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That sign is in Georgia, at the beginning of what is called "The Approach Trail." The Approach Trail is in the Amicalola Falls State Park and you take The Approach Trail to get to The Appalachian Trail (actually, you don't have to but being fool..., uh, being stu.., uh, being purists, we were determined to do this right).

It's the "Falls" part that's important here. The Approach Trail starts at the bottom of the falls and these are said to be the highest falls east of the Mississippi. They are 729 feet up from where we we're standing near that sign. That's 729 feet up in about one mile, up a trail the park people call "strenuous" and suggest you give yourself at least an hour to climb. Once you get up to the top of the falls, there's only another 7.5 or so miles, mostly continuing uphill at the same insane angle, to get to where the Appalachian Trail begins. We have heard that the Amicalola Falls people no longer suggest this path to get to the top of the falls. Instead they suggest a 400+ step stairway.

By about the 100th foot up we were hiking like those people you see in movies about climbing Everest; step, step, stop, breathe a lot. Step, step, stop, breathe a lot. The salesman in the outfitter's store where we bought our backpacking shoes told us this was the toughest part of the Appalachian Trail (AT), which runs more than 2,000 miles from Georgia to Maine. That should have warned us. It didn't, but it should have. Since then I have read that it is not the toughest. It is one of the two toughest, the other toughest part being at the other end, in Maine.

Actually, we have learned that we had made this much tougher on ourselves then need be. We were carrying way too much weight, largely because we were carrying way too much food. This was last fall, and we had planned on backpacking north from the falls, up to Springer Mountain where the Appalachian Trail begins, and then as far north as we felt like and then back again over seven days. We did not plan, as many intelligent people do, to bring enough food for three days and re-supply along the way, which is what people do when they hike all the way to Maine. We carried what we thought we'd need for all seven days. We were also carrying too many clothes.

By the third day we had vowed to at least make it to the top of Springer before turning around so we could honestly say we've been on the AT.

And all the streams dried up. There were none of the usual water sources for the first 11 miles. Drought in Georgia. Since we ended up averaging only about 1 mile an hour, and could only hike about four or five hours per day, we ended up carrying way more water than normal, and water is very heavy, over seven pounds per gallon and at one point I was carrying two gallons.

We actually made it to Springer. Here are our walking sticks on the top to prove it.

We camped on Springer Mountain on our third night. It was incredibly windy, but our new Double Rainbow tent handled it well. We made it as far as the Stover Creek shelter, about 2 1/2 miles north of Springer, before we turned around and headed back.

Now, most of my backpacking experienced happened when I was a kid forty .. uh, many years ago. My last multi-day trip had been two weeks in the Adirondacks in 1984, and I relied on the knowledge I had when I was a kid. So before we set out, we attempted to learn all we could, and I found that backpacking technology and techniques had come a long way. Although in my youth I had hiked and camped in relative comfort, confidence and ease, I was now, essentially, a beginner. Thank God for the internet. My wife, although a naturalist, camper, kayaker and general outdoors person had never backpacked except on our two short forays to practice for this AT trip.

We learned about ultra-light tents, and bought the Double Rainbow from Henry Shires at www.tarptent.com. You can see a pictures of it at http://www.tarptent.com/doublerainbow.html. This two-person tent weighs only 2 1/2 pounds, with a floor. Our previous two-person tent weighed 6 pounds. One of the things we love about the Double Rainbow is the headroom. Unlike many light tents, two people can easily sit up in this thing. Even with an optional inner liner (which eliminates condensation problems and cools in summer, warms in winter), it was very comfortable. Here's a picture of me sewing something while we sat out a 24-hour rain on Frosty Mountain.

The Rainbow is made of extremely light Silnylon, and we learned the critical importance of sealing every place thread passes through material from posts about this tent on www.practicalbackpacking.com, where we also learned from Mataharihiker about these Luhr Jensen Dipsy Diver Snubber http://www.cabelas.com/prod-1/0003422111782a.shtml, which you attach to your shelter lines to eliminate the need to get up at night and re-tighten them, especially when the weather changes. We learned about freezer-bag cooking and doing our own dehydrating. Sherri, who now has the trail name Mudpie, made terrific meals for us that we could put together just by boiling two-cups of water over a little alcohol stove.

We also learned a great deal from this trip. There's nothing like experience.

We're planning a thru-hike, a hike from one end of the trail all the way to the other. Most people take roughly five months to do this, and it takes a great deal of planning. It has been done by a wide range of people, including people in their 80s and a blind man who did it with his seeing-eye dog. Luckily, there's the internet and many helpful websites with many, many experienced and helpful people providing all the information one could need to backpack easily, carefully and safely. Some of the most useful are forum sites, and we like these so much we have taken one over, http://www.athikersonline.org , which we invite you to visit and join (ours, like most forum sites, is free). A huge one, and one of our favorites, is www.whiteblaze.com, another forum devoted to the AT.

One of the most knowledgeable people around, at least on the net, goes by the trail name Sgt Rock. He is part of www.whiteblaze.com and also has his own site, www.hikinghq.net . Whiteblaze has an extensive and well organized list of sites which you can see at http://www.whiteblaze.net/forum/links/index.php. Another highly knowledgeable hiker is Attroll. Attroll runs the site http://www.appalachianpages.com/ where you can buy a handbook that will guide along the whole trail, including distances, re-supply points, camping areas, water sources, maps and much, much more. He has been very helpful to us.

Other sites we refer to a lot include www.practicalbackpacking.com, www.backpackinglight.com, www.backpackgeartest.org (great user reviews), www.trailplace.com, www.trailspace.com, and www.trailjournals.com.

When I got back to work, everyone asked me how our trip was.

"Brutal," I said. "We can't wait to go back."

Richard

We found this track near a stream not far from the Stover Creek shelter on the AT. The shiny object above the track is a quarter. We're guessing the track is from a Bobcat. If anyone can identify it for sure, please email us below. Thanks.

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