still haven't found the camera cord.

West

We're in Boulder, CO staying with our friend Amy. Thus far on our trip we've slept under a full moon on the Buffalo National River; we've seen Martian-like landscapes in the Badlands; we met Theodore Roosevelt at Devil's Tower; we saw Wild Bill get killed during a card game at the No. 10 Saloon in Deadwood, South Dakota; we stopped in to Buffalo Bill's Sheridan Inn; we've seen bears, bison, and birds at Yellowstone; we've camped on a lake in the shadow of the Grand Teton, we've driven on the highest paved road in America--we're almost to the halfway point. We'll post the pictures as soon as we find the cord which connects the camera to the computer. 

Some new pictures

Waynesboro, VA to Harper's Ferry, WV

Washington, DC and Gettysburg, PA

Hannah's grandma passed away peacefully on Thursday afternoon, so we'll be hanging low in Florida for a few days and then heading out after the memorial service.

An end with new beginnings....

We made it to Harper's Ferry, West Virigina, on Sunday, and after dropping off our things at the hostel, hiked an extra mile to the Maryland state line. Harper's Ferry is the "psychological half-way point" for the AT, because it is just shy of the actual midpoint and is home to the Appalachian Trail Conservancy, where we stopped in and became members. We have decided to make Harper's Ferry the endpoint of our AT journey for now. We will return someday to finish the trail and reach Katahdin.
On Monday we took a train to Washington, D.C. and visited a bunch of memorials and museums. It's a great place to visit since almost everything is free! Tuesday night we took a train from D.C. to visit our friend Jim in Gettysburg, PA. He works as a park ranger at Gettysburg National Park, and is working on his PhD at UF. On Wednesday, we toured the park museum and cyclorama and had a personal 6 hour tour with Jim around the battlefield. It was such a great experience!
More adventures to come; we're planning to head out West!......so.....we'll keep you posted on where we go next!

Almost through Virginia...

We've made it to Bear's Den hostel which is in the middle of a part of the trail called "The Rollercoaster." It's a 13.5 mile section of steep and rocky ups and downs; we're exhausted! So it's great to have a bed and a shower tonight. It's the cleanest (and cleanest smelling) hostel we have been to--they have a thru-hiker special which includes a bed, shower, load of laundry, pizza, soda, and a Ben & Jerry's ice cream!

Tomorrow we cross into West Virginia! That will be the 5th state we've come through. The next day we'll get to the town of Harper's Ferry and cross over the 1,000 mile mark as well. Thank you for all of the comments! More soon...

Taking it slow

We're taking another zero day here in Waynesboro, VA. Just to keep you all updated, we've decided to ditch our plan of reaching Katahdin by August 8th, and are gonna take it slower so that we can enjoy ourselves a bit more and treat our bodies a little better. We'll just go as far as we can get by that date and return later to finish someday. Trying to complete the trail in 4 months was pretty tough, especially having to do 21-25 miles a day, and didn't leave much time to stop and smell the roses. Now we understand why people take 6-7 months to finish. We would pretty much just wake up, hike, eat, hike, sleep, hike, etc. So we've decreased our average daily mileage to about 15 miles. This next week as we go through Shenandoah National Park, we're going to go even slower to try to put some weight back on Mike. Thanks again for all of your love, support, and prayers. It's actually become quite fun again!

Pictures

We are very happy to be in Waynesboro, VA. We've posted our newest pictures; the link is below. We'll post an update tomorrow or Monday...

Damascus, VA to Waynesboro, VA

700 miles

We're now in Daleville, Virginia taking a zero and celebrating Mike's birthday. The day before arriving into town was a very eventful day. The morning started with a hike to Dragon's tooth where we almost climbed to the top - it was a bit scary, then a great photo shot at McAfee's knob where you sit on the edge of a cliff overlooking a valley, then sunset along Tinker cliffs, and then our first bear sighting as we hiked to our campsite that evening (the bear was terrified and took off running, so we only got a quick glimpse and no picture).
Since our last update, we've still been hiking through Virginia. We had 10 straight days of rain and the trail turned into a river. The terrain has also been really tough and slow in some parts. The worst is when the trail is completely littered with small rocks, and after hiking for a few hours you begin to feel every single rock beneath your foot and hope for a smooth path. Other parts have been very enjoyable with great views and fun climbs up or down large rock formations.
We also got to hike through the Grayson Highlands, where the wild ponies roam free. They are very friendly and have no problem having their pictures taken.



Thanks to all of you who sent packages! They were filled with the perfect goodies for our hike.

Send us things, again!

