Saying Our Goodbyes

Past.
In the last two months, I quit my job, moved out of my house, and got married. Crazy right? It’s taken years of hard work for both me and Savanna to get to this point but I am happy to say so far it has been well worth all the sacrifices. I’ve never felt more love and purpose in my life than I do right now and I think those two things can be hard to come by so I am very lucky and grateful to experience this life. The wedding was beautiful, despite the rain we enjoyed every minute. It was a small intimate wedding– around 70 people attended, mostly family. We decided on a small wedding one because big crowds scare us and two because who wants to plan a huge wedding on top of a 6-month hiking trip? We opted for the hiking trip obviously. It turned out to be a good choice, the wedding turned out better than I could ever have imagined! A celebration of love and beauty that felt 100 % true to us and our journey together.

After the wedding, we stayed at a small air bnb for a couple of nights just to relax and decompress before we headed out. The plan was to leave directly after but Savanna came down with the flu, plus our start date had a 100% chance of rain so despite my anxiety and feeling like somehow this was a failure we postponed. We now plan to start March 11, three days from now.

Future.
Tomorrow morning my new sister-in-law Caysh is driving us 10 hours to the lodge at Amicalola Falls state park where we’ll spend the night. Friday morning bright and early after we say goodbye to Caysh and take a selfie in front of the stone arch that marks the start of the trail, we’ll take our first steps on our 2,000-mile journey to Maine. Our bags are packed with enough food and supplies to get us at least the first 30 miles to Neels Gap, Georgia. From there it’s gonna be a series of jumps from town to town, planning as we go about what food to buy and which town we hike to next. I’m still a little nervous about the resupplying in towns. On all our previous backpacking trips me and Savanna bought our food at the grocery store before we left. I am reassured though by reading and watching stories online of previous hikers and how they handled it, also the statistic that 3,000 – 5,000 hikers visit these towns every year.

Present.
That is tomorrow and if Savanna has taught me one thing it is to face each day as they come because your anxiety is only as valid as your ability to predict the future. So I’m going to finish this blog, eat and try my best to enjoy my last night in Ohio!
Thank you for joining us on our journey! Feel free to reach out and contact me either here in the comments or on Instagram @kaldroga. I’m sure I will be getting lonely in the upcoming months and I am always open to feedback and criticism of my blog.