On February 24, 2019, my older son, Gavin, and I set out on the adventure of a lifetime from the summit of Springer Mtn., GA, the southern terminus of the Appalachian Trail. We aimed to hike the trail to its northern end at Mt. Katahdin, ME, nearly 2,200 miles distant. As those of you who have followed my blog know, we ended our hike nearly six months and 1,325 miles later in Vernon, NJ, just a few miles south of High Point State Park.
Looking back on it, we knew why we were no further along. Though we intentionally started the trail slowly, hiking only 6-8 miles each day to prevent injuries and to allow our bodies to adjust to the stress of daily hiking, we never picked up the pace to the point we should have. A scan of our hiking log shows that in the final month or so of hiking, we only covered about 300 miles. Our daily average was just over twelve miles, and we spent five or six days in hotels or hostels taking zeros, days when zero miles were hiked. Over the whole of the hike, we took about 30 zeros, not counting twelve days when we were off trail due to injury and waiting on our hiking partners to catch up with us. Counting only “hiking days,” our daily average was just short of 10.5 miles. Forgive my sudden purge of numbers and statistics. As you likely know, I taught math for 29 years, and even though I’m now retired, the use of numerical evidence is a hard habit to break. The point is, posting totals like those, it would be difficult to make it to Katahdin in one season.
There are many reasons why we didn’t “hike harder” that I don’t need to delve into here, but suffice it to say we’re older and (hopefully) wiser now. With the benefit of five years of rumination and 20-20 hindsight, we’re excited to announce our 2024 Do-Over Hike!
We’ll be starting in February from Springer Mtn. and are looking forward to rejoining life on the trail. Since 2019, we have updated some of our gear and are focusing on the psychological aspects of long-distance hiking. When discussing this year’s hike, many have asked whether we are going to pick up in New Jersey where we left off. Though that may be the most sensible option, Gavin and I both want to earn the title of thru-hiker by completing all 2,200 miles from start to finish in one season.
We’d be honored to have you join us on our journey. As I did in 2019, I’ll be posting blogs on this site weekly, or at least as often as possible. I’ll also be posting daily videos on my YouTube channel (@WaffleHikes) which is linked in the menu above. I encourage you to subscribe to both this blog and my channel to receive notifications of new content.