, beatings, and murder happen with people we know usually a loved one. On trail is actually safer in so many ways then walking down the street after dark. If you see someone taking to much interest in you then get off trail for a few days or skip ahead 50 to 100 miles and come back to this section. But most places at the beginning have a lot of people and most are willing to help.
Also, don’t stay in places with only one or two other people. Hook up with a trail family which will keep you safe. If you don’t have a trail family and you are not in a bubble of people then try not to stay in places that are less then 2 miles from a major road. Most of the people that will commit these kind of crimes are not willing to hike into an area to do it. Or for that fact, hike out and have the police waiting for them.
The trail is actually very safe compared to cities. Do bad things happen on the trail? Yes. But assaults and sexual assaults are very infrequent. Most trail crimes are at trailheads like someone put their backpack down at a trailhead while they were resting and a pickup truck stopped and a guy jumped out and stole it about 2 hours before I hit the area. Vehicles parked at trailheads are the biggest victims as they are broken into and things stole from them. Most of the crimes are littering, unleashed dogs, and vandalism of shelters. Mostly because hikers keep their eyes on the trail and hiking is a positive social activity and reduces aggression, i.e. you why to tired to start a fight after hiking miles and miles a day.
If you are going to take this much time away from your family, friends, and work; be sure to thank them for the chance that they are giving you to find yourself. But also, think hard about leaving the trail for major life events, i.e. weddings or graduations of children or funerals, and have the money to do so. The only issue beside money is leaving the trail for events, is that you lose your trail family as they most likely pulled ahead and it is hard to get out of that nice soft bed and back to the hard ground. Not every wedding is the same, i.e. best friend vs family member vs just a friend of the family. Make sure that it is a very special event that you should not miss.
Backpack w Gear
Don’t over pack! Just take the basic items that you need and pick up toys as you go if you are new to backpacking. The truth is that you only have to have a few items and everything else is gravy. Plus the first place you can get a new toy or change out your gear is only about 30 miles into the AT plus the 8 mile approach trail. Neel Gap but it will cost you a premium. The first outfitter is in Hiawassee which you already need to get food in if you are not going to Helen.
The bare minimum that you need to start is a backpack, shelter, sleep system, trekking poles (they work well), food hanging system or bear bag or bear canister, 2 to 3 water bottles (I use smartwater bottles), a stove, stove fuel, water filler system, pot, spook, 2 outfits, a puffing jack, beanie, 2 to 3 hiking sock, a hat for sun protection, most people take rain gear but I can’t stand to wear it personal, good hiking shoes that are broken in, a small first aid kit (Band-Aids, Neosporin, Benadryl, Anti-diarrhea medicine, moleskin, etc.), a small kit for camping (matches or a lighter, repair kit, super glue, and other little things), duct tape but not a lot, a bag to keep your things dry in your backpack, and most important vitamin I, i.e. ibuprofen. And try to keep it under 15 pounds. I will be doing a different post for this later. It is to important not to break it down in detail.
Money
It is the least and most important thing that you need to take with you. If you don’t have it, then you will be off the trail very quickly. Most people need about $6,000 to $10,000, but this can go up, on trail with the additional amount for money for bills back, beginning hiking gear, and transportation from home to the trail start and then back home when you leave or complete the trail. Check out my blog on it to get a better idea or I have an excel spreadsheet on Esty which can break it down for the right budget for you. Some people just have it but most people have to find a way to budget it. Each person is different. The younger you are the less you tend to spend because you don’t have it and are willing to be unconvertable. The older you are, the more you want to take an extra day or two in town. The fast your are then the less you are likely to spend.
But make sure that your budget is not so tight that you don’t finish the trail. After the first bit of the trail and a lot of people get off because they did not know what they were getting into. About 50 way through, people start dropping like flies because they did not budget enough or overspent. They run out of money have have to go home.
Summary
The Appalachian Trail and trail life is generally a once in a lifetime event. Make sure that you are in a physical, mental, and emotional place that you can take the pressure of the trail. Do not leave for it if you have someone at home that is critical ill or needs your attention, i.e. small children without a loving spouse to care for them. Your mind will not be on the trail but back home which most likely is where you will end up short after hitting the trail.
If possible, look at taking a 5 to 10 day pre hike around where you live and not in perfect conditions, i.e. at least one day that it will be bad weather. Almost every where has some trail within 2 hours of where you live. Even Los Angels as Big Bear Lake has a great trail but a bit over two hours away depending on traffic. New York has a train that go straight to the AT trail. You are looking at spending 5 to 7 months on the Appalachian Trail and spending at least $6,000 to over $10,000 on trail, $1,000 to $4,000 on gear before the trail, plus transportation to the trail (i.e. the average person will be spending at least $12,000 to have this experience plus a lost of wages for 5 to 7 months).
Take the time and money to get your basic gear and go out at least once. It is worth your time to make sure this is something that you actually want to do, what to spend that much time and money on. Plus it will give you a chance to check your gear out before you hit the trail.
Neel Gap is one of the most significate points on the Appalachian Trail (AT) for most hikers. It is about 31 miles in on the AT plus the 8 miles of the approach trail. It is estimated that over 25% to 40%, depending on the year, of Northbound hikers leave at this point or even before. Take that 5 to 10 day pre hike. But if you do have to leave for any reason before the 200 mile mark, take that money that you planned to spend on the trail and find a cheap but nice Airbnb or motel in the mountain or on a beach or even in a big city in a different place then home plus some of that 5 to 7 months time. If you wanted to hike the Appalachian Trail this badly, then something in you is tell you that you need time off and space to find yourself. It is a turning point in life for most people.
For those that only make it half way, some times that was all you needed. Some times you don’t need to complete the trail to find everything that you where looking for!