Descend From our First Mountain

With time on our hands (never thought I’ll say that), we are getting to books we wanted to read (or listen). In one of the books I finished lately, “The Second Mountain” , David Brooks proposed the idea that life for most people consists of two metaphorical mountains. The first mountain represents the pursuit of personal success—career, wealth, status, and self-fulfillment. Some, due to unexpected circumstances, fall from this first mountain. This leads them to the second mountain, which represents a deeper life of service, meaning, and commitment to others. Luckier ones find their second mountain first and live a more balanced life where vocation, their philosophy  and community involvment all blend more naturally. Couldn’t stop applying this analogy to our own journey. 

Our First Mountain

We spend decades climbing the “first mountain” of career building, some financial security, and meeting societal expectations. We are also lucky enough to have had elements of the second mountain as we had loving families and friends and vocations that helped people.  We did realize that the traditional markers of overall success aren’t as fulfilling anymore, not as much as the call to something else. The “else” is yet to be fully determined, but we know we want to wake up not rushed, to practice love and kindness meditation daily,  to have time to be grateful for each other and the people we love. For us, is time to leave the first Mountain. 

Our moment of transition between the two mountains is where we are right now . Our decision to thru-hike—the choice to step away from conventional life and embrace discomfort, challenge, and nature—is a part of that shift in values, a period of self-discovery and reflection, the start of our descent from the first mountain. We hope that at the end of this time of wondering and rediscovering of the simple pleasures of being alive, we will start the climb of our second mountain, continuing our retirement into a more settled life when we will slow down even further, dedicating our time and skills to the community we will be a part of. 

The descent began with planning  for the longest thru-hike we have ever attempted. 

Planning

Planing took many forms for us. We geeked out in learning about how to give ourselves the best chance of succeeding in this endeavor. Outside of mental preparation, which we were working on with our meditation practice, and physical preparation, we realized that carrying the least amount of weight will be the next important thing. Between the two of us, we got into different aspects of light and ultralight backpacking, from equipment to best nourishing, calorie-dense light food we could gind. The “Gear Skeptic” YouTube channel was instrumental for us, and we thank the guy that puts it together.(https://youtube.com/@gearskeptic?si=BI1490EFjs3Umudi)

We customized the Excel spreadsheet The Gear Skeptic shares with the hiking community to optimize our breakfasts, lunches, dinners, recovery drinks, and snacks based on Steve and my estimated caloric needs during the hike. We learned about electrolyte and water needs and also the rule of thumb that any food item with the calorie to ounce ratio better than 125 is considered ultra light. The color coded cells told us if we were balancing proteins, carbs, fats while keeping food light. My daily food requirements 2400 calories ended up weighing 1.2 lbs a day, while Steve’s 3400 calories, 1.6 lbs a day. Our breakfasts consist of a mix of gluten free oats, mixed nuts and seeds, milk powder and freeze dried fruits. For lunch, we discovered some GF coconut wraps, lighter and more nutritious than tortillas. To them, we add a packet of either tuna or samon in olive oil, hemp hearts and a packet of mayo for increased calories and protein content. For dinner, we invested in freeze dried prepackaged meals. Costco sells packs  of 24 GF Mountain House dinners that end up costing $7.50 each. The snacks vary, but each we pack  several bars, meat sticks , honey stinger wafers and Justin almond, peanut or hazelnut butters. We convinced ourselves of the importance of a recovery mix upon reaching camp each evening that consists of a mix of carbohydrates, protein, electrolytes, fats and stevia. We use the Tailwind brand. Every other day, to try and meet needs for fruits and veggies, we plan to have green powder packet. We will see how this goes. 

Example 4 day resupply for both of us

We are still working to enter our gear list on the The Trek, but a quite chaotic picture of our gear is below, and a zoom in into our Big Agnes Tiger Wall UL2 tent we setup in our backyard. Our luxury items used between the two of us are a kindle, a journal, some face moisturizer and Doe Nut and Gummy Bear. At Hurricane’s suggestion, we did invest into ultralight umbrellas that are going to come in handy during downpours with or without hale, when the warm weather comes and hiking in the rain with rain jacket might be too hot, or to protect from sun in open areas. We bought the silver shadow from Six Moon Designs that weighs 6.8 ounces. 

Gear spread for both of us. Sorry for the high entropy nature of it, we had little time.

Testing our tent in backyard. We had been hiking with an older version of the tiger wall .

Talking about cutting down weight, out of curiosity Steve cut all his labels from clothes and equipment and saved 16.5 g. Removing freeze dried food from its packaging for a 3 day supply saved a wopping 64.7 g.

When all packed , my backpack’s base weight (without water and food) was 13.8 lbs, and Steve’s was 18 lbs, as he is carrying the tent and the cooking system for both of us. Pretty good! 

Our packs with a 3 day food supply and no water with Blue wondering where are we heading ..

To try and eat as balanced and lightly as possible, and also making sure I stay gluten free, we packaged 20 resupply boxes and spread them out between self shipping (4) and family and friends to mail on the trail . Thank you: Dede, Camil(Hurricane, AT Class of 2024), Kathleen, Donna, Hallie and Griff!!! Extra thanks to Hurricane for answering all of our trail related questions. 

Some of the resupply packages ready to go, after stamp of approval from Doe Nut and Gummy Bear.

Almost There

The last two weeks passed insanely fast. Between wrapping up work, planning for the hike and an unplanned surgery I had to have , we thank the universe, the doctors, our family and friends that all fell into place and we made it out of the house. 
Landing in Atlanta and seeing Steve picking up our two backpack babies from the conveyor belt felt liberating. BTY, if you are flying into Atlanta before the trek, make sure to pack your poles into the checked bag, otherwise they’ll take them from you. 

We planned a lot, but forgot to secure a shuttle to Amicalola Lodge . Steve and I decided quite a bit ago that the start is going to be just like in the book “A Walk in the Woods” by Bill Bryson. Start at the lodge , have a great breakfast then start the approach trail at the arch. The approach trail is a 8.8 mile hike from Amicalola visitor office to Springer Mountain, considered the southern terminus of the AT. We lucked out and found the Bandit Shuttle service. Bandit , a former AT thru-hiker himself told us the most touching story: his trail name , Bandit was to honor his dog of 16 years. Smokie, who he had just lost before embarking on the trek. He carried some of Smokies ashes from Georgia to Maine and were Smokie and the Bandit. 

At Amicalola Lodge the night before the start

Gummy Bear, Doe Nut and Amicalola sunset

Gummy Bear and Doe Nut also marveled at the beautiful sunset, exchanging trivia about the Oglethorpe mountain that used to be the original southern terminus of the trail. 

And so, the beginning of our descent from the first mountain began, literally and figuratively, as to get to the visitor center we would have to climb down the Amicalola falls’ 600 some steps. 

We love you all and thank you again for all your support !