Feels Like Home: Hiking the Virginia AT

Greetings from Damascus, Virginia, where in just a few hours I’ll begin a self-supported attempt to hike the Appalachian Trail through the entire state of Virginia, 556.7 miles from the state line of Tennessee to the state line of West Virginia.

After a very busy and fulfilling spring of studying, performing, living, and breathing music in my graduate program, I’ve really been looking forward to treating myself to uninterrupted time in one of my favorite places in the world.

I have hiked parts of this trail many times in the last several years. I have lots of memories here–mostly good–and even the not-so-good memories weren’t bad, just hard. I have hiked the entire Virginia section of the trail once before, and that was during my northbound record on the Appalachian Trail. I had my highest of highs in Virginia, feeling so much love and support from family, friends, and supporters that came out to see me and hike with me. I also had my lowest of lows, when unrelenting shin splints, blisters on my feet, and despair almost brought my journey to a halt. Virginia is where I made the decision to keep going, even if it didn’t mean breaking a record, even if no one cared but me.

This journey, being self-supported, is largely about just “me and the trail”. I’ve been craving time on my feet, time in my head, time in the outdoors. 550+ miles is a long way to go. Nothing about this will be easy, but I can appreciate the simplicity of moving forward, even if that becomes really hard.

The unofficial women’s self-supported record on the Virginia section of the AT is held by my friend and legendary hiker Heather “Anish” Anderson., set in the midst of her record on the entire AT. With her help, I approximated her time through Virginia at about 12 days 22 hours. She is actually out on the Arizona Trail right now, on her way toward an unsupported record (carrying everything she will need with her from start to finish… for 800 miles). Knowing Heather is out there now will certainly be on my mind–we can send each other good juju from afar!

I’ll be posting trail dispatches at pinkfeathers.com whenever I am able, and likely a day or two delayed. I hope you enjoy following along!