Appalachian Trail Hiker: Trail-Proven Advice for Hikes of Any Length

by Victoria Logue, Frank Logue

Overview

A classic now in its fourth edition, The Appalachian Trail Hiker is today’s platinum standard on the latest must-have information for the 4 million hikers who explore the Appalachian Trail each year.

• Valuable step-by-step information on preparing to hike the A.T.
• Details on choosing the best equipment
• Comprehensive Trail Club data, including websites
• Crucial advice on nutrition, safety, animals, and insects

Stretching more than 2,100 miles from Georgia to Maine, the Appalachian Trail is the nation's premier long trail, and The Appalachian Trail Hiker is the essential guide for anyone preparing to hike it. With the help of dozens of A.T. hikers, the authors have gathered over 100,000 miles of A.T. experience into this commonsense guide on the nation's oldest trail system.

From boots to cooking gear, The Appalachian Trail Hiker offers essential information on backpacking equipment and prepares hikers to encounter wild animals, beat foul weather, interact with fellow hikers, and more.

Whether you are planning a day hike in New Hampshire, and overnighter in Virginia, a trek through the Smokies, or a thru-hike from Georgia to Maine, The Appalachian Trail Hiker is your passport to unlimited A.T. adventures.

”It's always amazed me how the Logues follow the ever-changing contexts of Appalachian Trail hiking and write about it clearly and comprehensibly. A great preparation for any adventure on foot!”—Brian B. King, Director of Public Affairs, ATC

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780897325837
Publisher:	Menasha Ridge Press
Publication date:	11/10/2004
Edition description:	Fourth Edition
Pages:	258
Sales rank:	1,078,166
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 9.00(h) x (d)

About the Author

Victoria and Frank Logue hiked the entire Appalachian Trail in 1988. They have returned again and again to hike it in its many parts on day and overnight hikes. Frank served on the Appalachian Trail Conservancy Board of Managers. The Logues were also selected as honorary life members of the Appalachian Long-Distance Hikers Association in 2003. They are the authors of “The Best of The Appalachian Trail: Day Hikes,” “The Best of the Appalachian Trail: Overnight Hikes,” and the “Appalachian Trail Fun Book,” among other books. Victoria Logue is the author of “Hiking and Backpacking: Essential Skills to Advanced Techniques.” The Logues live in Georgia, where Frank works as an Episcopal priest while Victoria writes, and they enjoy sharing their love of nature with their daughter, Griffin. The Logues’ website is at www.planetanimals.com/logue.

Read an Excerpt

NUTRITION
Whether you carry fresh or dehydrated food, you want to make sure you have a well-balanced meal. However, getting proper nutrition on the trail is often a “Catch 22,” particularly for the long-distance hiker. The more food you carry to meet your caloric needs, the heavier your pack. The heavier your pack, the more calories you burn. The more calories you burn, the more food you need to carry. It’s a vicious cycle. While it is easy enough to carry sufficient food to account for calories burned during a day or weekend hike, it is difficult and often impossible to do so for extended trips.

Typical hikers burn close to 5,000 calories per eight-hour day on a backpacking trip, so it is important that the food you carry has high nutritional value for its weight. The three sources of nutrition include carbohydrates (simple and complex), fats, and proteins. Each of these sources address the short, medium, and long-term energy needs of the body.

Carbohydrates are either simple (table sugar, honey, molasses) or complex (cereals, bread, pasta, rice, fruit, and vegetables). The extra boost of energy you get after eating a candy bar comes from the simple carbs. However, if you relied solely on these, you would quickly lose energy and crash. When the simple carbs are used up, the body turns to the complex carbs for more sustained energy. This is why a lot of runners carbo-load before a big race, to ensure they have enough energy to finish. Carbohydrates, simple and complex, should make up about 50 to 60 percent of the backpacker’s daily caloric intake.

When the body runs out of carbs, it turns to the fats stored in the body. This is why long-distance hikers lose weight—the amount of carb intake cannot keep up with the daily nutritional needs of burning 5,000-plus calories each day. (Note: This does not apply to ultralightweight backpackers.) Though we limit fats in our daily lives, on the trail fats should make up 20 to 25 percent of our diet. Sources of fats include butter, nuts, cheeses, and meats.

The third critical component to nutrition is protein. Though protein doesn’t directly give energy to the body, it is an important source of amino acids—the building blocks of the body. Many of the fat foods contain proteins, though incomplete ones, so eating beans (lima beans, lentils, etc.) helps complete the protein and give the body what it needs. Other sources include oat and wheat cereals, vegetables, and powdered milk. Proteins should make up 15 to 20 percent of your daily diet.

Getting the proper amount of carbohydrates, fats, and proteins is not all there is to good nutrition. You need to make sure you get the necessary minerals (calcium and iron among others) and vitamins. Food sources high in calcium are particularly important to long-distance hikers because of the amount of stress to your skeletal system, particularly your legs. Powdered milk and milk products such as cheese and sardines in oil are good sources of calcium. You may also want to consider the powdered energy drinks available through nutrition stores like GNC. Dried fruit, though not particularly high in calcium content, can add greatly to the total calcium and vitamin A intake when eaten on a regular basis. Whether or not you should take vitamins on an extended trip is a matter of preference, but we recommend taking some sort of vitamin supplement on an extended trip, particularly vitamins C and B. It is hard to maintain a balanced diet under strenuous conditions, so a multivitamin is your best bet during a long-distance hike.

We know of backpackers who subsist on the same thing for every meal, seven days a week. Experts recommend that you vary your backpacking diet as much as possible. While it may not bother you to eat cold cereal for breakfast, gorp for lunch, and macaroni and cheese every night for dinner, your body may soon tire of it. The most important aspect of a varied diet is the guarantee that you will be getting all the nutrients your body needs to function efficiently.

If you have certain dietary restrictions or are a vegetarian, you will need to be particularly diligent in maintaining a balanced diet. See the appendices for cookbook and food suggestions.

Table of Contents

Following the Blazes

The Trail Kitchen

Water

Shelters and Tents

Backpacks

Sleeping Bags

Footgear

Clothing

Other Equipment

Potential Problems

Preparing for Your First Hike

Winter Backpacking

Backpacking with Children

Long-distance Hiking

Equipment Checklists

Books About the AT

Trail Maintenance Clubs

AT-related Websites

Hiking with the GPS

Index

About the Authors