Yesterday I went over all of the gear we are starting the AT with and decided to break it up into two posts, mostly because of how long the post became with pictures. I only have a ten minute attention span with reading a blog post and I figured there are more like me! Lindsay and I have spent more time discussing clothing and weighing the options than we have any other singular task in our AT Planning. At 1230am the night before we left we had to bit the bullet and finally put clothes into bags!

I knew, more or less, what I would need for starting this hike. I’ve spent many many weeks at a time in the woods through being a Ranger Student and an Infantry Platoon Leader and have a bit of experience helping me build my packing list. Luckily I have a bit of an unfair advantage over most AT Hikers; I know what boots I can walk hundreds of miles in, I know what layers I need at what temperatures and literally how many days I can walk in the same pair of socks by turning them inside out and how my feet react to the 18 pairs of wool boot socks I have in my drawer at home.  That helped me make a “Winter Packing List” that I will trade a pair of pants and a long sleeve for shorts and a t-shirt in a month or two when things warm up.

Clay’s Clothing List – Total Dry Weight: 13.1lbs

Clays initial clothing layout

Top -LL Bean Gore-Tex Shell, Mountain Hardwear Ghost Whisperer Jacket, Patagonia mid-layer pullover, Under Armour loose long sleeve, 2x wick-away T-shirts

Bottom – Marmot Rain Pants, Kuhl Pants, Kuhl Zip-off Pants, Helly Hansen Base Layer”Ranger Panties”

Feet – 2x Darn Tough Hiking Socks, 2x LL Bean Hiking Socks, Garmont T8 Boots (Mil-Spec) or Inov-8 trail running shoes, BIRKENSTOCKS!

Additional – Red Sox Baseball Cap, Nomex/Wool Gloves, OR Windguard Winter Hat, Black Diamond Balaclava, Oakley M-Frame Sunglasses, Bandana, Moutain Hardwear Calf-Gaiters

Lindsay’s Clothing List – Total Dry Weight: 8.3lbs

Lindsay has spent the last couple years doing quite a bit of hiking in Alaska and other parts of North America, and more or less has her clothing dialed in. Prior to leaving Maine Lindsay bought some new equipment, since she doesn’t have eight years of tax-payer provided hiking clothes like I do! The big purchases were new under layers, as most of hers was pretty worn out. New Icebreaker Merino underwear and sports bras and Darn Tough socks will be in her clothing bag for day one and we’ll see how it goes.

Lindsays clothing layout for the start of the Appalachian Trail

Top – Marmot Precip Rain Jacket, Mountain Hardwear Ghost Whisperer Jacket, Ibex Half-Zip Base Layer, Smartwool Base Layer, Wicking T-Shirt, Tank Top, 1x Lulu Sports bra, 1x Icebreaker Sports bra

Bottom – CostCo Rain Pants, Patagonia Pants, Lulu Skort, Patagonia Base Layer Pants, 3x Icebreaker Underwear

Feet – 3x Darn Tough Ankle Socks, 1x Darn Tough Knee High Sock, Dynafit Feline Ghost Shoe, Reef Sandals

Additional – OR Headband, Lulu Headband, Mountain Hardwear Calf Gaiters, Black Diamond Balaclava, Sunglasses “Pee Rags”

Combined Weight of Clothing: 21.4lbs

Total Weight of Gear and Clothing (Worn and Carried): 70.0lbs

This is about 10lbs over what we were hoping it would be. I guess we’ll have to trim some weight and then write about it in the next couple days!

As with everything, we’ll write a review of what we dropped, what we added and what we bought more of as the hike went on!