Ready or Not: Time to Start Walking

 

 
By this time next week, I will be taking my first steps into my 5-month long walk along the Continental Divide. I will be attempting a north-bound journey, beginning on the New Mexico-Mexico boarder. Am I ready? I really hope so…

1. Gear testing: I took my gear up to a local mountain to test out its snow-worthiness overnight. It’s likely that I will be traveling in a fair amount of snow along the trail, so I wanted to test that out. It was collllllld. I’ll be making a couple adjustments, like adding a little more insulation, if I find myself sleeping on snowpack.  
   

   Camping a top Mt. Olympus on snow-pack: brrrr

    Otherwise, it passed the test. 
2. Practicing self-arresting techniques (stopping yourself when sliding down a snow-covered slope/glacier with an ice-tool) with my ice-axe has easily become the most fun I’ve had training; as well as simultaneously being the one skill I really do not want to use in real-life.  
   

   Practicing self-arrest techniques.

    
3. I’ve been out skiing, trail-running, and climbing, trying to build up some of my lost winter muscle. It’s that time of year, here in Utah, when you can follow-up your day in the mountains skiing with a nice trail run along the foot hills. Should be an interesting first couple of weeks breaking my body back into the thru-hike routine.  
   

   My last ski day of the year: the moment when ski-bum turns hiker-trash.

4.  Organizing chaos. This is easily the most organized I’ve ever had to be when planning a long-distance hike. Huge shout-out to Sister for her organizing skillz, for keeping me on track, and for being just as excited for this adventure as I am. The bills are paid, the job had been quit, the boxes and maps are sorted, the pack has been shaken-down, and a million other things have been arranged. Here we go!

Look for my updates along the trail this summer! 

You can also follow my adventure on Instagram! Follow me @kaytebrown