How To Train For The Appalachian Trail

Credit: Ric "Stick" Dark-green

Thru-hiking the Appalachian Trail is an enormous undertaking that requires ample preparation. The last thing you lot want to exercise is hitting the trail without your heed, body, and gear being ready! Here are our tiptop ten tips to help yous ready for a successful Appalachian Trail thru-hike:

HIKER HACK: Before getting to the list, here's a tip to save some dough on your AT Thru-Hike. When buying new gear, I highly recommend condign a fellow member of the REI.com Co-Op. A x% rebate on REI purchases and occasional bonuses volition cut your overall thru-hike costs. REI also treats thru-hikers well and may replace gear if it fails you on your hike.

Budget wisely. You're going to need some money. Stops along the fashion for food, showers, and the occasional warm bed or cold beer volition speedily eat upwardly your cash. Create a budget and stick to it. If you need some assistance with budgeting, make sure you check out our Budgeting Tool for Planning an Appalachian Trail Thru-Hike.
Pack calorie-free. Y'all probably already know that the less weight you have on your back, the ameliorate off you'll exist. While nosotros're not suggesting that you lot get out the really important things behind, we are telling you to advisedly consider what yous think is "of import". As a general rule, plan to comport less than 25% of your body weight. We built a pretty nifty Backpacking Gear Checklist with a weight figurer that will aid y'all correctly plan your pack weight.
Go fit. The best way to train for a big backpacking trip is to, y'all guessed information technology, practise a lot of backpacking. If you observe information technology difficult to sideslip away for weekends at a time, load upwards your pack with gear as heavy as what y'all plan to carry on the AT and go for some long day hikes. While running, cycling, and other activities are certainly cracking forms of exercise, they are no substitute for spending some serious time on your feet with a heavy pack.

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Know why you're out in that location. While thru-hiking the AT is plain an enormous physical claiming, it'southward also a very serious mental one. At some point you're going to be cold, tired, and asking yourself why you're doing it. Yous'd meliorate have an answer.
Line upward a support person. You're going to need some help from someone back dwelling at some signal during your thru-hike. It may be concrete support, in the form of shipping you a new pair of shoes when yours give out, or mental support telling you to get your butt dorsum on the trail. Get that person on lath for you before you lot leave.
Ready "bump boxes". Bump boxes are packages containing things you'll need to furnish in your pack that y'all postal service to yourself in towns you lot'll travel through. Bump boxes can include gear you'll demand to restock, a fresh fix of clothes to wearable in town, or only about anything else you think might requite yous a elevator on your journeying.
Bring duct tape. Ah, duct tape. People joke about how duct record tin fix but about anything – and they're right! Wrap a few feet of duct tape around a hiking pole or water bottle so yous tin quickly repair broken equipment on the trail.
Practise with your gear. Before yous hit the trail, make sure you're well acquainted with your gear. Be sure that your pack fits you comfortably and that you know how to first your stove. You lot don't desire to stop your commencement 24-hour interval of hiking and realize that something important is broken!
Program for a varied diet. One cannot live on Ramen solitary. Those noodles that tasted so amazing on the outset day of your trip? They won't be so appealing if they're all that you have to eat for weeks on terminate. The more than variety you can add to your food, the more likely you'll be to want to eat information technology.
Visualize. Visualization is one of the keys to reaching any goal but in this situation information technology'southward even more important. Spend some fourth dimension truly imagining yourself arriving at Mount Katahdin and yous're much more likely to actually do it!