What I ate on the Appalachian Trail.

I'm vegan. This should be obvious to anyone reading this (if it's not, then god help your miserable soul). Also obvious, food was an incredibly important part of my thruhike, and being vegan somewhat altered the experience I had, what I took with me, what was available for me in town restaurants and grocery stores, etc.

Food (or hot chocolate, coffee, soda) is and can be some major motivation. But being vegan means that you won't necessarily have those motivations readily available to you. Ask any thruhiker on their way into town, I promise you they're most looking forward to "a burger and a beer". This can put a damper on things, but honestly, you can prepare similar motivations for yourself. How? Mail yourself cookies and coffee and all sorts of fun shit. Trust me, the knowledge of having access to these things will give you superhuman strength and you'll suddenly find yourself hiking 30 mile days whilst fantasizing obsessively about dunking said cookies in said coffee.

Okay, so beyond being vegan, I'm also gluten free (wah wahhh). This also significantly decreases what I can eat, especially in terms of vegan junk food readily available at gas stations and trail towns. To those you reading this with special diets, fret not, your experience will not be diminished at all if you take the time to prepare. Trust me.

Let's talk about calories real quick. To keep the weight down, I wanted a very high calorie to weight ratio. This basically means high in fat, high in sugar, or both. So you know, by default, thruhiking food isn't exactly the healthiest stuff in the world...

Anyhow, let's get to the food.

BREAKFAST

1. Cereal or (gluten free) granola with powdered nondairy milk.

This is definitely my most favorite of breakfast meals. I experimented with different types of nondairy milk, and dehydrated coconut milk was undoubtedly the best. It's extremely dense in fat and therefore dense in calories and tastes damn good. This is the brand I used. You gotta help it dissolve some, but that's all good.

Soy milk was pretty hit or miss, honestly. If you're going to go with the powdered soy milk route, just make sure you actually experiment with different brands before you hit the trail. Some are very... healthy, ya know what I mean? The taste and texture is reminiscent of the smell and feel of being in an all vegan store owned by seventh day adventists with a name that includes at least two of the following words: mother, earth, and/or natural.

Other hikers have had good luck with rice milk, so maybe go with that.

As for cereal, I typically went with the big Nature's Path brand bags. Favorite flavor: Mesa Sunrise. So dope. And granola? Kind granola typically. It's cheap, gluten free, and has a lot of calories, and doesn't have too much sugar. Just make sure the granola you're buying doesn't have honey!



2. Instant oatmeal.

It was rare that I made oatmeal in the morning as oatmeal requires cooking (unless you've achieved thruhiker level 9 status, in which you are okay with eating cold oatmeal), but sometimes, on cold, lazy morning, a hot meal is dope.

Once again I mostly went with the gluten free Nature's Path instant oatmeals.

3. Bars.

So you don't want to have to prepare a real meal (i.e. eat anything that requires a spork)? You don't have time to get a pot messy or the water to waste cleaning it out? Bars are what you want then. I ate mostly Macro bars. The flavors with peanut butter have the most calories, but I ate mostly cashew flavors cause I got them from a discount grocery store before we left. They were stale as fuck by the end of the hike, but I long ago learned not to care. I'm also a big fan of Luna bars since they taste like straight up cake. White chocolate macadamia is probs my favorite flavor. Clif bars are a favorite of most hikers, but 1) I spent the first few years of being vegan living off Clif bars and learned to hate them and 2) they're not gluten free.

4. Chia seed pudding.

Chia seeds, sugar, chocolate, dates, raisins. Whatever you feel like adding really. I got sick of this eventually, but chia seeds are crazy nutrient/calorie dense and because of their omega fatty acids, are anti-inflammatory, and guess what fools, you need to eat things that are anti-inflammatory on the AT. If you don't then god have mercy on your knees. Or if you decide to ibuprofen your way all the way to Katahdin, then god have mercy on your liver.

SNACKS

1. Bars, part deaux.

You know, the ones I just told you about.

2. Chips.

Potato chips. Tortilla chips.

I'm a crazy person and sent myself chips in resupply boxes even though chips are available literally anywhere. So if I got a box, I was probably eating Earth Balance sour cream and onion chips, dope. If I didn't and I could find them, I was eating Kettle chips, probably sea salt and vinegar but maybe maple and bacon (they're vegan I swear!). Also dope. If I couldn't find either then I was probably eating Lays or Fritos (so many calories, jesus christ). I don't like doing these things, but you kind of go into survival mode and just eat what you gotta eat when your drop box doesn't show up in fucking Nowhere, VA and you gotta resupply at the Grocery Xpress where the car tools aisle is the same as the produce aisle.

3. Dried fruit.

Do yourself a favor. Eat some fruit. No, sugar does not equal sugar. Fruit sugar is different than corn syrup and your body will be a lot happier if you just eat some fucking fruit.

