It’s getting real…

I have been preparing for so long, and was thinking I was starting way too early, but now I am 3 months from my start and I don’t feel ready at all! So many things seem wrong: equipment, mental and physical preparation, budget, even the weather doesn’t look like it should be!!! I look at people in North Carolina mountains and feel so sad for them, but at the same time I feel bad for myself because it makes my experience way more stressful… Will I find water? Food? Transportation? How are bears reacting to that complete shift in the geography of their world? Are they going to be more aggressive? Am I panicking? YES!!!!

Just an example so you can crawl a little under my skin and into my brain…. My backpack. This is one, if not the, first item I bought for that adventure. I started, rather conservatively, with a  Osprey Ariel 65. And then I read posts on the Trek. Lots of them. Which made me think that I need to go as ultralight as possible because of my age, my long period of inactivity, my relative endurance to tons of weight on my back, my family concerns…

So I went to more extreme weight cutting and got myself a Crown 3 60L, size M/L. For a while (a year or so) I was happy with it, but of course it did not last… Two weeks ago, I went for an 8 miles back and forth in 2 days, on relatively flat terrain, with 35 pounds in my backpack, and ended up with a terrible shoulder pain. Back to square 1….

Discussing with my husband, we realized I would probably be happier with the small size. So I buy the small size, but still there is something with the fitting that doesn’t suit my body, so I return the small size… I am now waiting for a Mariposa, size small, in the hope that this time it’s gonna work… 

Imagine the same process, the same hesitations, the same expenses, for about 15 items constituting my life in these 6 months of trail… Now I have 2 different versions of everything, like an extra backup for when the first one is gonna break… and a hole in my bank account!