We finished,summiting Katahdin on Sept 9th, 2011!!!

Hi all,

We finished hiking the Appalachian Trail, summiting Katahdin on September, 9th 2011!  Sorry for not updating the blog in months :).  We were focusing all of our time on finishing the trail and then driving cross-country so Becky could get to graduate school on time, in California!  However as promised here are a couple stories and pictures to give you a sense of the last month of our AT adventure.

The Twins on the top of Katahdin! Normally goals such as these are so anticlimactic, but Mt Katahdin could not have been a more beautiful and powerful finish.

These are just a sample of the boulders we had to climb over to reach the top of Katahdin.

 

Hurricane Irene added a bit more adventure to our already crazy AT journey.  As you can see the stream crossings were a bit technical!  Also, most of the trails turned into streams, so we did not have dry boots for the last 2 weeks of the AT.

Here's another sketchy river crossing.  The river was too deep to cross, so we crawled over the log! 

In order to finish on time, we hiked from sunrise to sunset!

 Some of our favorite times were spent inside our tent.  After all it was our home for a full 5 months.  Becky jokes that she might have to set it up in her room in CalTech if she gets too stressed out:)

The lakes are gorgeous in Maine.  After 5 months of rain, heat, and a couple river dunkings my camera is on the edge of life; however, trust us, the beauty of the AT is unbelievable.

 

The mahoosuc notch is a 1 mile stretch that typically takes hikers 3 hours to complete.  One outward bound group took 11 hours to complete this 1 mile stretch of trail, because it was raining.  We survived! 

Ohhh, the view less rainy summits. 

Rainy mountains are beautiful in their own way, but when it's sunny, you can't help smiling the entire day!

Ohhh, our epic falls.  Neither one of us is a particularly balanced hiker even after 2000 miles.  Luckily we escaped with only a couple bruises and scratches.

In order to pass the time, in between dreaming about ice cream, we liked to come up with wacky songs. Here's a sample.
*Mama K is what some thru-hikers call Katahdin

A Hiker's Full Belly (To the tune of Wagon Wheel) by Maple and Oak

Heading up north to the land of the rain,
Hiking our way from Georgia to Maine.
Staring up the trail, praying to see moose.
Made up the coast in thousands of hours,
Climbing up mountains and smelling the flowers
Hoping to God that we'll see Katahdin soon.
(Chorus)
Oh rock me mama like a hiker's full belly,
Rock me mama like a sky so sunny.
Hey Mama K*, rock me.
Rock me mama like the wind and the rain,
Rock me mama like uneven terrain,
Hey Mama K, rock me.

Runnin' from suburbia and a boxed in life,
Born to be livin' on the edge of a knife,
Maple has the heart, Oak has the soul.
Ohh that materialistic world was getting us down,
So we threw on our packs and hiked out of town,
We ain't livin' that life no moooore.
(chorus)

Got caught in the whites for a bit too long.
The power of those mountains, hiking fast seemed wrong.
But now were heading north to the land of the lakes, where the spring water tastes like tea?
But we gotta get a move on before the sun,
Because Katahdin's calling our name and were starting to run,
And if we die trying at least we'll die freeee.
(Chorus)



So there it is a glimpse into our life as an AT hiker.  Overall it was definitely the most grueling activity in our lives, but by far the most rewarding.  Yes, on the AT you are always thinking of Katahdin and the next town stop full of ice cream.  However, to keep your sanity you have to grow to love the small beautiful memories along the way.  In life, there's no need to constantly strive to be the best... Its ok to sit next to a lake realizing that this is where you're suppose to be in life a smelly decaying mushroom on one side and your twin sister on the other.  

Thanks for all of your support and well wishes on this adventure!!

Best,

Amanda and Becky (Oak and Maple)

The Mosquitos have arrived!

Hi all,

We're almost in Vermont! We had a wonderful time visiting Aunt Alice. Thanks for all the delicious food and good company:) Aunt Alice had all our favorites (grilled salmon, vegetables, and cinnamon chex cereal;) It was a great break from trail life and some of the best food we've had on our journey so far.

We need to average 18 miles everyday in order to make our Sept 2nd deadline, which will be a challenge especially in the rocky whites. So we will probably be updating the blog even more infrequently! 

We're in Dalton Mass, 620 miles to go!!! Connecticut was scorching hot, Massachusetts is rainy and buggy, but we're glad we're in the North, because as the Mountains get taller the views get more spectacular. 

