>> Rather than do that, I just scoop the water out of the puddles with my bottles — with my water purification system (iodine crystals which diffuse into a glass bottle of water, then add the resulting solution to impure water and wait twenty minutes), I don’t need to worry about filtering or wasting my time in the rain.

[It's just rain water, no different from any stream or river I used as a fill-up spot. Iodine has a long history of use as a purification method, most notably in the military, and I never suffered any ill effects from it in my time out — although, it should be noted, the bottle says "not for long-term use" on it. My plan was always to use that as long as I could without ill effect and only then switch to something else (filter, chlorine dioxide, or something else); happily no such problems ever occurred, so my total expenses for water purification along all 2174-odd miles of the Appalachian Trail was perhaps $15 or so. (I had the iodine prior to the trip and don't remember its original cost, but it was definitely under $20. Every other system out there costs much more and is much more hassle to use, as long as water's plentiful enough that you can avoid too many "floaters" that a filter or bandanna would remove.)]

[Nope -- but I did see him in Monson back in Maine, and I mentioned him in one of my first posts. I hadn't heard of him since the Kennebec in Maine; nice to know he's still out there somewhere! I knew very little of how anyone behind me was doing unless I'd recently passed them and had an idea of their usual pace (and you really don't know a person's pace until you're south of the White Mountains, since it's impossible to reach cruising pace before then).]

If you get this before Springer (maybe at the Walasi-Yi), allow me to give you a piece of advice you may not be getting in spades this late in the season: if you can skip the approach trail, do it. It doesn’t count. Sit around for an hour. Wait for some tourists. Yogi a ride back down. Totally worth it.

[Oh, I had very little desire to hike the approach trail, and my scheduling of my flight home and the pace I had to sustain the past week to make it basically precluded doing it at all. For anyone ever considering a thru-hike, deadlines are an insidious evil which should be avoided at all costs. (Goals are fine and probably essential to success, but any goal which has serious consequences if not met is a mental burden more than something to aspire to reach.)

As for the "mysterious breed" thing, likewise, but vice versa. I'm not exactly a creature of solitude, but it doesn't seem like it's really possible to do much of the hike without being surrounded by other thru-hikers. On the other hand, an early-going southbounder with a respectable pace will hike near other thru-hikers sometimes and will hike alone sometimes, and he has a choice of which he wants — just vary his hiking pace to catch up to someone ahead or match the pace of someone behind or level. I had a modicum of company for most of the hike and solitude for the rest, interspersed so that I never went too long with either, but it never really got too crazy. I don't think I could expect the same from a northbound hike.

Early on I used to say that if I ever did another A.T. thru-hike I'd do it the direction I hadn't done it, but the more I understand of the northbound experience, the more I think it's not really what I'd want, unless I started before March or made similar effort to avoid the pack. I don't think I'd want to do that, so I think I'd be more likely to do another southbound than northbound — but there are so many other things to do first that odds are I probably won't get to either, so it's probably a moot question anyway.]

[They are relevant because they're by a Mozilla contributor; that the subject matter isn't Mozilla-related is my own personal choice. Delete or Next are easy to access, and I still make no apologies for syndicating the entire blog. As for length, I know some people who do read the entire things, and this is half for my own edification anyway.]