Why I’m Thru Hiking the Appalachian Trail in 2025 | My Story + Plans

Whenever I talk about through hiking the Appalachian Trail next year, there's always a few questions that I get, but one of the most common being why. So in today's video I want to talk a little bit about my why for hiking the Appalachian Trail in 2025. Hi, my name is Megan. Join me as we explore new places together, hike some trails, and enjoy this adventure outdoors. Today I'm out here for a quick hike at Sandy Creek Nature Center. I actually sprained my foot about a month ago, two months ago at this point. Last week I got the all clear from my ortho to resume normal activity, so I am slowly easing back into it. I've been biking some, but today I am going for the first hike I've been on in quite a while. The first question I want to chat with you guys about in this video is why the Appalachian Trail? Why not the PCT? Why not the CDT? Why not go to another country and do a trail like the Alta Viejo one? And that is a great question, but it goes back to 12, 13 year old Megan in 7th grade. You see, I had this science teacher in 7th grade, and I remember him telling stories about how every summer he would go for a section hike on the Appalachian Trail. At that point my family, we were pretty big on traveling. We would do a few day hikes, but we were mostly concrete walkers, so we stuck to national parks and state parks and paved trails. But I remember the way he told those stories was so captivating, and I thought about maybe going and section hiking the trail one day, but I didn't know anything about backpacking and really wouldn't take my first backpacking trip until college several years later, almost 10 years later. So I went and told my mom that my science teacher, shout out to Mr. Merwin, had been doing these section hikes, and she actually pulled out this picture. I'm going to try and find it maybe before I start the trail so I can show you guys of me, my sister, and my two cousins next to the iconic arch at Amicalola Falls several years before when I was really, really young. And I really think that maybe a seed was planted on that day that I wasn't even aware of that one day through hiking might be in my future. And yeah, since the first backpacking trip that I took in college, I have really been thinking about through hiking the AT. For those of you who don't know, I live in Georgia, and so Amicalola Falls, Springer Mountain are all within about a two-hour drive of me. Actually, when I'm in my racing season, I do a lot of my training runs on the approach trail, which brings me to letting you guys know I will not be hiking the approach trail during my through hike. I have done that trail countless times in life, so I don't feel the need to necessarily go and do that. I'll be starting on Springer, but I will be dropping by Amicalola first to go and pick up my tag, of course, and get registered. So hopefully that answers the question of why the AT and not a different trail. When it all comes down to it, the AT feels like home to me. It's where I, you know, really learned how to backpack and take a lot of day trips, too. I've done most of the Georgia sections and North Carolina sections, some of the Virginia sections, so I'm just really excited to get out there and connect all of those sections together. The next question is why a through hike? This is a question a lot of my family has been asking, and to be quite honest, I don't have a great answer for this. My ultimate answer, my why that I've come to for why a through hike is, quite frankly, to see if I can. I mentioned earlier that I've done a lot of the southern parts of the trail as section hikes, and I'm really excited to put those together into one long through hike, and I really want the through hiking experience. I think it will be really awesome to be able to meet the people who are on trail, fellow through hikers, or section hikers, even day hikers. I'm really excited for the social part of the trail, but I'm also just excited to see how the trail changes as I'm out there for multiple seasons. If I haven't mentioned yet, I have finally picked an exact start date. That will be March 8th or March 9th, and it'll still be winter-ish down here in the south. For all my northern viewers, winter down here in the south, yeah sure, it doesn't look as crazy as it does up there. We might get a little bit of snow, but I'm excited to see the world come alive as I hike during the spring to see things bloom, and I do hope to show you guys a lot of that. I actually want to show you what the trail is like right now where I am because it's quite pretty. My plan as of now is to go nobo, and if you're watching this video and you don't know what nobo means, it basically just means northbound. So starting at Springer Mountain here in Georgia and hiking up to Mama Cay, Mount Katahdin, up in Maine. Now I'm not fully married to the idea of staying nobo, and the reason for that is because I've got a few prior commitments for my job and for one big trip that I had planned where I will be getting off trail in the early section of my hike. So I'm gonna kind of evaluate when it comes to beginning of July, end of June, see where I'm at on trail, and a flip-flop hike is something that I will consider if I'm not as far as I want to be. One thing I don't want to do is rush the through hiking experience. I want to be out there and take as long as I feel like I need or I want to take. I'm not in a hurry technically to finish a through hike, you just have to finish it in 12 months. And I don't intend on rushing the trail even though I very well could, and I want to go ahead and get myself in the mindset now that I'm out there to enjoy the journey and to not treat it like a race. And I think that will be one of my biggest challenges out there is to not rush through the miles. So yeah, that is why a through hike, just to see if I can. The next why question that goes right along with why a through hike is why 2025? Why am I doing this next year? And to put it quite simply, everything feels kind of like it's lined up to where next year is the first year I've had the opportunity to do this. A lot of my friends who have through hiked the trail did so right after college. So they graduated, they took a gap year, and then