This morning I woke up and got my backpack situated. Today I’m going to be slack packing! This will be my first day hiking any miles on the Appalachian Trail in a little over two weeks. Which feels absolutely crazy to say out loud. I can’t believe I’ve been off trail for this long. And at the same time, I’m just so incredibly grateful that I’ve been healing every day. Even if it’s just slowly but surely. I’ll take what I can get.
I headed downstairs and joined everyone for breakfast. Most of the southbound hikers who’ve been here for the last three or four days are leaving this morning. Which is exciting because it means that I’ll see them as I’m walking. I’m going to get dropped off 6 miles south of Monson and head north. That way I can either just do 3 miles and get picked up, or 6 miles and get picked up. And if I’m feeling ridiculously good, then I could continue 3 more miles to the next road and get picked up there. I’m just going to take it slow and one mile at a time.
It was nice to enjoy breakfast, knowing I would be hiking out. And after I ate I grabbed my backpack, which only had the essentials. Basically just some food and water and a couple things in case of emergency. But with the availability of so many roads I’m really not worried about anything happening. It’s just going to be important to really ease in and not hurt myself. After taking so much time off to heal my biggest concern is setting myself back. But at the same time, another concern would be wasting too much time because I’m so nervous about setting myself back. I’m like a little baby bird and I think I just have to jump out of the nest and see how it goes.
It’s going to be hard to part ways with sweet little Indigo.
After I ate, I headed over to the gear shop. Hippie Chick said she would drive me down the road to drop me at the trailhead. It felt like an honor because she usually doesn’t do shuttle rides. But she wanted to take me down there and wish me luck. I’ve been at the hostel for literally two weeks resting nonstop. It’s wild to think how much time I’ve spent at this place with all of these wonderful people. It feels like I’ve spent the last two weeks with my extended family. With the added bonus of being right by the trail and surrounded by other thru hikers constantly.
You have no idea how good it felt to be back in the woods once more.
I was nervous when she dropped me off, but also very excited. And my plan was just to walk super slow to try to avoid any discomfort or pain at all. That’s what I did years ago when I had a different tendon issue. When I did get back on trail I wasn’t 100%, but just took it super slow. And over the next week or two my body slowly healed.
Oh how I missed these white blazes.
When I first set out, it was just such a marvelous feeling to be back in the woods. I spent so much time in bed wondering if I would ever be back on trail. And now here I am hiking again. It’s hard to imagine honestly. I felt wonderful that first mile and didn’t have any discomfort at all. Then the next mile, I felt a teeny bit sore. But it didn’t build or get worse. This is what I was expecting. For starters, I haven’t really moved much in two weeks. Plus, my tendon is going to be constantly jarred by movement. I think if I can avoid slipping and sliding too much or with too radical of movements, I should be in a good place.
The trail was covered in roots, rocks, and mud. As is to be expected. So I just took my time and went as slow as I needed to go.
After the 2nd mile and before the 3rd, I was thinking I would stop at that next road. I felt pretty good but the soreness just made me uneasy. I’m just so paranoid about making things worse. So when I got to that next road I decided to just sit down briefly and decide. I sat for a few minutes and when I stood up I felt reset. So I texted Hippie Chick and said I was going to try to make it to the next road. That would be a little over 6 miles for the day and would definitely have me feeling better about myself.
This section of Pine Forest was absolutely beautiful, and was nice and flat.
And I’m so glad that I did that. Because over the next couple of miles I actually felt like I loosened up a bit and was less sore. Which is interesting but not very surprising. Just because something is a little sore or uncomfortable doesn’t mean that you’re hurting it, necessarily. And when it comes to tendons, so much healing comes from exercising and loading them. As well as strengthening the muscles surrounding them. I had had some discomfort and tendinitis prior to slipping in the white mountains. But it had been very manageable thanks to stretching, heat compression, and listening to my body. It wasn’t until I slipped and jarred the area that it caused an injury.
The trail went past the very pretty lake.
I think another component to that was I wasn’t strengthening or doing any physical therapy to heal the issue. Because I really didn’t fully know what was going on in the first place. I just was hopeful that it would get better without doing anything.
There’s been a lot of rain recently, so the forest was incredibly lush.
The next few miles after crossing over that road were a major improvement. I still took it super slow, literally half as slow as I normally move. Typically I can maintain a 3 mile per hour pace, even on some rugged terrain. Super technical stuff might slow me down a bit, but it has to be pretty bad. When I’m on easier terrain with less rocks and roots, I can do well over 3 mph. Even on uphill portions of trail. Sometimes I think I actually move quicker on climbs, as long as they aren’t technical. Today I was logging around a mile and a half per hour. A couple of my faster miles were a bit better than that, but never 2 mph. Which meant the day went by ridiculously slow! But I was still just happy to be out at all.
Even though I was nervous around the 3 mile mark, I was very glad that I just kept going a bit further.
Today I definitely gained a new appreciation for the hiking experience of some of the other hikers on trail. I definitely wasn’t under the impression that everyone moved as quickly as me. But I didn’t fully appreciate how immense 30–40 mile days must seem if you’re hiking less than 2 mph. You really can’t go that far in a day when you hike slower. The only way to achieve mileage like that would be to hike literally all day long. But when you’re able to hike 2.5–3.5 mph, skies the limit. The miles just absolutely flyby. It was crazy today to take 40 minutes to go 1 mile. Some of my miles were a little bit quicker, but not by much. That meant it was taking me two hours to go 3 miles. Which might be normal for some people and is totally ok!