I'm getting kicked off the Comp, gotta go, more stories to follow...

The Twins

Only 799.9 to go!

Hi everyone,

We haven't had Internet for the last couple of weeks, but now we're in New York!!  We have less than 800 miles to go till Maine:)

Since we've last updated the blog we've now hiked through all of Virginia, West Virginia, Maryland, Pennsylvania, and New Jersey!!  Pennsylvania was a true rock hell; everyone was happy to cross the PA border, so our feet would get a rest from the rocks. The first day we crossed into NJ we saw 4 bears.  Supposedly, there is a bear every square mile in NJ!   Here's a pic of one of them!

We made it halfway!  Such a dorky sign.

Another rock scramble in PA!

The AT is gorgeous! 

A break on the fire tower, so worth the extra climb!

Sometimes, Becky and I feel like we're wildlife sightings.  After talking to a couple of tourists and explaining the thru-hiker experience, a lot of them ask if they can take our picture.  You can just imagine them telling stories about their pictures, and here we saw a bear, and here we have two smelly thru-hikers.  It's hilarious, because people are always so shocked to hear our story.  We met one couple in a state park, who handed us a handful of candy.  I know we were always taught not to take candy from strangers, but on the AT everyone just wants to help you reach your goal of hiking to Maine.

We have also gone a bit crazy on the trail.  We now make up songs in order to motivate, LOL.  Here's a sample song to the song "The ants to Marching 1 by 1"

The Twins go marching one by one! Hoorah, Hoorah!
The Twins go marching one by one! Hoorah, Hoorah!
The Twins go marching one by one!
Maple stops to bathe in the sun!
And they all go marching down,
The trail, and on, to Katahdin!

It's been really really hot lately, so we've been going a bit slower.  We've also been taking breaks at many of the state parks that the AT travels through!  They offer swing sets, beaches along lakes, vending machines with candy, free showers... oh its a great oasis for thru-hikers. 

The mosquitoes and ticks have become ruthless.  We now know at least 6 people who have gotten Lyme's disease.  The mosquitoes are great motivators to keep moving.  If you walk to slow, you spend more time slapping mosquitoes off your arms and legs, then moving forward, so sometimes its best to half run down the trail:)

Hope you all are doing well!!
Best,
The Twins (Oak and Maple)

 

A couple miles from West Virginia (995 miles from GA)

Hi Everyone,

We got off trail for a really short break to chill at home and organize the boxes that we are mailing ourselves. It has been great to be in civilization, but we are ready to hit the trail again. Except that as always we are up late finishing/organizing everything.

Shenandoah was really awesome! At first we were skeptical, because the AT crosses the road every 2-3 miles, but the views were awesome and it was great to stop in at restaurants along the way for food.

Becky finally got grilled salmon, but because we had dinner at the resort, we decided to night hike to make up the mileage. As we were night hiking we ran across a bear!  Yeah! We think he was sleeping in a tree and when we came upon him he scrambled out. We went up the trail a bit more and Becky saw his huge butt as he was lumbering away. Unfortunately though we were on a ridge, so we couldn't get by him without being 10 feet away, because the bear didn't want to go further down the ridge. We don't think he could tell what we were because we were blinding him with our headlights. But we were supper tired, so we clanked our hiking polls together and he finally moved farther down the ridge so that we could get by. Then the next day we saw a bear in the daylight. He was adorable and really curious! However he was pretty far away so it was difficult to get a good picture of him, but we swear there is a bear in the picture below!

From now on, we will be carrying a camera cord, which we picked up from home.  So we'll be able to post more pictures. Here's a few.

Becky's trying to pet and play with a horse, but he just wants to eat her shorts probably because of the salt. Not the best bath option, but not too bad.

We've seen a lot of really cool toads on the trail. We even met one hiker who killed, gutted, cooked, and ate a frog. We have not gotten that hungry yet!

This was such an interesting sign. We think it's real, but maybe a joke. We're not sure because we never saw any lost cows. We don't know what we would do if we saw this cow walking up the trail.

We've seen a lot of great views.

And we've been camping in beautiful places in the woods

and even out of the woods. This is at the YMCA in Waynesboro. A family of geese were hanging out at our campsite too.

Becky got a quick shot of Amanda sleeping.

