Michelle Ray, author of How To Hike the A.T., reveals her tips about planning a thru-hike on the Appalachian Trail.  She shares her advice about planning your hike itinerary, choosing the right hiking gear, discovering hidden gems along the trail, footwear and backpack advice, and much more.

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Do you need more advice about hiking the Appalachian Trail?
Read her book, How To Hike the A.T.

Michelle, what makes someone want to hike almost 2,200 miles through some pretty varied terrain?

Well, there are a lot of different incentives for people to take on a trip like this. There’s an authenticity to the experience, of course, it’s a really unique travel experience, probably the most unique travel experience a person can have in North America. You see all sorts of people coming in from backgrounds, from the military, they’re coming in from a divorce, they’ve lost a job, they just got out of college—it seems to be largely a transitional activity for people. A time to take some breathing room, a time to test themselves, a time to refocus and recollect their feelings and their thoughts and their philosophies on their life. You see people out there who have a largely physical approach to hiking the trails—they’re hyper-athletic, they want to challenge themselves, they want to hike 20 mile days every day. On the other end of the spectrum you will see people who are very cerebral about their hike. They want the time to be contemplative, they want the quiet and the peace and the solitude that you can get out on the trail. There are people that are escapists, we see a lot of people who maybe just got out of bad life situations and they just need time to think and reflect, and then you see kind of the competitive personality on the trail as well, which was a big surprise for me, but you do see people out there that want to hike the trail as fast as they can, as hard as they can, in the most extreme conditions that they can find. I think overall everybody shares this love for nature and an interest in a simple life. They want to go out there and have a stripped down existence. They want to get rid of their cell phones and their computers and their day-to-day office lives. There’s a phenomenon that hikers talk about and it’s called Springer Fever. Springer Mountain as you know is the southernmost terminus of the A.T., it’s in Georgia. Springer Fever is just a term assigned to people who are overwhelmed by this obsession to get on the trail, it’s this infectious kind of enthusiasm that people get that sends them out on the trail.

Talk about preparing yourself mentally and physically for a thru-hike on the A.T.

Preparing for something that lasts six months that deals with so many weather conditions and physical strengths and things like that is really difficult, and I would say that largely, hiking the trail is a mental game. Certainly, after you get past the 500 mile mark, you’re so fit and so used to the regime that you really don’t have the physical challenges anymore and it becomes a matter of being able to get up every day and walk. What I did when I prepared for my hike is I certainly did a lot of exercise, a lot of physical conditioning. I would walk 6 miles to a gym in the morning and do about a half-hour of cardio and a half-hour of weights, and then at the end of the workday, walk home another 6 miles. A really important thing that I did was getting trail guides and getting maps. I recommend the Appalachian Long Distance Hikers Association Companion, and that’s basically a guidebook that’s really small, it fits in your pack easily, and it gives you different mile markers, it lets you know where you can find water, it gives you synopsis of the trail towns in the areas you’re hiking through. There are people who use different guidebooks. The A.T.C. has a series of regional guidebooks that I saw some people use. There are also maps that are published about the Appalachian Trail. Some of those aren’t necessarily up to date, so that’s something to keep in mind when you are preparing your maps and trail guides and everything, you want to think about how current that information is. But I just used the ALDHA Companion, and I did work for them as a volunteer field editor for a couple years, so I have a lot of faith in that resource. I think a big thing to do to prepare yourself for the hike is to actually get out there and hike. Do section hikes, hike on the weekends. If you have a week off for vacation, go out and hike. And that’s going to really let you know the limitations of your body, your gear, and if you’re not doing that, maybe it’s an indicator that you’re not really that into hiking. So I think it’s good to be out every weekend or once a month on a longer hike just to get into it to see if it’s something that you really want to commit to on a longer term basis, be it a two week hike, three week hike, or six month hike, in my case.


Give us your advice about planning your hike itinerary.

Well, this is going to sound ironic coming from somebody who’s written a planning guide for hiking. My advice would be don’t over plan. You do want to have an idea of what you’re getting yourself into, and you want to have a basic game plan if you’re hiking northbound from Springer to Katahdin or if you want to hike southbound, there are definitely different time frames that you’ll be dealing with. But people will do all sorts of different hikes, they do leapfrog hikes and flip-flop hikes where they break the trail up into different sections, and of course, they’re section hikers, people who go out and they hike the entire A.T., but they do it over the course of two or three or more years.

What are some of the most interesting but underappreciated stops along the trail? Any hidden gems that really shouldn’t be missed?

