We always end our preparation and training for a pilgrimage walk with three “big” hikes. The first is a 20mi hike at Hanging Rock State park. Being very honest, I never look forward to this one. This year was no exception. First, it is a long hike. After 20mi, I have gone through the typical tiredness of hiking, the nice middle phase where I feel pretty good and enjoy the time outdoors. Then the problems start. I often get cramps in my shins, or I have a sore spot on a toe, or general fatigue sets in and I stumble a bit.

“Why then do we do it”, you might ask. Well the answer is two-fold. First, we do it to remind ourselves to never intentionally schedule a 20mi hike when we are on our actual walk. There is some temptation (for me anyway) to build in a buffer of time to allow for a contingency. This is probably well in-grained from having depression-era parents. So when planning a route, I am tempted to push harder at the beginning to build that buffer. This hike reminds me of the consequences of that approach. Twenty miles with full backpacks and 2890ft of elevation gain HURTS.

The second reason is to remind me that we CAN do this. Inevitably there will be a time when our planned lodging fails, or we walk 17mi and then have to make a grocery run that adds an additional 3mi at the end of the day. This hike gives me the confidence that it can be done – even if it is not comfortable. So when I’m tired at the end of the day and Allison and Nadine are as well, it is easy to get selfish and say “No way – I can’t do it – I just can’t”…I can reflect back at this hike and have comfort in knowing that I can, and often should, push a bit more if it helps us all in the long run.

Well, this past weekend was THAT hike. We did our scheduled 20mi hike on a hot and humid day. We climbed almost 3000ft in elevation and drank gallons of water along the way. Check,… done!

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Thank You to everyone who has signed up to the VLOG recently. A note to you all. Please take the time to scan all of the pages of OnceLostTrio. There is a Maps page, and an FAQ page that you might find interesting to have read at least once. If you haven’t been following until recently, check out the few previous entries within the VLOG itself.

The History Page is a work in progress, but it should be ready soon. My thought is that you might follow along with us and understand better the places through which we will be walking.

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We are only three weeks away from our departure so things are really going at full speed now. Allison and I have both created a gear review (video editing in progress), I have Nadine scheduled to give the next VLOG update, so you will get to hear from her soon.

Finally…meet the OnceLostTrio – our character actors for our video bumper. The characters were developed from a staged picture we took last weekend before the hike. Bet you can not guess which is which!