71 days until we hit the trail in Maine! Things are slowly coming along. Marty got the bag that will hold his hydration bladder inside his pack. His tube wouldn’t fit from the outside pocket to the front of his pack when it is fully packed, so he ordered a pouch/sling to hold it inside his backpack. Hopefully it works out. We prefer to have the hydration bladders on the outside for easier access, but if it doesn’t work….. Other than this small tweak, we don’t have any other gear purchases coming up at the moment. Just prepping food and counting down the days.
I need to get in at least one more backpacking trip to see if I want to carry the camping chair that Marty already owns. It’s an REI Flexlite Air chair that weighs right at 1 pound. I listen to a podcast called Mighty Blue on the Appalachian Trail and Mighty Blue sings the praises of a camp chair as do many other thru hikers.
I think it might be a nice change. I’ve tried to use my Nemo sleeping pad and leaning against a tree, but it isn’t always possible to find a tree to lean on. 😁 As we get older, sitting on the ground is a bit harder— especially after a long day of backpacking. <laughter> Most days I do not feel 57, but when I sit on the ground for an extended time, getting up and walking isn’t as easy as it used to be. 🤣 Is carrying a chair worth the extra weight? Mighty Blue says it is. I’ll let you know what I think once I give it a whirl.
Marty was just telling me last night that we need to plan another backpacking trip before July. In our spare time, that is. I’ll be heading to Eastern NC every Sunday again for the next several Sundays. Then I have an in person management meeting followed by the Indy 500 trip. May is packed full.
Driving for work on Sundays limits my ability to do things on the weekends, but it won’t be forever. It is very hard to plan section hikes when you have a full-time job! We have met many hikers on the trail who ask if we are thru hikers. I always reply, “Nope. We have jobs!” With that, hopefully we can get on a trail at the beginning of June.
In everything I do, I am always looking to bring the future into the present. In work and in life outside of work, I am a planner. If I get everyone trained in the new client properly, then there’s less trouble in the future. It just takes time and dedication to get it accomplished. That means lots of time out of town until training is complete. If we plan this AT hike well, we should have little to no trouble when we are out there.
Right now I still have 185 PTO hours and I am going to use some of them in 2026! Have I used any of them. No, no I have not…..but I will.
I was gone 4 nights this past week. One afternoon that I was home, we went to a local farm to buy fresh strawberries. They smell heavenly, absolutely heavenly. Nothing like store bought strawberries.
We got them cleaned up and in the freezer before I headed back out of town that very day. Marty started the freeze-dryer the next day. Aaaaand….since he is working this weekend, I unloaded the freeze-dryer and packed up two bags of brisket and 8 bags of strawberries. I also put in 4 more trays of strawberries and a tray of chicken & bacon Alfredo yesterday.
We are trying hard to freeze dry any leftovers that we don’t eat. We also make an extra servings when we cook now and then. Sean had a friend over for dinner Friday night and made his famous <laughter> Alfredo. Since he knows we are trying to pack meals for the trail, he made two extra servings for us to freeze-dry. Great son! So far, it looks like the Alfredo is doing well in the machine.
We will need at least 20 dinners and 20 lunches when we get on trail. It doesn’t seem like a whole lot until you start making them. Ha ha. I haven’t counted the number of meals we have made for this trip. I probably should do that one day. A few weeks ago, Sean had baked chicken breasts and there were two leftover breasts about 4 days later. I chopped them up, added broccoli along with sautéed garlic, onions and a few bell peppers. I added cheese and freeze dried this as two meals. A simple chicken and broccoli casserole. I have no idea how the finished product will taste, but it will be edible and no leftovers went to waste. Win-win.
We are going to eat well on the trail if we keep up the pace. The only store bought food we will bring will be the freeze-dried cereal we plan to cold soak in the mornings. It’s a keto cereal from Adventure Well and we really like it. We enhance it with strawberries and it turns out GREAT. I don’t have any recipes to make anything similar. Maybe when we get back, I can work on that for the next big adventure. Marty will have to unload the run of strawberries and chicken I started while I am out of town this week. I’ll be heading out to eastern NC in a few hours.
In other news, the worms are still alive and doing well! The garden is growing and we can’t wait to freeze-dry some of our harvest. That’s it for this week!
My Little Red Bike 