4. Nuts and seeds.

Cashews and pumpkin seeds were my most consumed. Cashews cause they just taste good and I'd rather buy cashews than peanuts if cashews are available and cost pretty much the same amount. Pumpkin seed because what did I just say about omega fatty acids? Oh yeah, they're anti-inflammatory. Dope. Also, pumpkin seeds have this weird ability to paralyze parasites so they don't take hold in your gut, and if you already got 'em then pumpkin seeds help get rid of them. Don't believe me? Too bad.

5. Peanut butter.

I honestly didn't start eating peanut butter until way later in the trail, and then at some point it became basically all I ate. That and chips. Peanut Butter & Co has the dopest flavors, like White Chocolate Wonderful, Cinnamon Raisin Swirl, and Dark Chocolate Dreams. Plus it's cheap and can be found at basically any grocery store. And they're all certified vegan so there.

Let me tell you, dipping gluten free cookies in dark chocolate peanut butter is an incredible morale booster after seven straight days of torrential rain.

6. Candy.

Yeah, candy is right. There's this company called Go Max Go and they have a shit load of vegan candy bars that seem incredibly similar to some of the more... mainstream candy bars... My personal favorite is the Thumbs Up (which is supposed to be a butterfinger... get it?). But if you're just sooo stereotypical and you just gotta have the real thruhiker experience (but you're still vegan), you should probably eat about ten Jokerz bars as day, as they're the snickers equivalent.

I also ate quite a few sour jelly beans from the company YumEarth.

There's a variety of gross candy that's "technically" vegan that you can find in most gas stations, but I won't get into that because I don't want to endorse it, and I don't recommend eating trash, regardless of whether it may or may not be vegan. Plus, well, I just don't think a lot of it is vegan... *cough* oreos aren't vegan *cough* everybody stop saying that *cough* *cough* what does the ingredient "chocolate" mean, y'all are lying to yourselves *cough*.

7. Faux jerky.

Primal strips don't have a whole lot of calories but god damn do they taste good. Only one flavor is gluten free, but at least I get to have that. There's also this brand, Butler's, and they have this product called Sam's Harvest Jerky, and god damn! This shit is amazing! Unfortunately it's not such a popular brand and you won't be able to find it most anywhere, so ordering online is recommended.

8. Energy chunks.

You know what I'm talking about right? Those weird squares of dates plus whatever other ingredients they wanted and maybe a superfood or two? You know, they have them at literally every health food store in the world in bulk? Anyhow, these are dope and I'm surprised more people don't use them on the trail... I mean, they're chunks of "energy", isn't that we all need whilst thruhiking?

9. Dates and figs.

With or without coconut shreds. SO GOOD. SO MANY CARBS. SO MUCH HIKING WILL BE HAD.

10. Cookies.

Gluten free cookies? Gotta have 'em. There's a bunch of brands of gluten free vegan cookies, Lucy's, Enjoy Life, Mary's Gone Crackers... once again, figure out what you like most and go for that. Or go for variety, that's what I did and I literally never got sick of cookies. Honestly you can probably just thruhike on cookies and peanut butter. Do the damn thing.

11. Dark Chocolate.

Bars and dark chocolate covered everything. Peanuts, almonds, espresso beans. Honestly, you can find dark chocolate just about anywhere but like always, watch out for the companies that hide "less than 2% milkfat" up in that shit. I probably ate more chocolate than any human being has a right to consume, but chocolate is healthy! It's got antioxidants and shit!

DINNER

1. Premade dehydrated meals.

I, unfortunately, made the mistake of placing a huge order through Outdoor Herbivore, thinking that I would at least enjoy most of their products, if not all of them. This was a huge let down and I would never recommend that anyone eat these meals for any extended length of time. Why? It doesn't matter what you get, they all pretty much taste the same... kind of like clif bars. It doesn't matter what flavor you're eating, you're eating a god damn clif bar and it tastes like a god damn clif bar. Same principle applies to Outdoor Herbivore. If for some reason you decide you just gotta order something from these guys, then let it be the blackened quinoa or the lickety split lentils. Everything else is whack and I hate that they have a monopoly on the vegan backpacking food market. Someone please remedy this!

However much Outdoor Herbivore sucks, Backpacker's Pantry does not. There's a reason this is a popular brand. The best part is that these are pretty much anywhere. Only a few of the flavors are vegan, but the pad thai is amazing and has like a thousand calories.

2. Dehydrated beans and corn tortillas.

Once again, I got sick of beans pretty quick, but it was a good idea for awhile. Pack out an avocado from town, carry a little bit of hot sauce, and god damn you got a badass meal. There's a variety of dehydrated bean flavors, so once again, figure out which ones you like best before committing to eating them for 5+ months.

3. Noodles and sauce.

Gluten free macaroni noodles. Probably of the corn or quinoa variety. These cook decently fast, but make sure you dump that starchy water as it will ruin whatever else you put in your pot with your noods. I used some powdered marinara mixes and cheese mixes, but honestly I wasn't a big fan of either. Maybe just olive oil and nutritional yeast is your best bet here.