Every region, every section of the A.T. is wonderful and unique, and as I hiked through each section, I would say, this is the best section of the A.T. But there are certainly hot spots, places you do not want to miss. The first thing that comes to mind is the Trail Days Festival in Damascus, Virginia. Damascus is this wonderful hiker’s town that is very welcoming to hikers. They have a lot of amenities for hikers, and Trail Days is a multiday festival where they have vendors, they have hiker events, they have hiker feeds, they have lecturers come in, they show films and it’s a great place to congregate, meet other hikers who are hiking the same year you are, it’s a great place to meet people who have previously hiked the A.T., and it’s just a wonderful melting pot of hiking culture on the east coast. I definitely recommend for people who are out on the trail, to really go out of their way and get to Trail Days in Damascus. And then there are wonderful spots along the trail like Grayson Highlands which is in Virginia, it’s about a day or so walk north of Damascus. That was one of my particular favorites because the terrain is beautiful and gentle, and it’s populated by wonderful herd of shaggy ponies that are super friendly to hikers. Of course, Mount Washington and the White Mountains are a great place to hike. I love Mahoosuc Notch, that’s a portion of the A.T., it’s in the southern area of Maine, right after you cross over the New Hampshire border, and that’s the hardest mile on the A.T. according to most people. There’s a lot of boulder scrambling and jumping and crawling and climbing, and every hiker I saw who came through that came through a bit bruised and bloody. It’s a wonderful, challenging section and it really engages your body and your brain in a way that no other part of the trail can do. Shenandoah was wonderful. Again, this is a very flat area, like Grayson Highlands, very gentle, rolling terrain. I particularly liked it because there are bears everywhere. It’s also great, too, because if you’re willing to do 20-mile days, you can be guaranteed to have a really nice warm breakfast and a big dinner at one of the shelters or the weigh stations they have there.

What equipment and supplies should you carry with you, and what’s optional? And what do you definitely want to leave behind?

Comfort is key here. It’s really going to depend on how you want to hike, how fast you want to hike, how much time you want to take, what your needs are in terms of setting up camp at the end of the day. There are a lot of good resources for people to look at when they’re going to buy gear. I have them listed in my book, but a couple I’d like to mention are Backpacker.com’s gear guide, it’s called Gear Finder. This lists a lot of equipment specifications and it gives you reviews on equipment. Another really good resource to get an idea about what sort of gear you might want to bring is TrailJournals.com. That’s a site where hikers can put their daily blogs or their logs of their hike, and there is a section within Trail Journals where the hikers can list the gear that they’ve used, and they review it and talk about how that gear has worked for them, or how it hasn’t worked for them. There’s a bigger focus now, more and more, on hiking lightweight or ultralight, and that works for a lot of people, and I do recommend trying to trim down your gear as much as possible, simply because you don’t want to be carrying 50 pounds of junk around the woods, but on the other hand, you don’t want to go so ultralight with your gear selections that you’re compromising your comfort or your safety. In terms of my gear that I carried, I tried to go lightweight—I didn’t go ultralight, certainly—but I used a Hennessy Hammock, which is a wonderful alternative to a tent and I highly recommend it. It weighs two pounds and change, and it gave me a lot of different options for where I could camp at night. I also really focused on getting a comfortable sleeping bag, and I switched out bags according to season. During the colder seasons when there’s snow on the ground, I used a heavier down bag, and then during the summer times, I used a synthetic lightweight bag.

Some of the hiking gear you need seems like it could be pretty expensive. Where should you buy it and talk about renting gear—is that something that’s a viable option?

I wouldn’t recommend renting gear for a long-distance hike. Simply because you destroy your gear, just the day in, day out wear and tear of the gear, that’s not a good option. I do think it’s a good idea if you’re testing gear and really feeling out what you want to carry on your trip, I do recommend renting gear and using it for a week or so, that way you’re not investing money in buying a new piece of gear and you get a little bit of a chance to use a specific piece of gear and see if it works for you. I would just go to a regular outfitter—REI, EMS, smaller outfitters, particularly those along the Appalachian Trail corridor, are really going to have a lot of the gear that you’re going to need. But also the alternative of buying used gear—again, your gear is going to get so much wear and tear, that it’s probably best to buy good gear, because it’s going to last you in the long run and you’re going to have the advantages of having a manufacturer’s warranty and things like that. There are people on the trail who make their own gear, for example, the year I was out hiking in ’07, there was a man out on the trail who actually made all of his gear out of Tyvek, including his pack and tent. But a lot of different options, most of the people out there do buy new gear, and when you’re looking at it in terms of cost, the investment that you make in your gear, much, much cheaper than what you’d be spending on a mortgage or a rent during the time you’d be out hiking, so when I would make my gear purchases, I looked at it like that.

