Rebecca Sperry

It has been exactly one month since I finished what has been more or less 3 years of nonstop hiking (with cancer treatment sprinkled in the mix) and in the last month more than just my knees are welcoming the break from throwing down thousands of miles on the relentless trails of the Northeast. From June 19, 2022 until October 29, 2023, I hiked over 2,000 miles with over 600,000 feet of elevation gain while working part time and running a household. I turned hiking into my full time job and had to put everything that wasn’t essential on hold. All of my other interests, graduate school, and anything that didn’t qualify as necessary to keep things running smoothly were put on the back-burner and I am happy to say that I am finally able to return to a normal routine (something that 2020 Rebecca never would’ve expected to hear herself say).

Although I’ve never completed a long distance backpacking trip, I imagine that some of what I experienced in the last 16 months many thru-hikers can relate to. The sense that your entire day is dictated by miles completed, having to narrow your focus down to just hiking, and even forgetting what day of the week it is are all things that I’ve experienced in the last year and a half. I had to become a hiking machine and in order to do so, I adopted various routines that made things easier for me. Packing my food bags on Sundays for the week, doing the same laundry over and over again because all I wore was a handful of outfits, and spending my free time resting, writing, or eating; by month 14 I was ready for my hiking journey to end.

My own face began to reflect the same look I’ve seen on northbound AT thru-hikers many times. Weariness, exhaustion, wanting to be done but still having a few hundred miles left. I felt like those final 200 miles were never going to end. That they were stretching off into eternity. It might as well have been 2,000,000 miles. As the days grew shorter and my weather window narrowed down to weeks before snowfall, I knew I had to either put off the remaining hikes until the following summer or grind them out fast. After taking ten days off hiking I rose from the ashes and found the strength within myself to get the last 6 hikes done that I needed to do in order to complete every trail in the White Mountain Guidebook.

I still had 4 hikes remaining to complete a timed attempt to hike every trail in the guidebook, but after finishing that final piece of trail for a lifetime completion of the guidebook, I had had enough hiking. Redoing trails I have done before just for the sake of some pointless goal that I created back in 2019 felt not only anticlimactic, it felt like it would take away from the joy I experienced when I did my final trail. With 97.6% of the trails completed in 16 months 10 days, I quit my timed attempt, went home, and slowly began the reintegration into a normal life again.

What I’ve realized throughout these last 17 months is that I am more than just a hiker, and being multifaceted, multidimensional, and a contributing member of society are really important to me. Back when I worked full time as a teacher, I dreamed of being a full time hiker one day. In fact, part of what drove me to leave my job in education was the hope that someday I could make hiking my full time job. Now, after living that dream for 16 months, I am very sure I do not want hiking to be my full time job. Turning a passion into a career will take some of the fun out of it regardless of what passion it is. Whether it’s writing, reading, hiking, or any number of other things that interest me, turning those things into a full time job means doing them even when I don’t feel like it. I knew that this was the case, but wanted to believe that I loved hiking so much that it would never feel like a job, even if it was one.

In the last month, I’ve hiked 3 times and couldn’t be happier about that. I went from going hiking anywhere from 2 to 5 days a week down to 1 day a week and although I am still burnt out on it, those 3 hikes were really nice. It felt good to hike because I wanted to, not because I had to. To do trails that weren’t death marches and only drive 2 hours instead of 4 or 5. Working a job with normal hours, being around people, writing a ton, and doing the things that I’ve had to put off for years because I’ve been too busy, has been wonderful. I sacrificed a lot to accomplish this hiking goal and even though I came 4 hikes short of my original plan, I still hiked every trail in the guidebook, something only 96 of us have done. What I learned in the last 16 months about my own abilities, strength, and determination I never could’ve learned if I hadn’t been fortunate enough to be able to complete this hiking journey. But in completing it, I realized that there is more to me than just hiking. I found new interests and had old ones reignited, things that I can now give the time and attention to because I’m not having to focus all of my energy on one part of who I am.

So during this winter, I am looking forward to what the future holds. I’m looking forward to things that I once saw as in the way of what I wanted to be doing back when I thought that hiking full time was the ultimate goal. And I am grateful for all that I was able to learn about myself over the last 16 months. Most importantly that I am more than just a hiker and there is more to life than just hiking.