Rice noodles cook fast. That makes them worthy of thruhiking in my book. Thin noodles work best (duh). Pair some noodles with a "sauce" and you win. My favorite was powdered miso, which is fairly easy to find, but watch out for fishy (literally) ingredients in that miso! Pad thai and peanut sauce packets are fairly easy to find in most grocery stores as well, but once again, check those ingredients y'all.

4. Thai kitchen.

Cheap, but not very calorie dense. You gotta use like three to get a decent meal out of the deal, but I loooove eating these things on the trail. Only a couple of the flavors are vegan, but who cares, the spring onion is the best and it's all you need. Or get the garlic flavor, mix it with a spring onion, go nuts, it's your hike and you deserve it!

IN TOWN

1. Produce.

Eat produce! Just do it! You have to! You're a human being god damnit! Pack out some bananas and avocados and you'll be so fucking happy you did, I promise. Maybe even eat a salad in town, I don't know, get crazy!

2. Pickles.

Let's face it. You're gross and sweaty. You've lost more sodium through your pores than you've consumed in the last ten years of your life. Get it back. Eat those damn pickles.

3. Soda.

You know the routine, it's liquid calories dude.

4. Nondairy ice cream.

Mostly coconut milk, but sometimes those new cashew flavors. Once upon a time in the "Daleville/Troutville Metropolitan Area" I ate two pints of cashew milk ice cream then watched Mad Max at the Roanoke movie theater. My gut was literally on fire for the duration of the movie, but I have no regrets and I'm still alive, if just barely.

5. Coffee.

Strictly for morale. Also, I don't drink alcohol so I had to spend money on something in town, right?

6. Chinese food.

If you're on the AT, you'll notice that most trail towns have at least one Chinese restaurant. If you're really desperate for some town food, hit it up. They should have tofu and at least one thing on the menu that's vegan. Should being the key word here.

SUPPLEMENTS/OTHER

1. Powdered greens.

I used Healthforce Nutritional's Vitamineral Greens. This was a good idea in terms of staying healthy, but it was hard to adhere to. I just didn't have an incredible amount of extra containers to get all nastied up with greens. Is nastied a word? Doesn't seem like it. Who cares. I'll try to do greens again on the PCT because I'm a fucking hippie and I don't believe in not eating them.

2. Magnesium powder.

Early on in my hike, this was a good idea. Magnesium powder makes a huge difference in whether or not your legs are going to cramp hard as shit in the middle of the night. After a few hundred miles and a couple months of routine exercise, your body adjusts and you find that you no longer cramp, ever, for any reason. You've transcended into some other realm and you're a deity who no longer experiences muscle soreness.

3. Electrolytes.

The AT is hot. I mean like, really fucking hot. You're going to sweat. So much. Gallons. Every day. There's no avoiding it. Unless you want to struggle for the entire summer, I guarantee that you'll want to use electrolytes. I used Ultima and Vega most of the time. They were both messy and annoying, but hey, you do what you gotta do.

4. RAW meal.

This was the hardest of the supplement routine. I figured I could use a high quality protein source since I was getting pretty physical out there on the AT, you know, using my muscles and shit. But it was messy and just didn't work well and blah. I eventually started ditching all of my RAW meal powders into hiker boxes and never once regretted it.

5. Multivitamins.

I took a couple of different brands. Again, find what works for you, it's just a multivitamin. I will definitely continue to use multivitamins on my thruhiking ventures. Read all about why, here.

6. Starbucks VIA coffee.

For anyone who isn't familiar, Starbucks VIA are little coffee sticks that you just add to water and voila, a delicious coffee drink. In "real life" these aren't the greatest, but as soon as you hit the trail and you/re forced to cope with the sudden absence of caffeine in your life, you'll be reaching for the VIA sticks and praising jah that they exist.

7. Tea/hot chocolate.

These are the two reasons that I refuse to go stoveless on the PCT, I just love my hot drinks too much. I made my own hot chocolate mix ahead of time, and it was incredible. I sent myself a variety of teas in every drop box and probably only made half of them, but who cares, the weight was negligible and the tea was delicious.

8. Veggie bouillon.

Get the cubes and put them in literally anything and it's suddenly worth eating. Par boiled rice? Add some veggie bouillon and you win.

9. Condiments.

Mustard, ketchup, hot sauce. Whatever tickles your fancy. If you hate what you're eating, squirt like six mustard packets on it and just try to disguise how gross it is. I'm looking at you Outdoor Herbivore...

THINGS I DIDN'T USE BUT MY FRIENDS DID

1. Ramen.

With and without MSG. The "natural" brand is Koyo, and the in-no-way-natural brand is Top Ramen. You know, the one from walmart? Well only the "oriental" flavor is vegan... but what the fuck kind of flavor is oriental? On the plus side, these cost jack shit. On the not so plus side... these may literally kill you because I would never actually qualify them as "food".