What backpacks are most popular? What features should you be looking for when you’re choosing a pack?

There are a lot of options for backpacks right now—the market is really driven and there’s new technology, new materials, and new designs on an annual basis. I saw a lot of Granite Gear packs out there, Osprey, Gregory—the pack that I used for the most part was a Nimbus Ozone. But I’ve been backpacking for over 15 years and I started with an external frame pack, which I wouldn’t recommend, you don’t need much of that now, it’s a bit more of an old-fashioned design, but the predominant design used is an internal frame backpack. If you’re a woman, you do want to look at female-friendly designs, and it’s great because the market is really exploding with a lot of options for female-friendly packs. When you’re looking to fit a pack, you want to think about your body, how much you’re going to be carrying, what kind of mileage you’re going to be doing, and when you’re getting fitted for a pack, you really want to deal with an outfitter that has knowledge of long-distance hiking, and of packs, because they do measure your back, and they do specific fitting procedures with you, and if you put the effort and the time into finding a pack that’s a good fit, it really, really pays off. I mean, that’s the piece of gear that’s most closest to you, it’s on your body for 8-10 hours a day. Other things you want to look at when you’re choosing a pack is the brand’s reputation. You want to know that you’re going with a brand that has a good track record, that’s got good gear reviews that maybe other hikers have recommended. You want to look at the craftsmanship and the construction that are put into the pack, and then you want to think about things such as warranties, customer support—you want to know that if your pack breaks down halfway through your hike that you can go into a town, give a phone call to the manufacturer and they’ll be able to replace the part or give you a replacement pack.

Talk about choosing the right footwear. There’s a pretty big difference between the terrain in Georgia versus Maine, and I’m guessing that can complicate things a little bit.

Footwear is a big item that’s up for debate with hikers. It used to be that if you went out and did long-distance hiking, you would wear really heavy, waterproof leather boots. Now more and more people are moving into lighterweight footwear, so they’re looking at trail runners, they’re looking at trail shoes, there are even people out there who are hiking barefoot, such as the Barefoot Sisters, and then there are people wearing things like Chacos, which are trail sandals. Essentially, when you’re looking at footwear, you’re looking for how much stability it gives the foot, and there’s a popular misconception right now amongst hikers, that a tall boot gives you the most stability. When in truth it’s the heel fit that gives you stability, so I think that when you’re looking at footwear, you really want to see that you have a shoe that fits your foot well, it gives your heel stability, you have plenty of room in the toe box, so you don’t get blisters. When I hike, I use Merrell Moabs and I switch them out about every 500 miles or so, and it really depends on what kind of footwear you’re using as to how often you’re going to switch out your footwear, but I think that the internal structure, the padding and the lacing and the stitching tend to break down after four or five hundred miles, so its essential to go ahead and buy a new set of shoes and have them shipped to you on the trail if you’re going to be out for a long time. In my shoes, I use Shock Doctors, which are an over-the-counter orthotic that provided some gel insole and a little bit of lateral stability with the foot, but people who have special needs with their feet might use prescribed orthotics. Another thing I did with my shoes, I had these thin gel inserts that I bought at the pharmacy, and I would just put those in under my Shock Doctors, and that added a little bit more padding to the foot, and it really helped out in rocky areas such as Southern Maine or the Pennsylvania terrain, which is super rocky and hard and you’re walking on stone all day.

What are the biggest mistakes people make when hiking the Appalachian Trail?

I think that the biggest mistake I’ve seen people make is to have a very specific set itinerary. Maybe they have an obligation off-trail at a certain point in time that causes them to rush, or maybe they’re dependent on mail drops, which is when you mail your supplies to yourself at specific locations along the trail at certain times. I’ve seen a lot of people wreck their hikes because they’re rushing, they’re are not able to enjoy or take side trips or take days for rest. Good to go out there with an open mind and to be very flexible about your itinerary.

Michelle, what’s the one thing that you wish someone would have told you before you started your hike?

Well, I think when I was looking to do this long hike, I was really focused on the hike itself, rather than having a plan for re-entry when I came back from the trail. And re-entering civilization after you’ve been out in the woods for six months is a pretty difficult thing financially, logistically, psychologically. So I think a lot of the information that you can find out there on the Web and in books really doesn’t address what a difficult transition that can be. So I would have liked to speak with more hikers about that transition and be able ot get more information from resources on that.

Michelle Ray is the author of How To Hike the A.T.: The Nitty-Gritty Details of a Long-Distance Trek.

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