Re: [at-l] Monetary Matters

["The Weathercarrot" <weathercarrot2@hotmail.com>]

>>WHAT HAVE PEOPLE NOTICED THEY MINIMALLY USED FOR THE AT? <<

The cheapest I've recently been able to do over a long stretch of trail, 
including all food eaten (no pre-packed drops) is 50 cents a mile. This is 
very difficult to maintain. You have to severely limit all non-trail food 
expenses (restaurants, motels, ice cream, even hostels). I end up turning it 
into a kind of game: how little money can I spend in this town? If you think 
about it, it can work - a day of trail food doesn't need to be more than 
four or five dollars a day, but your mileage will average about 13 or 14 
over the whole trail. This translates into a daily budget of about $7 a day, 
which allows for the occasional postage, role of film, hostel, etc.

This is not a method most people would find enjoyable. When I first hit the 
trail in '91, the average thru-hike was about a dollar a mile. Now it's 
probably in the $2,500 to $3,000 range. To throw in just four or five 
hundred into the above scenario would give you a more comfortable hike but 
still significantly more inexpensive than what is typical today.

wc
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