2. Probars.

These have the most calorie content of any vegan bar on the market, to my knowledge. They're decent and there's a million flavors. Unfortunately they're made with oats (contaminated with gluten), and I'm a big enough baby to care about that kind of stuff. They're also hella expensive, so, try to find a sale or something.

3. Gatorade.

I don't deny that gatorade is pretty delicious, especially the flavor glacier freeze. I just adhere to stricter standards about these things, and I already had ultima and vega playing in my electrolyte game. Gatorade does have a lot of calories and doesn't taste like shit, so there's that.

4. Tortillas.

I was very jealous of other's ability to eat gluten whilst on the trail, and nowhere is this more apparent than bean burritos. I don't think I would have gotten sick of beans, or at least not nearly as fast, if I had had the burrito option. Plus you can just get weird and make trail mix, peanut butter, cookie, chocolate burritos and honestly that sounds like a damn good meal on the trail.

5. Couscous.

So cheap, so easy. Cooks literally instantly. Also has a good nutrition profile comparable to quinoa. Honestly if you're going on a thruhike, regardless of diet, you should be eating couscous.

WHAT I TRIED AND DIDN'T LIKE

1. Outdoor Herbivore.

I already explained this one. They're just bad, but don't take my word for it, go ahead and buy a couple. Ha.

2. Coconut oil.

Too messy. Hot and then cold and then hot again so many times that it probably went rancid. A lot of people used coconut oil on the trail, but it just wasn't for me. I may come back to it someday.

3. Little almond butter packets.

So annoying. Don't ever do this. It seems like a good idea at the time, but it's not.

4. Raw meal.

Like I said, this just didn't work out. I'll try to find some other powdered protein mix that I like more.

Post AT 2015 Gear Review.

Here is a link to my original post about the gear I took (or more accurately, planned to take) on my thruhike of the Appalachian Trail. Don't get me wrong, I still used most of that same gear, but I made some changes just before and during the trail. Check it out.

The hexamid in all its glory and some asshole posing.

Zpacks Hexamid Solo.

Pros: This tent weighs like 12 ounces all things included. It takes all of two minutes to set up (once you know what you're doing). It's made from cuben fiber so it doesn't retain moisture like silnylon, so it won't weigh you down if it gets wet (and it will). Easy to repair with cuben fiber tape.

Cons: Cost. This thing costs a buttload, but I bought a slighter older, well loved model from somebody on the Gear Swap at backpackinglight.com. Unfortunately, this means it wasn't seamsealed, so halfway through our hike I had to "re-seamseal" all of the stitching with cuben fiber tape, which actually turned out to be inexpensive and easy. It rains a lot on the AT, and it sucks to get rained on in this thing. Or at least it did for me. Why? I didn't have the "bathtub floor" and I took a lot of splash damage through the mesh bottom.  Trust me, it sucks to have residual splash damage hit you in the face all night. I used my own polycro or emergency blanket groundsheet most of the time, and eventually I figured out how to rig my groundsheet and various stuff sacks to block most of the splash. In addition, there's no way this thing will make it through another thruhike, as of right now I have parts of the mesh duct taped and lots of small damage taped up on the cuben fiber top.

Bottom line: It got the job done and weighed jack shit. Anyone who has thruhiked with Zpacks gear will tell you that it's the way to go. Did I mention that Zpacks has great customer service? I was having trouble with my zipper and they offered to have me send it in to get fixed, free of charge. I didn't take them up on the offer since I was using it literally every day at the time, but the fact is that they are willing to help thruhikers pretty much without fail. Regardless, I was pretty envious of anyone with a Zpacks Solplex, which seems to be made more for AT-like climates with its large bathtub floor and . If I was going to do the AT again, I would use a solplex, but since I'm doing the PCT this year, I'll be using the Hexamid Tarp, which is the same tent but with no mesh.

After 2189.2 miles of rain, dirt, and giardia.

Looks pretty good before it turns the color of rusted robot shit.

Hyperlite Mountain Gear Windrider 3400.

Pros: Waterproofish. Would definitely last another thruhike. Carries weight well. No frills, easy to use. Turns brown after hiking with it for too long. Amazing customer service. Offered to send me a loaner pack whilst they fixed mine up and then send it back to me once done. Turns out I can fix the problem myself so it wasn't necessary, but I'd put HMG service on par with Zpacks.

Cons: Waterproofish. Somehow water gets inside and soaks your quilt, unbeknownst to you. The brown stain will never go away, forever turning your 300 dollar NASA gear into a turd colored piece of shit that normal people sneer at whilst in town. Retains a smell... a bad smell, kind of like ammonia. Allows for absolutely no ventilation, this in turn makes you sweat profusely, this in turn warms your back up considerably, this warm sensation turns from uncomfortable to horrible pain when the heat becomes a thousand tiny stabbing needles. Way, way, way too big. Should have got a 2400, what the hell was I thinking? The only times I used the entire collar was when Cheyanne was dying and I carried most of her gear to halfassedly slack pack her for awhile.