A cool salamander we saw. The orange ones are always really awesome to see.

We've been seeing deer the entire time especially in Shenandoah. Here's one walking along the AT too. It's hard to tell, but he had some amazingly big and fuzzy antlers. 

Because of the heat we've even been waking up earlier, so we've caught some great sunrises.

Well that's it for now.

Happy Trails,

Maple and Oak

Waynesboro, VA (In town avoiding the heat wave!)

Hi all,

We're in Waynesboro VA (854 miles from Georgia).  We now only have 1,327 miles to go.  Wow that seems like a lot on this computer screen!

In the middle of our 8 day trek from Daleville to Waynesboro Becky decided that she couldn't stay on the AT any longer (she was feeling trapped by the white blazes, lol).  So we took a side trail to see Crabtree falls.  Every once in a while we take side trails as proof that we're not just on a steady trudge to Maine.  One would think that hiking the AT is about wandering in the woods; but sometimes its too easy to only think about the goal of Maine, and loose sight of the adventure along the way.

We're now intently reading the guide book looking for any reference of a swimming hole and planning accordingly, even if it means hiking a 24 mile day.  Its getting hot!  However we can't think of a cooler spot than the Appalachian ridges.  However crossing the brutally hot cow pastures can be a challenge on multiple levels.  One its hot and two Amanda's constantly afraid Becky will loose her head and try to pet a cow, but so far the flies have kept her away. As we were watching the cows wallowing in a muddy stream, a hiker passed us and said "Don't you just want to jump in there with them." We looked at each other and cringed.  The water was so gross, no heat wave would have possessed me to jump in that water.  Amanda wanted to call the VA water board and report the farm, but we think it might be legal in VA to have cows in rivers depending on the size of the stream.  This is why we filter water!

We're camping for free at the YMCA in Waynesboro, VA.  We saw more wildlife camping outside the YMCA then on the trail (an otter, a family of geese, and a family of ducks).  The town is really hiker friendly; everyone is willing to help out the AT hikers.  Essentially we are just a group of wandering vagrants, but as long as you're a vagrant with a lofty goal (such as walking from GA to MA), everyone is excited to help you out!

Happy trails,
Amanda and Becky
"Maple and Oak" (The Twins or as one hiker said "just a couple of hardwoods")

Also if you're looking for a short hike in VA Dragons Tooth, McAfee's knob and Tinker Cliffs were all gorgeous.

Rain, Rain, Rain, and more Rain...

We're in Pearisburg VA now (627 miles from Springer, GA)!

After leaving Damascus it rained for 5 days straight. Needless to say the trails were muddy :)  We were sliding around like two awkward penguins pretending to know how to skate in the mud. 

Our wildlife sightings have gone up!  We are now seeing countless cows everyday, haha!  Still no bears, but we have seen some very friendly deer:) 

We met a hiker who summed up the Appalachian Trail experience quite beautifully.  On the AT one eventually becomes "comfortable with being uncomfortable."  We are mostly at that stage now.  In normal life, one is in a state of constant equilibrium.  However in trail life there's always something out of whack.  For example, it's either too hot, too cold, too wet, too buggy, too hungry, too full...  We live in a world of extremes, and yet once you embrace this mentality then you can easily ignore all of these uncomforts and you truly become "comfortable with being uncomfortable." 

Everyone is hiking the trail in a different style.  "Hike your own Hike" is the best trail slogan for the AT.  We've met hikers who are spending years on the trail hiking <10 miles a day just experiencing life.  We've also met someone whose hiked the trail for the 9th time, and another who is running the trail (30+ miles a day).  And for some it can become another beer fest.  There's a few who participate in the suitcase challenge.  Where hikers dress up in suits and dresses and hike 24 miles while drinking 24 beers (carried in a suitcase) in 24 hrs.  Needless to say not many actually succeed in this challenge, but it was hilarious meeting them along the trail in various states of delirium:)

Were hoping to be in Harper's Ferry the weekend of June 18th.  So if anyone wants to visit just let us know through the blog or by email!

Happy Trails,
Amanda and Becky

In Damascus for Trail Days 464 miles and 5 weeks of hiking

Hi All,

We finally have a great computer with a SD drive, so this blog will be mostly pictures!! So sweet. We are currently in Damascus now for Trail Days, which is this awesome festival for hikers.  It's a great way to catch up with other hikers who we have passed or who have passed us on the trail.  Today is our first actual zero day, which means that we're not hiking any miles on the trail today. It feels weird not to be walking, but we're excited to have some time to update the blog with pictures:)

We've been camping in some beautiful spots! 

