Trying to Make Blogging More Weekly with Only a Few Weeks Left

If I counted correctly, 52 days till departure. That's a little over a month. It's crunch time. We plan on actually leaving March 30th or possibly the 31st so that we can take our first steps on the Trail April 1st.

We got a little more tenting practice with our tent this last weekend. Once again, it was in the rain and it held up superbly. Easy set up and easy break down. We went to Tchefuncte State Park for a friend's birthday to do some camping. Some really pretty woods there.

That's ours on the left.

We are headed back to Tunica Hills Sunday for some more training. Nothing will really prepare us for true mountains locally, but Tunica is so beautiful and a good semi challenge. It'll probably be a stroll by the time we return.

Our dehydrating journey has still been nonstop. Fruit after fruit after jerky after jerky. My dad and Lindsay's parents have awesomely been picking up bags of nuts, granola, fruits and other crucial trail food when they go to the store. That sort of thing helps so much. We've been advised, in order to complete the Trail on a budget, to eat the free food that you send yourself as much as you possibly can. It's so hard to determine what's gonna be enough. We have SO much right now. We just did another run at the grocery store for Trail dinners and breakfasts last night. But it still doesn't seem like enough for 6 months. Next we need a substantial amount of flat rate mail boxes to pack out with vacuum sealed meals we'll be preparing.

 Good donation foods.

That's one of the toughest parts, really. Planning out our stops. The itinerary still isn't as finely tuned as I'd like. However, I've been making an Excel list for anyone who would like to send us necessaries along the way. It'll be posted here when it's complete. Dog food is another concern. So many things we won't really know until we are out there. After the first couple weeks we should have it down.

We are pleased to be joined by fellow skater and buddy of mine, Austin aka Caveman. He tinkered with the idea of the Appalachian Trail a bit, spent a couple days hiking it in the Smokey's section last year, and decided three months ago to attempt the through hike. He's headed up there with us and we are gonna try and hike the first couple weeks together. He has a little more experience than us and he is good company.

I can't imagine having only 3 months to prepare for something like this but people do it in less. I recall on an AT video, some dude was just gonna hike a section but decided to keep going and completed the whole thru hike. That is kinda encouraging, really. If he can do it on a whim, we can do it with our year and half preparation.

We haven't really updated Twitter as often as we like even though we've been gaining followers. This is mainly due to every time I've attempted to update the last couple weeks(and it hasn't been many times), an error would come up or it would pretend like it's posting and not post. I got a little frustrated with it and distanced myself from it until we have some real stuff to Tweet about. I'd rather talk to you guys with a couple more characters than they allow.

YouTube, too. There is a slight lack of updating. I'm working on a pretty sweet dehydrating montage but dehydrating is a slow process. Also, the hike this weekend. I plan on making it a little more informative than the last one.

Thanks again to everyone. There were a lot of donors in the last two weeks and we couldn't be more appreciative. Aaron Crafasi, Jessica Pounce, and Chris Cafferal(again). You guys are awesome and every dollar is crucial.

One last thing. We are gonna have a little gathering at Greenwood Park in Baker near our house two weekends before departure for a "Goodbye for a Couple of Months" "party". We will miss everyone and will do our best to keep everyone as updated as possible. Note: if anyone would like to bring some cheap Trail foods for donation, we wouldn't mind. :)

Greenwood Park Sunset (2/7/12)

Psst. Mardi Gras is coming up. Louisiana rules.