We were so greatful to receive the packages that everyone sent last time, and it's time for us to receive our next mail drop! If you'd like to send us things again, here's how you can address the package:

Howard Johnson Express
Please hold for AT Thru-Hikers Mike & Hannah O'Malley
ETA 19 May 2009
437 Roanoke Road
Daleville, VA 24083

Please try to have the package there before the 19th of May, and enclose things in ziplock bags (the extra ziplocks always come in handy for us, too!).

This time we'd like to request home baked things like cookies or brownies (fudgey not cakey, please) or rice krispy treats or other wonderful things!

Other things that we love: Lara bars, Clifbar Shotblocks, Dried fruit (apricots, berries, cherries), shelled pistacios, turkey jerky, Luna bars, Candy bars (Reeses' Fastbreak, Heath, Milkyway, Skor, Twix).


p.s. Mike's birthday is on May 20th :)

New Pictures

Below is a link to our newest picture album. Enjoy! Thanks for looking!

Hot Springs, NC to Damascus, VA

New shoes for Hannah

Although I love my Montrail Hurricane Ridge GTX, they don't keep my feet dry in rain or snow, so Montrail has kindly sent me a new pair of shoes for free - the Mountain Masochists.

Since then....

It's been a while since we left hot springs and are now in Damascus, Virginia taking a zero day. We haven't had good cell phone reception or access to the internet until now, so we apologize if it caused any of you worry. The weather has been very rainy for the past week or so, and we're expecting even more. It's nice to finally be dry.

During our night in Hot Springs we enjoyed an AYCE spaghetti dinner at the community center and had ice cream with our friend Bark, Berry, Otter, and Flatlander. It was sad to leave them, especially because now as we continue on the trail most everyone already has an established group of hiker friends. It was so nice for Hannah to have some 'girl' time with Berry. There aren't very many girls on the trail, so it was nice to connect with her and encourage each other. I am so thankful for the opportunity of getting to know her and hope that we meet again someday.

A few nights after leaving hot springs, we stopped to camp at a random spot along the trail near a creek just down the hill from some other hikers. I (Hannah) woke up around 2 am from a horrible dream of a bear trying to get into our tent. We had recently heard about a bear tearing up someone's tent just 2 nights ago. In my dream I was camping with my mom and I couldn't wake her up. No sound would come from my voice so I couldn't yell. Finally I woke up and what do you know, but right outside our tent I heard slow big footsteps walking through the leaves of something that couldn't have been anything but a bear (I've heard lots of wildlife in the woods). I woke mike up and the footsteps stopped so he didn't hear anything. I started praying that the Lord would protect us and our food that was hanging not too far away. A few minutes later they returned and we heard the animal turn around and walk away.
I was too scared to fall back asleep, but the Lord reminded me of something I had just read earlier that night from a chapter about Faith in a book that my friend Todd had given me.
'The testing of your faith provides steadfastness. Ask in faith with no doubting....My peace I give to you. Let not your hearts be troubled, neither let them be afraid...According to the riches and glory in Christ, ask and it will begiven to you...'
There was no need for me to be scared. I had asked the Lord to protect us, so He would. Then I peacefully fell asleep and woke up alive and well the next morning.
Another cool thing is that after talking to my mom today, she was awoken around 2am that same night and felt lead to pray for us. Cool, huh?

Hot Springs, NC

We've made it to Hot Springs, NC just in time for the Trailfest! There's a spaghetti dinner and a free movie tonight at the outfitters. Here's some new pictures:

Newfound Gap to Hot Springs, NC

The past couple days have been long and hard, as we've done 25 and 23 mile days to get here in time for the trailfest. On our way we've passed the oldest person to hike the trail, an 86 year old man who set the record a few years back, but it was broken by another person, so he is back on the trail to set the record again as the oldest thru-hiker. We've met some new friends including 3 old guys from Massachusetts- Uncle Noel, Smirk, and Oatmeal. They are lots of fun and remind us of an old-time comedy group. Unfortunately we've passed them and probably won't see them again. Also, we met "Lion King" who is a filmmaker and a bit of a celebrity on the trail (http://www.walkingwithfreedom.com/). In the meantime we have caught up with our friends Bark & Berry - the couple from Louisville. Tonight we'll have a final dinner with them (since we'll be passing them too) to talk about our experiences thus far, and then head back out tomorrow. They are part of a ministry called AT Servants, and Bark is a Kanakuk alum. It is refreshing and encouraging to talk about the Lord with them.

Tomorrow we head back on the trail and will be in Erwin, TN in a couple days.

New Pictures

We have a new picture album online! Click on the image below to see it.