Bottom line: I like this pack. I wish it was smaller. I'm going to keep it around in the hopes that I will one day get into packrafting or ice climbing (ha), but I don't plan on using it on the PCT or even CDT for that matter.

A very rare specimen, the giant slug with the head of a Cheyanne.

Enlightened Equipment Prodigy 30 Degree.

Pros: Synthetic, won't lose warmth when wet. And trust me, you'll get wet, and you'll stay wet, for days, for weeks, for months, you will forget what it's like to be anything but damp and clammy and eventually you'll start to seriously worry about trench foot, but don't worry, it's all apart of the AT experience. Easy to wash. If it's hot (and it will be), you can drape that shit over you like a blanket. Tight. Did I mention that by using synthetics rather than down you're not contributing to one of the most despicable and morally reprehensible industries to ever exist? 

Cons: Quilts can be drafty. That's why I got a wide. I didn't really need a wide, but this was my first thruhike, and I can be a baby if I want to, so ha.

Bottom line: I will be using this same quilt on the PCT... it's only a 30 degree so we'll see how that turns out.

Way, way, way too big/wide, to the point of being an inconvenience.

Thermarest Neoair Xlite Large.

Pros: Huge. So comfortable. Amazing. Luxurious. King in the castle.

Cons: Too big. Seriously, so freaking big. Barely fits in my tent/shelters. Also I've had this asshole for like five years and have entirely compromised its R-value (ability to reflect heat) by blowing moisture inside of it.

Bottom line: Don't buy the lie. Neoairs don't pop for no freaking reason. Trust me. I've had this one literally forever and have seriously manhandled it, and it's never freaking popped. I'll be using a neoair size small on the PCT.

Little rusted droid dude.

Soto Microregular Stove.

Pros: Super easy. Reliable. Light weight. Can simmer (kind of). I've had this thing for a million years and I've never had a problem.

Cons: Doesn't do great in wind, canisters cost a bunch of money and weigh more.

Bottom line: A canister stove is a canister stove is a canister stove. If the PCT bans alcohol stoves, I'll bring a canister stove. It might be the Soto, it might be a Snowpeak, it might be something else, but I don't think it really matters.

Only about an ounce of difference. Don't use the mini!

Sawyer Squeeze and Sawyer Squeeze Mini.

Pros: Easy to use. Decent flow. Immediate satisfaction.

Cons: Probably will break. The flow on the mini is total shit. I filtered all of my water the entire trail and somehow got a bacterial infection in my gut that I still haven't quite figured out, so I guess I kind of hate these filters.

Bottom line: I'll end up using a Sawyer Squeeze on the PCT because aquamira scares me more than most waterborne illness and it weighs jack shit, plus it's just so damn easy to use.

Looking like a total doofus with my O2 rain jacket in The Smokies.

O2 Rain Jacket.

Pros: Costs almost nothing and actually works. Plus it's an obnoxious yellow color so you're sure to never get shot by a hunter.

Cons: Obnoxious yellow color. Can't wash. Disposable. Fragile.

Bottom line: I didn't have any problems with this jacket, and honestly I'd recommend them to just about anyone, but I think it's time for me to upgrade a bit. I won't be using this on the PCT, instead, I'll be opting for the Ultimate Direction Ultra Jacket.

"Quick, look like a model."

Montbell Thermawrap.

Pros: Really light. Synthetic. Doesn't lose warmth when wet. Handy dandy pockets for keeping fickle things like your phone close to your body heat so that the cold doesn't destroy them.

Cons: None, really.

Bottom line: I'll use the no frills UL version of the thermawrap on the PCT.

"What are you doing?"

Patagonia Houdini.

Pros: Nice to have on laundry day. Versatile.

Cons: Stays wet when it gets wet. Honestly couldn't find very many practical applications for this particular piece of clothing.

Bottom line: I won't be using a windshirt on the PCT, instead I'll have a more functional rain jacket that I'll use for both rain and wind.

Not as uncomfortable as you might think.

Injinji Toe Socks.

Pros: No blisters.

Cons: Get "stale" easily. Don't last long before the toes start busting through the fabric, probably 300 or 400 miles each.

Bottom line: I'll probably use these again. I hate blisters and I can always "layer" injinji liners with more durable darn toughs to get the most bang for my buck.

Pack down small. Especially handy for hitchhiking purposes.

Rusted hardware. However, probably a universal screw that can be found at any hardware store.

Locus Gear CP3 Poles.

Pros: Very light. Very compact. Easy flick lock mechanism. Fairly inexpensive.

Cons: Annoying rattle. Didn't bother me much but is super noticeable after using another person's poles. Several obnoxious, albeit easy, repairs had to be made whilst hiking. My hardware kept coming loose on one of the sections and I had to find a super strong adhesive to bring it back to life. Locus Gear assisted me with this, emailing me all the necessary information and handy pictures to guide me in repairing my poles.

Bottom line: I'd use these again, and I will if my Gossamer Gear LT4s break, but until then the LT4s are my go to.