Many of the hostels along the AT are quite unique!  This one had a cat, which decided to sleep on Amanda's jacket all afternoon:)  At night they are excellent mice catchers! 

This is the tree that marks the GA to NC border.

Amanda decided to chill out on top of a bald.  We were two miles from camp, but we needed a break.  Becky jumped around saying "It's so pretty"  three or four times and took tons of pics, but they don't do it justice.

Becky decided to sleep in the sun during a lunch break on top of one of the fire towers.

Another beautiful spot in the Smoky Mountains.

Amanda eats tuna. Yikes:)  After 5 years as a hard core vegetarian, she has decided to become "mostly vegetarian" for the AT. 

We've been having some interesting wildlife encounters.  Still no bears, but hanging bear bags are still not easy!  It usually ends up with us cursing our third grade PE teachers for not teaching us how to throw well, LOL.  However we're improving ever so gradually.  Also, we saw two copperheads the other day.  Becky saw the first one and jumped off the trail. While Becky was taking a picture, Amanda kept walking, talking some science about copperheads, and nearly ran over a second snake.  She was not expecting two snakes in a row, haha. 

In order to finish before Becky goes back to grad school, we're increasing our miles to 20 miles a day.  So we'll let you know how that goes in the next blog!  Gotta go, we've been on the computer too long...

Best,
Amanda and Becky

Thru the Smokys and chilling in Hot Springs, NC

271 miles and 23 days into our AT adventure!  As we up the mileage to 15-20 miles a day were more tired, but were getting stronger as the days go by.  A couple years ago, we remember hiking in the Whites, NH and complaining that the Appalachian Trail did not go over enough mountains.  Hah!!  That was a riduculous assumption.  We have gone over more mountains than most people climb in a lifetime and were only 1/10th ish of the way to Maine.  But the mountains are beautiful and the wildflowers are all in full bloom, pulling us forward! 

Happy Easter!  On Easter Sunday we were met by two trail angels who gave us fresh fruit!  It was our first apple in weeks.  We were inspired by their tales of completing the trail and their generosity in giving back to other thru hikers.  Later on that day we talked to a fellow thru hiker who overheard a tourist tell the trail angels "Wow we had no idea that there was such a large population of homeless people in this town."  LOL, yes, we may look grungy, but were not homeless.  The trail is just our home for the next couple of months. 

As we hike more miles each day we get to see new people.  We're always excited to see other girls on the trail, since the girl to guy ratio is rather biased towards guys.  However we're keeping pace.  After passing quite a few hikers one day, a thru hiker commented "Wow, you guys hike fast for girls!  You guys hike like guys."  So we're keeping up and crushing a few egos as we pass some Macho male thru hikers:)

Hot Springs is the first town with a real grocery store, since leaving Springer Mountain, GA.  So needless to say Becky and I were very excited about seeing town.  Becky nearly fell off the trail in excitement, while Amanda day dreamed about every building full of fresh vegetables and cereal.  Most hikers are craving beer and hamburgers as they exit the trail, but we have more unique cravings.  Becky's been looking forward to grilled salmon and sweet potato chips, which she may never actually get and Amanda craves Cinnamon chex rice cereal and fresh raw vegetables, yum!!  The last two days before a resupply we mostly talk about food; it gets pretty ridiculous:) We made the mistake of going to the grocery store as soon as we got into town and ended up buying two huge bags of groceries and ate all of it in one evening!  Wow "the hiker hunger" is a real thing.  You can eat 1000 cals in one sitting and an hour later feel hungry again.  Haha. 

Hope you all are doing well!!

Best,
Amanda and Becky

Hi from Fontana Dam, NC (162 miles and 15 days into our AT adventure)

Hi all,

We finally have Internet, yeah!  Here begins our account of our AT adventures;)

We took a taxi to the trailhead of the AT, and wow was our driver a character.  We could barely understand a word he said, which he explained away as a slight cough, but the 4 cigarettes he smoked (after tearing off each filter) in our half hour drive to the trailhead might explain otherwise. However, he had a contagious laugh and many stories of other hopeful AT hikers just like us:)

We mostly go by "The twins" since its easy for people to remember, but our individual trail names are "Quercus" (latin for Oak tree) for Amanda and "Maple" for Becky.  We decided to give each other tree names based on our personalities.  Becky's the sweeter twin, always stopping to take pictures of wild flowers, and Amanda's the more hardcore twin, lets keep trekking forward no matter the elements.

