hiking – Page 17 – Wandering the Wild

Day 5-8: Mending

March 21, 2013 Anna (North Star) and Chris (Shutterbug)34 Comments

Day 5-7: Zero Days in Blairsville, GA

Shutterbug’s left knee was painful and swollen when we reached Neels Gap on Day 4 so we had decided to take a few rest days in Blairsville to let it heal. The four components of RICE (rest, ice, compression, and elevation) have been our main priorities these past three days. The local $3.99 pizza buffet was also important to us. We got our money’s worth.

Shutterbug felt significant improvement after the first rest day but then the healing plateaued. We sought medical advice from places around town, but people were either on vacation or not experienced enough with knee issues to give us any definitive answers. Though we didn’t learn anything new about Shutterbug’s knee pain, we did meet a ton of friendly folks trying their best to help. Thank you.

Downtown Blairsville

While we were in Blairsville we also chatted with our friend Jen who is fulfilling book orders for us from Oregon. Since we started hiking there has been a noticeable drop in sales. Jen wants to assure everyone that books are still being shipped even when we’re out hiking. Please help Jen regain space in her living room! You can order here:
https://wanderingthewild.com/book/

Jen with PCT photo books ready for shipping

Day 2-4: A Rough Start

March 17, 2013March 19, 2013 Anna (North Star) and Chris (Shutterbug)45 Comments

Day 2: Long Creek (Mile 4.7)-East of Justus Creek (Mile 15); 10.3 Miles

Our first night on the Appalachian Trail brought bitter cold and powerful wind. We had planned for cold weather but 9 degrees (with wind chill) chilled us to the bone. Neither of us slept much.

In the morning when we pulled the tarp stakes out, clumps of dirt were frozen so solidly to the stakes that we couldn’t remove the dirt. We finished packing up quickly and started hiking to get our blood flowing. Gradually our fingers and toes began to defrost.

As we warmed up, Shutterbug began to notice that his left knee was sore. The pain was slight but it was bothersome to swing his leg forward, especially on downhill sections.

Backpacking Food Galore!

March 7, 2013March 7, 2013 Anna (North Star) and Chris (Shutterbug)36 Comments

Shutterbug adding to a food resupply box — Filling a long line of resupply boxes

On our Appalachian Trail thru hike, we’ll sometimes buy food at stores near the trail, and other times pick up a food box which we prepared prior to the hike. Organizing and creating food resupply boxes is time consuming, but we love the result: better tasting and more nutritious trail food. For vegetarians like us this is especially true, since vegetarian food is harder to find in tiny trail towns. Mailing food boxes also enables us to stay away from larger towns and remain in the wilderness. There’s nothing like the calm that extended time in the wild brings.

The first step in preparing food boxes is to create a meal plan. This has been an iterative process for us over the years. Incredibly, after hiking 2600 miles in 2012, we still love most of our backpacking food menu. We made a few small changes for the Appalachian Trail and have updated our list of favorite backpacking foods accordingly. You can view the list at any time by clicking the “Food” tab above.

Read More “Backpacking Food Galore!”

Tag: hiking