A lovely little boardwalk along the trail.
Lucky for me, the terrain across Maine is slightly more slow going in general. So I probably wouldn’t have been going 3 mph or faster. There are so many rocks, roots, and sections with mud. As well as some more technical areas, which require you to go slow. So at least I had to go a bit slower, no matter what.
It took me a little over four hours to do those 6.2 miles. Which definitely blew my mind. And put a lot of things into perspective for me. But I just felt so grateful to be moving north! Plus, by the time I did get out to the road, I felt really good. So good that I contemplated doing the next 3 miles as well. But just figured since I felt so good it was probably a solid time to stop. I haven’t walked further than what I did right down the road in two weeks. That means I definitely want to ease myself back in. I don’t want to risk having to take any more time off.
Just before popping out at Route 15 the trail went across a rocky area. I was very careful to go slow so as not to risk my foot slipping out from under me. That would definitely be the worst case scenario for me right now.
Hippie Chick came and picked me up once I was finished. Then I got back to the hostel with the whole day ahead of me. I wound up calling my dad and filling him in on everything. My parents are both really excited that I’m feeling better and I’m finally able to move again. It’s nice to be able to call with some good news for once as well. It felt like such a rut recently, having such a slow healing process and so little to talk about.
It sure doesn’t seem like much, but after being physically unable to walk for a week, it felt amazing to do a little over 6 miles today.
After catching up with my dad, I decided to clean up and take a shower. I also repacked my backpack. Tomorrow, I’m still going to slack pack, but not to the same extent as today. Tomorrow I’m going to carry everything except for my food. That way I’m not absolutely shocked when I get back on trail with a full pack. I think it would be risky to only a slack pack before resuming hiking. That would just leave a bit of a risk that my first day out with a full pack might not go as planned.
My plan as of now is to do a 14–15 mile slack pack tomorrow. Ideally, I probably would’ve started with a slightly smaller day back, but when you slack packing, you’re bound by the distance between roads. There isn’t another stretch of trail where roads are accessible north and south. But with how I felt today, I think I easily could’ve done a few more miles. So the idea of going out tomorrow, going super slow, and going further, doesn’t frighten me too much.
After I showered, I hung out with everybody by the gear shop. And got a very exciting surprise! Another northbound hiker arrived, who I havr actually been dying to meet. His name is Chia and he was a week or two ahead of me before I flipped out to the PCT. But because he was further ahead, he got off trail somewhere around Massachusetts. He’s doing the Appalachian Trail and CDT this year. So he went out to the desert section while he waited for the snow out east to melt out. Then he came back out to finish the AT. When I got back on in Hanover, he was two days behind me. And because of the two weeks I took off, and him also taking some time off to wait out that snowstorm, now we’re here at the same time.
It was cool to meet him after having heard about him so many times. And as you might imagine, he is super excited to be finishing the Appalachian Trail in the next few days. Then he just has to go back out to the border of New Mexico and Colorado to head north along the CDT. It’s very exciting how many hikers are doing long and ambitious hikes this year.
Typically only five or so individuals do the CYTC each year. And that’s only a trend of the last few years. And very few hikers will do two trails in a year or do what is known as a yo-yo hike. Where you go both directions on a trail in one year. But this year there are record numbers of hikers embarking on all kinds of different journeys. I know of two individuals doing the 7000+ mile great western loop, 12+ individuals doing the CYTC, and a handful of different individuals attempting to complete either a yo-yo or more than one long trail in a year.
Later on in the evening, a bunch of us wound up going down the street for dinner. There was a couple staying at the hostel doing a section hike, and they wanted to take everybody out. Which is so incredibly kind! It’s just always so nice to spend time with all of these wonderful people. We all wound up going to the lakeshore house which has great food. I got this Thai vegetable and chicken stirfry, which was amazing. I wound up eating every last bite.
After eating, I headed back to the hostel a little bit early. It would be nice to have some time to get more writing and video work done and prepare for tomorrow.
If all goes well tomorrow, then I’ll probably officially hike out with all my gear the following day. Which is exciting and also a little stressful. For so long there’s been no end in sight. So now to be standing on the threshold of resuming my hike is a very interesting feeling. I’m so excited to get back to it, and also very anxious about reinjuring myself. Plus, it’s going to be a little bit hard to do the math and make estimates for my mileage through the hundred mile wilderness.
Typically that’s a very easy thing to do. But I haven’t been on trail for a long time and I’m trying to take it fairly easy. It’s tough to find a balance between doing too much too fast, and also doing so few miles that I’m carrying too much food. I think both options actually would be bad for my body. Carrying massive excess of additional weight would not be good. And also assuming my ability to do bigger miles, and not being able to, would not be good. It’s going to be very interesting to plan out and also just see how everything plays out.
I tried to do a little bit of planning before going to bed. But until tomorrow, it’s really hard to gauge what I’m going to be capable of. I think first I need to do this 15 mile slack pack to see how I feel. Then I can reassess and attempt to make plans from there.
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