Stoves

Resupply

On average,² hikers went four days between resupply, with about two-thirds of hikers falling between one and ten days. This year, three hikers in the survey went extended periods between resupply; one hiker each said they went an average of 50, 55, and 60 days between resupply. One of the three reported they were dissatisfied with their resupply strategy, but didn’t offer more detail.

Hikers with dietary needs were significantly LESS likely to resupply at stores and were MORE likely to use mail drops or both, compared to hikers who did not have special dietary needs.³

Water Treatment

We asked hikers how often they filtered water they took from natural sources.

Overall, hikers tended to treat their water. Over three-quarters said they treated their water every time, which was a higher percentage of hikers than those who treated their water every time in 2018. Treating all water except direct spring water was the next most common response. Very few hikers said they never treated their water.

Illness

Only 2.2 percent of hikers in the survey (eight people) reported they contracted a waterborne illness during their 2019 trek. In past years, we found that people who filtered less often were more likely to contract waterborne illness. This year, since so few people contracted waterborne illness, we weren’t able to look into this.

TL;DR

• The majority of AT long-distance hikers use canister fuel stoves, the most common model being the MSR PocketRocket.
• Alcohol stoves decreased in popularity this year. These are typically handmade stoves from cat food-type cans.
• For people with dietary restrictions (such as vegetarian), canister fuel stoves are still the most common, but going without a stove was more common than it was for hikers with no dietary restrictions.
• The average number of days between resupply was four days, but up to ten days was common.
• About three-quarters (75%) of hikers primarily bought food in town, rather than using mail drops.
• However, mail drops were significantly more common for hikers with dietary restrictions. While mail drops used to be the norm on the AT, at this time, if you don’t have dietary restrictions, you probably don’t need to bother with mail drops.
• For the most part, hikers treated their water.
• Mid-size pumps, such as the Sawyer Squeeze, are the most popular type of water treatment system.
• This year, so few hikers contracted Lyme disease that it was impossible to get much information about how prevention tactics worked for them. About 60 percent used permethrin and about 32 percent checked daily for ticks.

Thank You!

Many thanks to all the hikers who participated in the survey! Congratulations for walking so far! I am grateful to Maggie Slepian and Zach Davis for their input and for distributing the survey. Thank you to everyone reading this for your patience with my delays in getting it out.

Want to Contribute to Next Year’s Surveys?

I will need some help next year to get all the survey posts done more quickly. If you are interested in helping with these posts next year, please contact The Trek. It would be especially helpful if you are familiar with R/R Studio statistical software and/or making graphs in Excel, and if you have done long-distance backpacking. Contact The Trek here if you would like to help.

More from the Annual Hiker Survey

Check out the 2019 overview post, as well as the posts on footwear, sleeping bags, shelter systems, and backpacks. To stay updated on the subsequent hiker survey posts, subscribe to The Trek newsletter.