[at-l] So here is the deal

[nealb@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx (William Neal)]

I guess it all depends on the situation.  I know a couple who is planning on
hiking the AT by sections.  The husband has a 3 day week -- basically 12
hours a day & gets paid for 40 hours if he does all 3 -- plus vacation.  His
wife is a school teacher and has all the Summer off.  So he plans on hiking
when he can, and she will join him when she can -- mostly during the Summer.
Since he can get cheap airfare, he plans on heading North first.  But since
the last 100 miles may take longer than he has, they may make that last.
They've already done Springer to Suches.  So they'll hop back and forth.

But if I were in such a situation, I'd prefer the Springer to Katahdin
approach.  Skipping plays havoc with me: It's okay for seperate trips, but
for a thru, it's got to be Springer to Katahdin for me.

William, The Turtle
PS  Met a guy one time who has hiked the whole AT in parts.  He works a
month and then has a month off -- oil rig if I remember right.  At least 3
weeks out of 4 is spent outdoors; mainly on the AT and side trails.  I was
lucky to meet him since he tends to avoid people on his "days off".

-----Original Message-----
From: Jim Bullard [mailto:bullard@northnet.org]
Sent: Tuesday, April 08, 2003 9:29 AM
To: Rich, Timothy D.; 'at-l@mailman.backcountry.net'
Cc: 'greyowl@rcn.com'
Subject: RE: [at-l] So here is the deal


At 08:13 AM 4/8/2003 -0400, Rich, Timothy D. wrote:
>I've sectioned sequentially from south to north since 1989, now up to
>Gorham, NH.  Logistically, it worked well for me since I'm down South
>(except a short stretch living up north in Knoxville, TN).  We agreed
>initially that we'd do it sequentially so as not to cherry pick the "best"
>sections.  Of course, I've now found out that every section is beautiful
and
>merits hiking.  A patchwork approach requires more planning to make sure
you
>leave reasonable trip lengths in between.  If I were going to hop around a
>bit, I'd mix in some south and north.

I'd thought about the problem of hopping around too much which is one
reason I was going to do sections sequentially S ==> N. The only real
change in my plans now are that I'm thinking of doing alternating
sequential sections S => <= N and ending in the middle.