Wait, are you walking the whole thing?

Yep. Left foot. Right foot. Repeat 13,296,250 more times. And to the next natural question, “are you going alone?”, I reply “yep” too.

How much will your bag weigh?

My bag will typically weigh near 10 lbs before I add food and water. I’ll be eating 5,000 calories a day (think: 2.5 lbs) so a five-day stretch between resupplies would add 12.5 lbs to my bag. In some stretches like the Sierra Nevadas, I’ll be required to carry extra cold-weather gear adding a few pounds to my gear.

How will you eat? Forage for food?

I’ll be in a town every 3.5 days on average where I will replenish supplies.

A resupply consists of me preparing food for my parents to mail to me at towns OR purchasing food. I’ll resupply at least 60 times during the Great Western Loop. I am an Excel nerd at heart, so you should see the spreadsheet (thanks Joe) mapping out my food resupplies.

You’re carrying a gun right?

I’d be more liable to accidently shoot myself in the foot than hit whatever was coming my way (and a gun is heavy, who’d want to carry it?)

The deeper question is valid though: “how will you stay safe?”.

• I will be carrying a GPS communicator, the Garmin InReach Mini, that will let me communicate messages and my location the entire hike.

• In heavily populated bear areas, I’ll carry bear spray as an extra form of protection.

• Preparation. In sections of the hike that poise the most danger, I’ve prepared immensely.

Are you crazy?

The jury is still out… and depends who you ask. This begs the question though: why do this?

There is a quote from W.H Murray, Mountaineer and Writer:

Until one is committed, there is hesitancy, the chance to draw back, always ineffectiveness. Concerning all acts of initiative (and creation), there is one elementary truth the ignorance of which kills countless ideas and splendid plans: that the moment one definitely commits oneself, the providence moves too.
A whole stream of events issues from the decisions, raising in one’s favor all manner of unforeseen incidents, meetings and material assistance, which no man could have dreamt would have come his way. I learned a deep respect for one Goethe’s couplets:

Whatever you can do or dream, begin it.
Boldness has genius, power, and magic in it!

I first read this quote on July 30th, 2019 and its stuck with me ever since. I’ve dreamed of doing a thru-hike for three years now and if I am going to pause my life, I want to be bold and try for something epic.

Each of us possess the agency to change our world; it begins with beginning… and that is what I’ll do on April 4th.