Dicks Creek Gap to Newfound Gap (Gatlinburg, TN)

Love & Wildlife

Thank you friends and family, for all of your love! We arrived in Gatlinburg yesterday but had to wait until this morning for the post office to open so that we could get our packages. We went up to the counter, told the clerk our name, and he came back with a stack of about 7 packages containing lots of love and goodies! Thank you!!! Unfortunately we can't take everything with us back on the trail, so we shared a lot of it with our new hiker friends. Everyone was so grateful to share in such wonderful treats!

On another note, we've seen lots of cool wildlife while on the trail....still, no bears.....but LOTS of birds. TO name a few: Ruffed grouse, wild turkeys, belted kingfishers, downy woodpeckers, LOTS of pileated woodpeckers, chimney swifts, eastern phoebes, purple martins, american robins, white-breasted nuthatches, pine warblers, yellow-rumped warblers, northern bluebirds, baltimore orioles, and TONS of Dark-eyed Juncos. In addition to birds, we've also seen eastern cottontails, red squirrels, gray squirrels, chipmunks, newts, salamanders, and of course.....mice!

We took a zero day today so that we would have time to go to the post office, grocery store, and to get a little taste of Gatlinburg. It's very much like International Drive in Orlando, except with mountains in the background and wedding chapels all around. Tomorrow morning we head back on the trail and start doing around 20 miles a day. We should reach Hot Springs on the 24th, in time for the hiker festival there, and will hopefully have a chance to soak our tired bodies in the hot springs.

Fontana Dam

Hi! We're in Fontana Dam which is a tiny resort town in North Carolina--it's like a strange mini-Disney; we just paid almost $70.00 for 2 1/2 days worth of groceries! There's a nice lake here, though. We'll be in Gatlinburg soon and will upload more pictures and a longer post. Tomorrow we enter the Great Smoky Mountains National Park and we'll be going in and out of Tennessee and North Carolina for the next week or so. Thanks for reading!

North Carolina

We finally reached our 2nd state, North Carolina yesterday, and crossed the 100-mile mark today. Yesterday we hiked through a lightning and thunder storm, and had hail hit us after setting up camp, but today we are nice and dry and staying the night in Franklin. Tomorrow we will enjoy an all-u-can-eat pancake breakfast at a local Baptist church. Happy Easter!
My (hannah's) knee is doing a lot better, due to the more gradual declines in NC. Thanks for your prayers and I'll always be appreciative of more :)
Mike finally has a trail name - EarlyBeard - due to us being the earlybirds every morning and leaving camp before the rest of the hikers, and also because everyone comments on him already having a big beard before starting the trail.
It's amazing how much time you have to think while hiking. Usually there is a hymn going through my head, as those provide a good walking rhythm, as well as 10 other thoughts and ideas. The Doxology is what always pops in in the morning, and it suits our journey quite well:

Praise God from whom all blessings flow,
Praise Him all creatures here below,
Praise Him above, ye heavenly hosts,
Praise Father, Son, and Holy Ghost.

We've seen signs of bears, but no actual sightings yet. In 2 days we will be reaching the Great Smoky Mountains National Park which has the highest population of black bears in the country, so we are almost guaranteed to have an encounter.

Send us things!

Around April 18th we'll be getting to Gatlinburg, TN. If anyone would like to send us a package with some goodies (nothing too heavy!), you can do so by addressing a package as follows:

Mike and Hannah O'Malley
c/o General Delivery
Gatlinburg, TN 37738
"Please hold for A.T. hiker expected on 18 April”

Be sure the package arrives by the 16th of April. Hannah loves Reese's peanut butter eggs and dried cherries. Mike will take anything. Also, please put things in ziplock bags in case they leak or melt.

Snow, snow, snow, snow, SNOW!

Yesterday it snowed a lot! We felt like we were walking through Narnia the first time the children come out of the wardrobe. It was my (hannah's) 3rd time seeing snow, and it reminded me once again of why I am so thankful to live in FL. It's very nice to be in a warm house with dry feet. We are taking a zero day and staying with Robert Brewer and his wife. Robert is a world famous honey judge that we met at the UF Bee College.
We've met some wonderful people along the trail, and were traveling along with a little pack until the snow came. To name a few....Bark & Berry - a couple our age from Lousville, Sandy- a retired Scottish man from Australia, Itai - a young adventurer from Israel, Gypsy - a crazy and hilarious chef from Ocala.
We love being on the trail and actually miss it while taking this day off, but we need the rest for our weary bodies.