On Day three of our adventure we saw two fluffy white dogs, but had to resist petting them, because we decided we were way too grungy, LOL. 

We are mailing food and other essentials to Post Offices along the way (Thanks Mom and Dad for mailing our packages for us!!!!).  We picked up our first resupply in Suches, GA (11 days worth of food).  It was heavy and that's an understatement.  After climbing Blood Mountain (the tallest Mt in GA), Amanda declared at the top that the 2 lbs of instant brown rice was going into the first dumpster she found.  (We really left it at a hostel for other hikers to use).  All along we have been loosing gear and food as we realize how little gear we need and how unwilling we are to carry anything unessential all the way to Maine (bug spray, maps, spices, sleeping bag liners, extra fuel, batteries, etc.)

Hanging our food in bear bags has also been an adventure. Amanda is use to carrying a bear canister, since out west the bears are too smart to be tricked by hanging food, so neither of us is experienced with hanging food.  Therefore we have had some interesting first attempts in hanging bear bags.  First of all, neither one of us are champion throwers.  Usually the first try ends up with Becky "Maple"  accidentally throwing the rock backwards and then ducking for cover.  Yes, its as hilarious as it sounds:)  We have also realized that it is important to hold onto the other end of the string before hauling the rock over a branch.  Amanda "Quercus"  hauled one rock over a branch with so much force that the string wrapped around twice and then got caught in another tree.  In order to get the rope untangled Amanda had to climb 6' up a tree "Bear hug style."  Amanda figured that if a bear could climb a tree, so could she, LOL.  So far we have always been successful, and have not gotten our food stolen yet.  We have outsmarted the Bears!! 

Others have not been as lucky.  For example, there were four hikers camping at Blood Mountain shelter.  Three of them had hung their own food and were sleeping in the back room.  The other hiker was still cooking dinner in the front room.  All 4 heard a bear successfully take all of their bear bags that they had hung in trees outside the shelter, and then the bear came inside the shelter.  The hiker cooking his food, dropped his bear bag and ran into the back room, and they all were trying to crawl out the windows.  But the bear only grabbed the last food bag remaining and ran into the woods.  This story has been traveling up and down the AT, and we have heard 4 different versions so far, but I believe this is the real one, because I got it from a hiker named "Meatloaf" who claims he got it from a primary source:) 

We have met many many other cool hikers along the way!  Everyone's so wonderful.  We have met people from all walks of life, all ages, and all experience levels which is why the AT is so amazing.  The AT brings together people from all backgrounds with one crazy somewhat disillusioned notion that their place in life at this very moment is to walk from Georgia to Maine.  A couple even offered to ship us letters of encouragement and possibly some food, because she had a son our age and they were the nicest people.

We're now heading for the Smokey's tomorrow, currently stuck in Fontana Dam, waiting for a food package to arrive.  We'll try to update the blog again in a week in Hotsprings, assuming that we can find Internet.  Otherwise we'll be mailing letters to a friend (Thanks Supriya) who will be updating our blog for us, when we can't find Internet.  There's Internet everywhere, but no computer access in this era of iPhones, LOL. 

Hope you're all doing well!!!  Best, "The Twins"

Leaving Tonight

We're leaving tonight. No time to type, but everything is almost organized. We hope!

Goodbye Cities. Hello Mountains.

Becky's Goals for the Trip

I wanted to practice adding pictures. It's actually quite easy, which is so sweet. Thus, many pictures will follow for all you viewers. Although these are not AT pictures they represent my goals for the trip as of now.

 

1) Conquer the hardships of the trail. This is Amanda crossing a river on our backpacking trip on the Lost Coast of CA.

2) Meet some awesome interesting animals and people. This is a curly tailed lizard (I have no idea what the real name is, but I really like it's tail) from the Caribbean. 

3) Learn wisdom and patience from mother nature! These are the foothills of the Sierras.

Starting soon

We have set a date. Amanda and I are officially starting April 6th! More to come at a later date. The boxes of food and supplies are piling up at my house, and I am eager to begin.