Not looking too bad after 500+ miles.

The most noticeable damage.

Lugs still looking pretty decent at the end of their life.

Altra Lone Peaks.

Pros: Very light. Wide toebox, No blisters. Zero drop. Very comfortable. Somewhat aggressive lugs.

Cons: So slippery. I don't know what the fuck it is about Altras but their soles are insane slippery. It's unfortunate because I'll literally only use Altras. The Lone Peaks had a tendency to "pancake out" after about 400 miles, which is what I'd expect from them realistically.

Bottom line: I will only wear Altras. Lone Peaks or Olympus.

First pair of Olympus. Brand new at the time of this picture.

First pair, end of their life. Most noticeable damage. Sole was coming detached from upper.

Pretty much no tread left after 700 miles. Pennsylvania will do that to you. 

Second pair at the end of their 1100+ mile life. The tread was smooth as a baby's bottom.

Altra Olympus.

Pros: So much cushion. Wide toebox, No blisters. Very comfortable. Got 1100 miles out of a pair of these, that's half the AT fools. And it weren't no easy sections neither. They went through Pennsylvania, The Whites, Maine, and up Katahdin.

Cons: Again, so slippery. But Altra has fixed this problem with more current models. They teamed up with Vibram and now have not just nice soles, but the best soles in the biz. It's too bad they cost 150 bucks a pair now, oh well.

Bottom line: You bet I'll be using these on the PCT.

Use this book. It's the AT thruhiking bible.

AWOL's Guide to the AT.

Pros: Pretty much tells you everything you need to know. Mostly just an elevation map so you can look ahead and laugh at how much your life sucks in the days to come. Also has detailed information and maps for trail towns. Comes with a nice little pdf document to save to your smartphone.

Cons: Sometimes just flat out wrong, in which case you're fucked. Seems to omit some really important information sometimes, like WATER SOURCES.

Bottom line: This is the most reliable guide for the AT regardless of its problems, I'd use it again and so should you. Guthook's app is good too, but it costs quite a bit.

What I would have done differently:

I would have used a Zpacks Solplex rather than a Hexamid. I would have taken a real rain jacket like an Outdoor Research Helium II and ditched the windshirt. I would have used the 2400 version of the HMG Windrider, or I would have used a ULA Ohm 2.0. I would have taken a small external battery for emergency phone charges... Other than that, I think I'm aces.

That about wraps it up. Obviously I used other random shit like water bottles, stuff sacks, electronics, etc., but I don't think I need to tell you how well a stuff sack worked... right? Maybe you disagree, if so, shoot me an email or leave a comment.

Day 139: Meese is plural for moose.

I sleep poorly because I never closed up the footbox on my quilt and my body heat escaped all night. The nights are getting noticeably more chill. Not chill as in Mathew McConaughey but chill as in my face is frozen so I cover it with a bandana.

The first four miles down into the notch are smooth sailing, a little victory lap for jumping up and down treacherous, sharp boulders for the last week.

Along the way I run into Haulin' Oats, a quirky thruhiker with strange mannerisms who I honestly like a lot more than most. She's standing down the way exaggeratedly mouthing "MOOSE" at me.

Oh dang, I pause my Neil Degrasse Tyson podcast and sneak forward, and sure enough, a moose momma and baby, meese if you will, are basically eating trees. It's mega loud which makes sense since they're megafauna. I mutter a silent prayer for all of the megafauna that humans have forced into extinction, take a few blurry pictures, and head out before momma moose decides I'm too close to baby.

Out of the notch is our last section of the Whites, referred to as the Wildcats. Why? I don't really know, but the first climb out is mean as hell. Sometimes "rock scramble" just doesn't cut it. The trail is, at times, a straight up hand over hand, pull your body weight up with your arms, rock climb. But I love it.

I'm feeling pretty good and I've learned to really appreciate these moments. I just want to be healthy and injury free, I could give a damn how hard the trail is, just get me back to 100 percent and I'll crush anything you put in my way.

Obviously whatever is going on with my stomach isn't affecting my athleticism too much because I literally run up the side of the mountain, and all the way up I'm wondering if there's a foot race like this somewhere in the world, more vertical than horizontal. That'd be fun. I should look into it.

I get to the top and find a bunch of tourists just milling around. God damnit. There's a gondola ride to the top, and I'm actually standing at the top of a ski resort. Ugh.

I wait around on top, listen to the soothing narration of Neil Degrasse Tyson talk about science and science related humor and at some point, I fall asleep.

Hours later I wake up to find Stevie standing over me. Shit, it's already 3:00 and we've got a ways to go.

We make it another five miles, the trail never lets up on us, and it doesn't look like we're gonna make it much father than the next the hut. So we hobble in wondering whether or not we should try to stealth or do work for stay. Then they feed us potato dill soup and it's decided. Y'all got some more of that? We'll definitely do work for stay.