A verse that my mom gave us the day before we left:
"Remember how the Lord your God led you all the way into the (mountains) these next (4 1/2 months), to humble you and to test you in order to know what was in your heart, whether or not you would keep his commands....Your clothes did not wear out and your feet did not swell during this time. Know then in your heart that as a man disciplines his son, so the Lord your God disciplines you. Observe the commands of the Lord your God, working in His ways and revering Him. For the Lord your God is bringing you into a good land - a land with streams and pools of water, with springs flowing in the valleys and hills...when you have eaten and are satisfied, praise the Lord your God for the good land He has given you." Deuteronomy 8:2-10

Please pray for my knee as it hurts and is swollen at the end of each day.

Daylight over the mountains

We've made it to Hiawassee, GA--we're doing great! We only have one more day of Georgia hiking before we hit North Carolina. We're staying with a friend here, and it's great to be indoors because it's snowing outsite! We went out to a great Mexican restaurant tonight--what a treat! I'm attaching a picture album of our journey thus far. Our feet are doing great: Mike has 2 small blisters, Hannah has none. Regarding trail names, some friends we met named Hannah "Good Spot" because everytime they saw us we were camping or taking a break in a beautiful spot on the mountain. Mike is still trail-name-less: any suggestions?

Springer Mtn to Dicks Creek Gap

We did buy a new tent (Big Agnes Seedhouse SL2 for those keeping track). It's a bit smaller and a bit heavier but it actually keeps the rain on the outside which gives us great peace of mind. Last night we experienced some sideways blowing hail and had to come off the trail to get out of the storm. The temperature in our tent was about 29 degrees in the morning, but fortunately our sleeping bags kept us very toasty during the night. The picture below is the thermometer on my watch reading 29 degrees.

Snow started falling pretty steadily as we started walking towards Dicks Creek Gap (where the road to Hiawassee meets the trail). Below you see the start of our snowy walk on Tuesday morning. It began snowing very hard soon afterward and there were some beautiful (but cold!) scenes, but our camera ran out of battery power.

We expect to be in Franklin, NC in about 3-4 days, so you can expect the next update then. We are really enjoying the trail and having a fantastic time together!!Thanks for reading.

At Neels Gap

We've arrived at the Mountain Crossings hostel at Neel's Gap--it's pretty nice here. It has rained everyday so far, and we've learned that nothing is really water proof after being subjected to enough rain. We're staying in a bunk house with about 15 other thru-hikers, and we're considering buying another tent snice ours leaked so much last night! We've met a lot of great people so far, and we're having a great time. I've only got a few minutes, so I'll post pictures when we stop next which will be in Hiawassee, GA on Tuesday afternoon. Thanks for reading!

Finally starting

I've just finished a 4th helping of Hannah's uncle's fabulous Brunswick Stew! Thanks to all of you who voted in the poll...

We're finally hitting the trail in the morning, but by the time most of you read this, we will be on our way to Maine. Our packs feel heavier than expected, but comparably lighter than previous backpacking trips we have taken. We'll be heading 5-7 miles each day for the first week or so. We're carrying 3 days' worth of food, and our first planned resupply point is Mountain Crossings at Walasi-Yi which is on top of Blood Mountain--the highest peak on the AT in Georgia (4458') and is supposedly the spot of a battle between the Creek and Cherokee tribes in the late 1600's. If there's internet available there, we'll post an update and some pictures. Thanks for reading.

Our first picture

We're currently staying the night at our friends Ericson and Jen's house. Hannah's parents are here as well, and we'll be heading to Georgia with them in the morning. I'm posting a picture to test how easy (or difficult) it will be to do this on the trail from computers that are not our own. The picture is of me using silicone to seal the seams on our tent so the rain doesn't get through!

Before we get on the Trail

Updates before we go

Hello. I think it might be interesting for those reading to see some of the specifics about our trip, e.g., what exactly we will be carrying in our packs, what we plan to eat, and where we plan to be each day. I've begun to post these things on the site; I hope you enjoy and leave intriguing comments. 

We're in full gear tying up all the loose ends before we leave Gainesville and our jobs here. Those belongings that we decided not to keep have either been sold or donated to an organization (or friends). Hannah's parents are coming up to Gainesville on Sunday (29 March), and we're leaving Monday morning and heading to Georgia where we will stay the night at Hannah's aunt and uncle's house; I'm really hoping that Hannah's uncle will make his famous Brunswick stew--it's amazing! We'll be up and out early Tuesday morning and will hit the trail by Tuesday afternoon, I expect.

The first week we're only scheduled to go 5-7 miles per day. We'll gradually increase our mileage each week until we're averaging about 20-25 miles each day. That should put us in Maine in mid-August!

We are very excited about getting started on this journey. Thanks for reading

Welcome to Mike and Hannah O'Malley's blog about hiking the Appalachian Trail in 2009.