Sending self food vs. on trail resupply

[MarkCevoli]

So I am debating how to tackle food on my upcoming thru hike.

I am considering two main things here

1. spending as little money as possible but to the point of taking away from the experience
2. Trying to be a little more healthy and diverse in the food I can eat on the trail

I am thinking if I go to BJs and stock up on ingredients make a huge thing of gorp, muesli, bulk dried milk, bulk nuts, bulk granola bar, bulk whatever isn't perishable and cheaper to buy a lot of. The second part of this plan is to get a dehydrator (seems like I can get one for 40$ at JCPenny or something) and dehydrate a variety of meat, fruits, and veggies to put in the ramen and rice and all that stuff that is more dinner like.

The downside here is that I will be relying on the post more than I originally wanted to, and that is also another expense, every box would be like what 5$ to send? Say I get one every 2 weeks for 5 months thats another 50$. I would supplement the box every other week with a short shop in town.

Now. Is the added variety and more access to vegetables, plus the savings in buying everything in large quantities enough of a benefit to go this route instead of just buying all my stuff in town.

[Miner]

Argument for buying as you go:
I got sick of eating the same 8-9 things every week and wanted some real variety.
My resupply boxes get dumped into the hiker boxes and I end up buying food anyway
Buying as you go requires less pre-planning and no help of an outside party mailing to you, so it's easier to go this route.
You can always

Arguement for sending boxes from home:
More nutritionally balanced food sent from home
Can send hard to find stuff from home
I have dietary restrictions that are hard to cater to in small stores
I have enough backpacking experience that I know what I want to eat on the trail and prefer the stuff from home
Too hikers fall into a rut where the only variety they are buying as they go is changing up what flavor of Korr's sides or pop tarts they buy.

If you lack experience with long trails, you don't appreciate what your body may want to eat a month into the trip which is the problem many have with supplies sent from home. If you have someone at home that can adjust the food in your boxes based on your experiences and cravings, then you can make this work. Many don't which is why most people recommend resupplying in towns along the trail. People who have some long distance experience have a better understanding of what they want to eat so it's easier for them to plan their meals ahead of time. I personally prefer the food I make at home as I find that I actually eat a wider variety of food then I tend to buy in towns along the trail. Some towns have poor selection due to size. Others have a full supermarket. What works for many is a hybrid approach. Buying as you go at the better resupplies and having packages sent to the rest. You can buy food in one town and send it ahead to a another town if you don't want to do it at home. Or have a box sent from home.

Shipping boxes has gotten expensive recently. $5 doesn't seem like enough for much of the trail except the areas more local to you. Most people recommend using Priority Mail instead of regular parcel which costs more. Priority Mail is more likely to show up on time. Priority Mail boxes always go out each day, but regular parcel boxes only go if there is room so they can sit for awhile at places. With Priority Mail, you can forward a box to another post office or send it home for free if you don't open the box. So if a box shows up late, you don't have to wait for it if you are willing to buy locally and can have that late box sent ahead to the next town for free. I'd budget at least $10 on average. Have your box person prepay online using the click and ship option of generating your own label and postage at home to save additional money on shipping costs. However, shipping costs can be offset if you are buying food in bulk packaging. Say a large box of mash potatoes and repackaging it into ziplocs rather then buying the more expensive individual sides that many who resupply on the trail use.

[Lone Wolf]

what happens if you quit a week or month into the hike? happens all the time. best to buy as you go

[Miner]

I forgot to mention this, but another thing you can do with buying as you go is having supplementary food sent to you occasionally that you mix with the food you buy in trail towns. Things such as dehydrated veggies, dehydrated ground beef, or hard to find items you want can be mailed periodically to you on the trail; say once a month. The extra you can bounce ahead 2 weeks in your bounce box.

[Slo-go'en]

Many a wannabe thru hiker has bought 6 months of food before hand, only to find they quit after a few weeks or a month. Then what do you do with all that food your not gonna want to ever eat again?

[MarkCevoli]

YEs I think the supplemental idea is good. Buy up in bulk the expensive and hard to find stuff, which is essentially nuts and dehydrated veggies, and buy everything else as I go. Maybe pack 3 or 4 boxes and receive that at various points in the trip or when the stuff gets more expensive up North, or so I hear its more expensive up north. I understand that people quit and all that, but im not planning this hike as if there is a possibility im quitting that just seems ridiculous to me. I spent the 1200 on gear or whatever I spent, whats another couple hundred on food to make things better if I do make it?

[semicolon]

Many a wannabe thru hiker has bought 6 months of food before hand, only to find they quit after a few weeks or a month. Then what do you do with all that food your not gonna want to ever eat again?

Well, you eat it on your next outing(s)... I hear this all the time about possible overstocked dehydrated meals. OK maybe I dont finish my thru hike. But that doesn't mean I quit my outdoor lifestyle. I will still have meals for my next hike, my next kayak, my next ...you name it.
I'd rather have a leftover stock of good FBC meals than have to rely on pop tart, knorrs and ramen on a thru . But that's just me.

[garlic08]

Go hybrid. Start the trail with a month's worth of resupply. If you want to continue that process and are still on the trail, take a day off in a bigger trail town, buy bulk at a grocery, make a few more boxes for the next month of hiking, and mail them to yourself up the trail.

That way you're more self-sufficient, not depending on someone at home to mail box X to location Y.

Hiker boxes in towns are full of home-made dehydrated meals. That idea doesn't always work.

