Let’s Talk AT Gear!

The closer I get to starting my AT thru hike, the more I get asked about what gear I’m taking for this or that. I love gear talk so I can go on and on about what goes in my pack and why. I run through a lot of important kit here, but my comprehensive AT thru hiker gear list can be found here.

Why I’m not Ultralight
Since my base weight (pack weight w/o food & water) will be around 20 lbs I’m far from ultralight. This is for a few reasons. Cost is of course the greatest enemy in lightweighting my gear. I set an ambitiously low gear budget when I first starting planning for the hike. I wasn’t quite able to meet that goal but it still set an ethos for gear shopping. Another reason is that in most cases I’ve been updating gear rather than starting from scratch. This has brought a TON of compromise. My gear can be split into 3 categories.

Continue reading to learn more about gear needed for a AT thru hike, written by Collin Horne.