Our adventure started on Wednesday, April 24 from Amicalola Falls, aka the Approach Trail. Ranger Bob who registered us as thru hikers in informed us this would be the hardest day of the first five.

The first day began up a very large stair case with a waterfall. It felt like something between 400 repeats on the track and a heart attack.

John’s parents offered to drive our packs to the top but we decided to huff up the 600 or so stairs.

It was relatively warm day for these two Minnesotans. The heat and the effort of the climb was no joke.

When we rolled into Springer Mountain Shelter at about 3:30pm, we were pretty tired and ready for bed. After putting our feet up the walls of the shelter, we made dinner (mashed potatoes and a freeze dried meal of Chana masala) and washed up.

John has been giving me a hard time about taking a sponge on the trail (and he used to work on Scotchbrite!) but it turned out to be pretty useful in washing off the sweat and dirt after a day of hiking.

We were in our tents before sundown, around 8pm. And slept a solid 13 hours. John calls the tent Little House on the Trailie. It’s a pretty fab tent with a door on each side and a great view of the night sky if you leave the rain fly off.

Day 2 was a very green walk under a canopy of trees with the sound of running water.

Long View Falls on Day 2. Photo taken by our soon to be trail friends, David and John.

The second day of hiking was much less strenuous than the first. We decided to take our first week or so pretty easy, going around 8 miles a day, to get used to our pack weight, avoid injury, and get what hikers call our “trail legs.”

Within the first two days, it became clear that we had some food items that were too heavy for what they brought to the hike. Example: We had purchased a very large jar of almond butter that weighed in on its own at 2 pounds. Keep in mind we spent months and several hundred dollars getting rid of 3-5 pounds between our tent, backpacks, rain gear, and sleeping quilt only to be stymied by a jar of almond butter. Our food was put together somewhat hastily once we arrived in Atlanta on Monday.

We needed five days worth of food until Neel’s Gap and the amount we had was adding a fair amount of weight to our packs. Our base weights were 15 and 22 pounds respectively, but with food and first aid kit we were weighing in at 25 and 33 pounds! Our food included mashed potatoes and pre-packaged freeze dried meals for dinner, tortillas with jam and almond butter for lunch, granola bars and oatmeal for breakfast, dehydrated butter, and nuts, goldfish, and beef jerky for snacks. We also had EmergenC as our substitute fruit.

Our answer to this problem was very sensible and a bit gluttonous: eat as much almond butter as possible. We added it to our oatmeal, and John tried it in our mashed potatoes (but eventually decided against it).

We spent the second night at Hawk Mountain Shelter. The AT has shelters every 5-8 miles that give a hiker a bit of relief from the elements. There is usually a privy, a water source, and some campsites close by. I have to say that Georgia’s shelters are very nice. Because it seemed like it might rain, we spent the night in the shelter with other hikers, listening to the pitter-patter on the roof. We set up our sleeping pads and quilt in a corner and we were joined by about 8 other individuals in the two story shelter.

When we registered at Amicalola, Ranger Bob gave me 2379 and John 2380 tags to wear on our packs. This means we were the 2,379th and 2,380th people to register as thru hikers from Amicalola.We were informed that we were behind the “bubble,” the crowd of AT Northbound hikers that start from Amicolola between March and April. I mention all this because the first couple of nights and days, we have seen quite a few thru-hikers! And when you add in weekend folks and section hikers, the nights at the campsites and shelters can be lively.