Trek Dirty to Me: 72 days until 2,193 miles of my life and I MAPPED IT ALL OUT!!!

Holy shit I did it!

I did it! Holy shit I did it! It took me four straight days of going line-by-line through the “AWOL” AT Guide, The Trek, and sooooooooo many Wikipedia and Google searches of tiny towns along the Appalachian Trail. I’ve been listening to AWOL’s account of his thru-hike as well (it is literally a play-by-play account of his hike, so listen with that in mind. Fascinating to me…maybe not so much for somebody wanting to dip their toe into the sea of hiker phenomena).

Anyhow! I managed to map out 175 days of hiking from the start in Georgia to the top of Maine! As I alluded to in my previous post, this is immensely important for me to not only stay on track (think of it as one of those old AAA TripTik planners…oh my god…do they even make those anymore!?!). Okay…let’s think of it as a 175-page book where each page represents a different day on the trail. Now turn that book into a spreadsheet - a glorious, Google spreadsheet accessible on any device from anywhere.

Immensely important to stay on track? Yes, with the wedding that I will be officiating in Raleigh and two weeks to be determined in August that I will be off-trail, this was important. Now add to that my need to set up interviews with restaurant, bar, farm and hostel owners along the way in order to give them a realistic window of when those interviews will happen. It also proved to be very handy in mapping out my resupply points for food (I will be attempting a hybrid liquid diet that I will share more of in the future, and which requires sending powder meal replacements to stops along the way), and lining up desirable accommodation.

So…HIGHLIGHTS!!! These are but a few.

• Days spent in each state (S-N): GA-13, NC-22 (including 3 zero days in Raleigh for the wedding), TN-12, VA-41, WV-1, MD-2, PA-18, NJ-4, NY-6, CT-4, MA-7, VT-10, NH-14, ME-23 (not counting 2 additional days in Portland on the way back to Indy).

• Number of Zero Days (no miles hiked towards the AT): 23 (not counting the 14 days I expect to be back in Indianapolis in August).

• Nights of expected camping: 100

• Nights of expected hostel/motel/inn/trail angels: 75

• Strip Clubs: 1

• Nudist colonies: 1

• Maybe a cult…?: 1 (or 2?)

• Trail festivals: 4 including Trail Days in Damascus, VA

• Weddings officiated: 1

• Ferries: 2 (one retired and replaced with a bridge)

• Food challenges: 3 (that I’ve found so far)

• Karaoke nights/bars: 15 (and counting)

NOW FOR THE FUN PART!!!!!!!!!!

This is just a taste, but…if you’ve lasted this long…I AM INCLUDING THE FRUIT OF MY LABORS!!! FOR YOU!!! FOR FREE!!! FOR YOUR INCESSANT SCRUTINY, JUDGEMENT AND RIDICULE!!!!!

But mostly, I thought I would share and give you a chance to see what I am planning on doing, approximately when, and where. For you to hopefully help give me suggestions and additions, see if there is a portion that looks intriguing to you to possibly hike with me, meet up, or if you have any input at all. You can also use it yourself if you like.

Please note that this is my working draft. There are notes in my gibberish (though usually quite clear), and I have a yellow line in the spreadsheet that sort of signifies where everything can be thrown off by a couple of weeks for fluid plans in August. So essentially the first 120 days are pretty solidly in place. The remaining 55 could move back by 14 days at any given point in time.

And now!!! THE LINK! You can click here to view this Google Document in all of its glory!

-AJ

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