This time though we actually have do some real work. Dun dun dun! So what do we do? Clean the range. Well shit, I've only been a line cook for most of my adult life. I'm so pro at cleaning commercial stoves that I actually enjoy it. So we go beast mode on the range, steel wool held akimbo before me and the process is therapeutic. I miss the rituals of real life, especially those related to food.

After, we go beast mode on some soup, broccoli, and salad. The black bean soup isn't as good as the potato dill, and the broccoli is half steamed/half raw, but I can't say anything bad about the salad and regardless of whatever, real food is tasty.

Turns out the dudes working this hut just finished the trail and they shoot the shit with us for a little bit about AT related crap. How hard the trail is in Maine, how the hell did Scott Jurek hike on two hours of sleep every night, never listen to a southbounder, etc.

Then, we sleep, once again blowing up our pads between the dining room tables, swearing that tomorrow we'll make up for our "low" mileage today.

Day 138: Presidential tint.

The Yellow Deli drives us back over to Pinkham Notch the following morning and it's up to us to figure out how to make it back up to the top of Washington.

The bad news is that we're going to have to attempt to hitch which is still hella illegal (because then the AMC won't make any money off of us, big freakin' whoop). So we sneakily walk past the auto road gate and over to a convenience store where Stevie starts slyly soliciting rides from people who literally just paid at least 30 dollars to drive seven miles on a road.

A nice older couple has a pick up and we explain our situation to them, to which they decide, yes, they will give a ride. But first they have to ask permission from the Gatekeeper. Oh no, we're so gonna get in trouble. But luck is smiling on us this day, and the old man says, "Oh no, they aren't soliciting rides, I just offered to help them out" and then we're in the back of a truck on a dirt road climbing about five thousand feet.

The weather is perfect. It's super clear and this is quite possibly the most badass way to ride up to the top of Mount Washington.

At the top the couple takes pictures with us, gives us a business card, and tells us to stay in touch. Damn, sometimes people are just insane nice.

Back to business. It's time to do the Presidential Peaks, and I'm hella stoked.

The trail is a hellish haphazard piecing together of sharp jagged boulders and talus, but I ignore that. I'm too busy thinking about how much better it is to be above tree line than it is to be below it.

The day is beautiful and we can see about seventy miles in all directions and as we go I frequently turn back and trace our path with my finger.

The real challenge is Mount Madison, a steep poorly blazed boulder scramble and I begin to think of it as a "choose your own adventure" trail since I can't really follow a nonexistent blaze. We up and over and just like that, we're done with the Presidentials. Unfortunately the downhill is wicked steep, a field of massive boulders that seem sturdy enough until you put your full body weight on one, only to feel its 20,000 pounds of mass rock beneath your feet. It was scary y'all.

After going back down thousands of feet in a real short amount of time, we decide to cowboy camp on a tent platform since there's not really any good place to stay. The Whites never have any good places to camp, in all honestly. It's either do work for stay at a hut or pay eight bucks to sleep in a shelter that "maybe leaks" the caretaker tells us. Sweet.

But the weather seems like it's going to hold up through the night, so we take our chances, lay our pads out sardine style on a pad, and hope that moose don't trample us to death in our sleep.

Day 136, 137: Dodgin' rain.

136: 

Our hitch out of Conway is a former thruhiker (AT twice, PCT once). He lives out of his van and I can't help but think my future will be extremely similar to his.

My dad gets off before us to make his way up to Tuckerman Ravine, a shorter, albeit very steep hike to Mount Washington out of Pinkham Notch (4000 feet in 4 miles). We have an unceremonious goodbye, as all goodbyes end up being on the trail even though I haven't seen my dad in over a year and potentially that could happen again. But the trail does that to you. You never know when you'll see another hiker again, so goodbyes are almost nonexistent. It's grown on me.

Regardless, my dad has been a pillar throughout my life. An immutable source of strength, the foundation on which I build all my endeavors. Beyond being intelligent, athletic, and above all capable, he's always been there to instill that same wealth of confidence in me. Having him around for a few days allowed me to silence the anxiety surrounding my unknown illness and just put faith in my own abilities. Abilities that my dad has never doubted, even if I have. So it feels like a loss, but the recoil of the loss will propel me forward these last few weeks.

A few hours later and we're making our way up the not-so-gradual climb to Mount Washington. We've been trying to play the weather, and it seems like it might be in our favor, but with very few options of where to camp, we end up doing work for stay at the Mizpah Hut.

The AMC allows thruhikers to do work for stay on a hut to hut basis, and so you're kind of at the mercy of the employees at a particular hut. This particular hut ends up being very amiable and they have us sweep the basement, which we make quick work of. They attempt to feed us, but we're vegan and I'm gluten free so I basically just end up eating salad with no dressing. Cheyanne and Stevie get some minestrone soup and some bread. Sometimes I'm really jealous of stupid things like this (hiker hunger is real y'all) but the soup is from a bag and the bread was made by some chump with no baking experience, so I'm not so disappointed.

