Hiking 2,200 miles… That’s an undertaking. You must be serious, stupid, or a little bit of both to try an adventure like that.

Probably both.

FOUR to SIX months, and you sleep in the woods the whole time? I could never do that.

We’re not in the woods the whole time – sometimes we’re above treeline…

Aren’t you scared of bears and spiders and snakes and lions and ticks and…

Yeah, most of those things. Well, maybe not lions.

There are plenty of reasons not to hike the Appalachian Trail. Ask all you want, some of those reasons just don’t shake us. We’ll try to dispel any concerns you have in future posts; for now, we’d like to explain our reasons for hitting the trail.

We love the outdoors We both love camping, hiking, traveling, and experiencing nature. Backpacking the Appalachian Trail is the ultimate testament to all of the above. We value everything that the AT is, and everything it stands for.

Now is the perfect time There’s no time like the present. We are both in situations where we can take breaks from the working world. We’re still young. We don’t have any toddlers to drag up Mt. Washington in 40 mph winds. Finally, we’re in sound physical condition. No one could pick a better time to do the AT.

The Physical and mental challenge The Appalachian Trail has a 70% failure rate due to the environmental, psychological, and physiological challenges one faces between Georgia and Maine. We’ll be fighting through cramps, blisters, black flies, long days, rainy days, rainy weeks, interrupted sleep, heat waves, cold snaps, you name it. We’re excited by the challenge, and want to push ourselves to our limits in order to accomplish something as great as the Appalachian Trail.

It makes for an epic start to our lives together Talk about trial by fire, right? If we can make it 2,200 miles together, we’ll probably be pretty well set for the rest of the road. Not to mention, we’ll create stories that we can tell and retell (and embellish) for the rest of our lives.