[Malto]

I did mailed resupplies and it worked very well. But I also had massive variety with 17 different dinners and likely as many breakfasts. The main reason I went this route was that I mailed 85 lbs of Maltodextrin to myself which was one of my primary fueling sources. While there are downsides with mailing you can minimize those with a bit of prep and variety. One example, I had 12 different flavors of jams and jellies for my lunches. I had a great mystery everyday on which flavors were for that day. (It's the little things.)

my 85lbs of Malto was a major risk, would I get sick of it consuming it for 98 days? Even here I stacked the deck in my favor by having over a dozen flavor combinations. I never got sick of it. (I had also used it for a year prior on shorter hikes.). but as others mentioned, way too many hikers think they are going to eat the same mystery goo day after day. Hiker boxes are full of this. I tended to mail and supplement with town food. I found this much quicker and consistent, my goal for resupply. but you will get cravings like Hostess Blackberry pies, I bought most stores out of these when I found them.

[Tprunty8]

Admittedly, I'm a newbie, but a hybrid approach makes sense to me. I plan to make up some healthy meals to be mailed, and supplement as I makes decisions along the way. I plan to go FBC as much as possible. I just picked up a variety box of dehydrated veggies from HArmony House, added bases and flavorings, and I love them. Check them out, their running a great special through the end of January.

[Slo-go'en]

Food has a shelf life, especially if you don't package it properly. Be sure to get a good vacuum/heat sealer and store the food in a cool place. Don't forget to label it too. Trying to guess what a mystery meal in the hiker box is, is always a fun game.

Don't make your packages too big. You don't want to get a 10 pound package when you already have 3 pounds of stuff in your pack. That's one of the big problems with mail drops unless you have someone who can make up the packages as you need them and you can let them know what and how much you need at the time. So much mail drop food is either given away or thrown away due to getting too much or what you don't want at the time.

[RED-DOG]

On both my NOBO's I bought 100% of my food as I went up the trail, I didn't have any issues with finding the right kind of food and I feel that the cost of buying as you go and doing mail drops is the same, however on my 96 Flip-Flop I did 50/50 and the mail drops became a major pain in the butt so I quit doing them, however if I was going to do AT thru again and I probably will I would have a few mail drops.
these are the places where I would have a few drops.

1 Mountain Crossings at Walasi-yi in Neels Gap. ( just way to expensive to buy food their ).
2 Fontana dam ( at the Fontana Village Lodge ).and I would have enough food here to get me through the park without going into Gatlinburg TN, Gatlinburg is not hiker friendly.
3 Standing bear farm Hostel ( 2 days of food here just enough to get you to Hot Springs ) Curtis waits to late to stock up so he might not have much when you get their.
4 Kincora Hostel ( Bob Peoples does take people into town for supplies but in my opinion a mail drop here would be easier ).
5 Monson ME ( is has always been my hardest and most expensive resupply on the entire AT ).

that's it the rest of the trail you should no problem buying what you need.

[Elewolf]

RED-DOG just totally changed my mind. I may only make 5-6 boxes rather than 10-12...

Good advice!

[colorado_rob]

Just another opinion, I've had total success with the mail thing. Even with the cost of mailing (medium flat-rate priority box = $13), I'm sure this saves me money as I pre-buy the trail food at a deep discount, for example, Costco carries 10-packs of freeze dried foods for $40 and also carries big boxes of trail snacks, bars, jelly beans, nut mixes, you name it way cheaper than grocery stores. I also have a few staples that I like particulars of, like 2-3 Starbucks vias/day (also way cheaper at Costco) and non-food items like TP and vitamins/Ibuprofen, which I add to my boxes. Of course this also works for swapping out gear for changing seasons, etc.

I have found over the years that one can certainly easily over-pack mailed boxes, so I generally purposely under-pack and I nearly always walk into a resupply town with leftover food. In that town, I take inventory with the mailed box of food and supplement with a store stop or not, probably about 50/50. Occasionally I've bounced a box when some timing/situation changed. This is all so easy to do, I cannot imagine doing the full shopping thing in town for resupply, but that's just me. I pack a decent variety of foods I think, and again, supplement in towns to add more variety.

One rookie mistake I did do early on the AT was to mail to a post office vs. a hostel or hotel/whatever: this is a bad idea unless you're sure you won't be arriving in that town on a weekend after noon on Saturday. My very first resupply in Hiawassee cost me a down-day because I made this rookie mistake, never did it again, only mailed to a PO when I was sure I'd be arriving early-mid week at that location (in case I was running behind, not unusual).

Another aspect: I have a wife at home who graciously mails the later boxes (I mailed the first few myself). This whole process would be problematic if you don't have a good friend/spouse/family member to do this chore for you.

[Elewolf]

Also an excellent point, Colorado rob! In my mind I don't see it being a great hassle, but a lot of people make it out to be overkill. To me it's about eating calorie dense/inexpensive foods until you hit a good restaurant or meal at a hostel or something. Mail drops make sense to me for at least 25% of our meals, but I keep going back and forth. God bless you, Whitblaze.

[Grinch]

what happens if you quit a week or month into the hike? happens all the time. best to buy as you go
I have been reading that people suffer from joint and muscle inflammation. The bodies recovery process is inhibited by bad fats and eating "gas station snacks". So maybe people wouldn't be so inclined to quit if they brought healthier homemade food. Just saying.

[Grampie]

Just a few points: 1- you may prepair a lot of mail drops and have to abort your hike. 2- You may prepair food drops before you go but your food wants will change so you will by more along the way. 3- It can be a pain to always have to go to the post office for a pick up. 4- Eat good in town. 5- you can resupply along the way every 4-5 day. 6- withmail drops you will carry a heavier pack.