The employees end up trying to talk to us all freaking night (or you know, past 9:00) and I'm falling asleep standing up. They take a hint and we blow up our sleeping pads and lay them down between the tables in the dining room. The cook bangs around in the kitchen until almost midnight with the lights on, and I mostly regret my decision to stay here... But at least we didn't have to pay anything.

137:

It's almost 5:00 in the morning. The cook is back and they sound like they're throwing pots and pans around. I ignore it as long as I can but before long patrons start to wander down to the dining room and I'm forced to break down my "camp" on the floor between tables.

The kids workin' the hut want us to stay and help clean up bunks after breakfast, and that sucks because it means we won't be hiking until after 9:00. Oh well, the chores end up being easy and the forecast says Mount Washington will be clear and almost no chance of precipitation.

They were wrong.

Right about the time we get to Lakes of the Clouds Huts (plural on huts because I think the plural use of lakes is redundant as all get out and it becomes a running joke for us), we're totally immersed in a really dense, really wet cloud. Seriously, the wind is crazy and it's basically sleeting on us. I can only see about 30 feet in front of me as I make the final ascent up to Washington and I hear the tourists before I see them. Wow, what a fucking zoo.

I really wish they'd stop building roads to the tops of mountains. I seriously hate it. Nothing like hiking 1800 miles through "wilderness" to emerge into a faux Disneyland where they sell four ounces of lentil soup for $4. I hate this place, but outside is worse. It's sleeting and feels like it's below freezing.

Clear?! 4 percent chance of precipitation?! What the hell AMC!

We know that the next eight miles are on a really unforgiving, exposed ridge above tree line, so we ask the "rangers" at the "state park" what our best option is. 

We can either hike back to Lakes of(s) the(s) Clouds Hut(s) or pay 40 dollars (each) for a shuttle down to the notch. There's no hitchhiking down the Mt W auto road... But who's going to stop us?

It takes a surprisingly long time to find a ride, but when we make it down we get in touch with a bunch of the others hikers who made the same decision as us. Seems like no one wanted to hike over Madison in sleet today.

So we call up The Yellow Deli (hurrah hurrah!) and they assure us they'll be through the notch later to take us to their "hostel" in Lancaster. In the meantime we hangout at the AMC center in Pinkham Notch and teach all the hikers to play a charades-like game called "poop smoothie". The game basically forces you to guess whatever gibberish someone else wrote down and most of the cards end up being poop humor (hence the name) with a Slender Mane reference or two thrown in. Much fun is had by all and even though I feel like shit and go to the bathroom to sit on the toilet once every 5 minutes, making someone else guess "Stream Clean's naked body" is satisfying.

My best homies in the Twelve Tribes show up late... With lots of other hikers... And what looks like a truck designed to carry hay bales. Dang. Me and Stevie hop in the back of the truck and tuck ourselves under a giant tarp to block the wind then just try to zen out for the long ass drive to Lancaster.

At the Deli we grab some bunks, eat some shitty grocery store food, and pass out with our electronics plugged in to an outlet (what a luxury!).

131 - I don't even freaking know: The Whites with my dad.

First day is a zero in North Woodstock/Lincoln. The weather is shitty and there's no way I'm going above treeline again, so me and my dad hang out in town and he listens to me talk shit on section hikers for most of the day.

Day two is Kinsman Notch to Franconia Notch. Not a whole lot of pay off for a whole freaking lot of really difficult hiking. Probably 4000 to 5000 feet of ascent and descent and the trail is once again, massive boulders. This will be a reoccurring theme for the rest of the trail. My dad quickly realizes that despite his ironman status, this trail is no fucking joke. This will also be the day that my dad gets to witness how bad my stomach problems have become. Although we only do 16 miles, it takes us eleven hours and we end up in Franconia Notch with nowhere to camp. So we head back into Lincoln to camp at "Chet's". Chet is a trail angel with no desire to be in the AWOL guide, so instead there's a secret black dot on the map of Lincoln where Chet's house is. He lets hikers stay, but first he grills the shit out of them about the trail, just to make sure they're true thruhikers.

Day three. Franconia Ridge. God damn. I don't have anything to say really, I've been dreaming of this moment for the last year. I'll let the pictures speak for themselves.

Day four. We each paid eight dollars to stay in a shelter. This will be the beginning of my disappointment with the AMC (Appalachian Trail Club), they maintain (profit off of) the trail in the Whites. On this day we walk through more massive boulder laden trails, slowing us down to less than a mile per hour at times, and end up back at another shelter (where we pay more money to sleep... in the woods).

Day five. Near-o into Crawford Notch. Get our boxes from the AMC highland center, hitch waaaay too far away into North Conway, hit up an awesome natural foods store, eat Thai food, watch Friends at the Quality Inn, and decide that tomorrow we must part with my dad. His schedule won't allow him to make it the full distance back down into the next notch with us, and so he decides that he'll take a side trail up to Mount Washington, just to tag the summit.

Hopefully this adventure has dissuaded him from ever attempting the entirety of the Appalachian Trail.