A.T. or Bust ...

Spring has sprung, at least here in E. Texas - cool temperatures (52 degrees F when we left), strong, cold northern winds, green grass, trees in bud, and rivers and streams overflowing. Soon the flowers and tree leaves will soon be visible and ding to the riot of color that accompanies spring. As we drive down the road, heading east, we see and feel all of this plus more. Danny reviews his The A.T. Guide by David "AWOL" Martin as we discuss and finally decide exactly where we are headed. The final decision, Duncannon, Pennsylvania, we think.

His plan is to "flip-flop" the trail, but still hike it in its entirety. By "flip-flopping" he will not start at one and go straight through to the other end, but rather, start somewhere need the middle and go south to the southern terminus in Georgia, then drive back to the starting point and head north to the northern terminus in Maine. In this way he will hike a fairly flat area as he gets his hiking legs and in tune with the Trail. He has been hiking long distances since the first of the year but still feels that he has to "find" his legs.

The total distance is 1350+ miles to our detonation and we zero out our odometer.

 It will be interesting to see just how many miles we do with this trip. Our recent driving roundabout journey to Canada ended up having over 8000 miles in less than 5 weeks of travel. This time we are planning on being out  approximately 5-6 months but our actually driving will be less as it will be dependent on Danny's hiking. I will drop him off in the morning, locate the days stop for the night, then pick him up and returning to our stop for the night, each and every day.

We know what Danny will be doing this whole time, but what about me? What will I be doing? I have been throwing around the idea of going back to school to obtain my Master's Degree, just because I want to. Maybe I will take some classes towards that. Then I brought a very small rink-dink sewing machine and a couple of small projects with us. It is not just a matter of bringing the sewing machine, but with quilting there are the extras as well. So I also packed a travel iron, a rotary cutter and cutting board, and 2 projects and 3 ideas festering in the back of my mind. Of course, this will also require fabrics! I also brought a couple of needlework UFOs, of which Chrissy Cleo, Miss Cleo's alter ego, is the most important to be finished. However, reading, sewing, and introspection will be probably what I will be mostly doing for this segment of our life.

By the end of the day we had travelled 396miles which is more than we had expected and leaves around 1000 miles more to get to Danny's start ...