they went on into their career or whatever they're doing now. And I went straight into a job right after college, so I did not really have that gap year. Oh, I gotta watch where I'm walking. I'm not trying to trip over anything. I didn't really have that gap year right after college, so it never really is lined up. And then I bought a house, and it doesn't make sense to go out and through hike while also paying for a house. Now I'm at a point where, if you saw my last video, I am a full-time pet sitter and farm sitter, live out of my Subaru, so I don't have a house tying me down right now. I don't have a family as far as husband and kids. And not saying that that is a tie-down, but I know that is a reason a lot of people feel as though they can't hike the trail. Maybe they're waiting for their kids to graduate, but I don't have anything that's necessarily tying me to one specific place, and that feels like the perfect window of opportunity to go for a through hike. So I'm not getting any younger, and I do really want to take this opportunity. I think a common myth people have is that people who are through hiking the trail are all 20 years old, fresh out of college. But I have been doing trail magic at a spot, a hike-in trail magic place in Georgia. If you don't know what trail magic is, that just is providing a service for free to people who are through hiking the trail, whether that's food or just supplies they might need, maybe a ride to town. I hope to be showing some trail magic if I am lucky enough to receive some while I'm on trail. But I've been providing that for the past two years, and I have seen people from all walks of life from 80 years old to little kids out there, and that just goes to show that through hiking is for everybody. So I'm in my 30s, and I am excited to get out there while, yes, a lot of people might be in their gap year after college. There are plenty of us who are older who are out there hiking the trail. Oh, there's a deer over there. Little buddy. I think he's by himself. My last why question I want to talk about in this video is, why am I vlogging my experience? And this question is kind of twofold. One, I'm a very sentimental person. I have been vlogging and or videoing my travels for quite some time now, and thank you to those of you who have been around for several years. But I am so sentimental. I love going back and watching those videos and reliving the experience. It helps my memory because when you cram all this stuff into maybe a few days or even a week or two or for this time a few months, it can be really hard to remember exactly what happened. And so I think having this vlog to go back to those special days where maybe they were just really, really good days and even to go back on those days that might have been really hard to remind myself that I can do hard things and I can get through it, I think will be awesome. So I don't really know where this goes. Oh, there's a sign. Let's go. Uh, I think it might just go down to the creek. We'll see. But yeah, so that's my first reason for that. My second reason is because I would love to share this experience with you guys. For those of you who maybe aren't able to get out on the trail this year or maybe aren't able to ever get out on the trail, that you'll have these videos to come and maybe hike from your couch with me. I hope to share as much of the trail and as much as the nature as I can. I know that realistically for that first part, for me to be able to look back on, I do want to... Oh my gosh, look at these roots. That is cool. I do want to be able to chat a lot. Look at this. I can't see because of the sun. This is so thick. I want to be able to chat a lot about my experience. So you will be seeing my face some, but I mean this video is probably the most you've ever seen my face in one of my videos. So beautiful out here today. But yeah, ultimately I just want to share the trail with you guys. I am still debating between daily or weekly vlogs for the channel, but no matter what I end up deciding, I'm leaning a little bit more towards daily vlogs because I feel like weekly vlogs will be just a lot when it comes to editing. And yeah, I just worry about making long form videos while I'm out on the trail. Daily seems like it might be a bit more enjoyable for me to keep up with, but no matter what, I end up deciding my videos will be probably about three weeks delayed. I thought about doing two weeks, but with the time that I'll need to get off of the trail, I don't anticipate maybe starting to release my videos until that first or second week of April. Just for the time that I'm off trail, you guys won't have to worry about a lag or a skip of the videos in that way. But I'll also be riding a bit for the trek, which I'm super excited about. I plan on maybe riding about once a month for them, just an experience and or how the trail is going for me personally. I made it over here to the boardwalk section of the trail, which is always super fun and a bit slippery with all the leaves still from fall. Sorry if you hear some construction noises. They are doing construction on the greenway portion of the park, which is on the other side, but still without the trees having their leaves. Sound travels pretty well in the forest. But yeah, thank you guys so much for watching this video. If you liked it, please give me a thumbs up, leave a comment down below. It is a free and easy way to help creators like me. I'm gonna hop over here onto the pond trail so I can go down there before I have to leave. But I have already gotten a couple of great questions for next week's video regarding the trail. If you have questions for me for that video, you can also drop those below or send me a message on Instagram at adventure underscore outdoors. I would love to hear from you guys. But that is all for today's video. If you want to hang out for the next year and watch my videos for the Appalachian Trail, I would be so honored. You can hit that subscribe button and press the bell so that you're notified every time that I press a video. I've got a really exciting trip coming up as well, and we'll be posting some content from that come end of December. So I hope you guys have a wonderful rest of your day and happy trails. See you guys in the next video!