When should I go.

[OrionTheRanger]

Ok now I am planing a thru-hike when I get older, and the one thing I keep coming back to is: When do I go?

I would like to after highschool, but that bolds two problems.
-Starting college late
-I want to do a northbounder, and the AT website recomends starting in early May. I would have to start in mid June. Also bad.

I also considered after college, but that brings another problem. My friend Steven says he wants to go with me, but he is going to college to be a docter, and a Fighter Pilot(me) will finish college alot earlier then a Docter(him). So that means I just lost my hiking buddy.

I then thought of waiting till im older(like mid 30's) but by then i'm thinking I will have a family and kids. Would prefer not to abandon my family for 6 months...

What do you think I should do?

[rafe]

Figure out your priorities. Why not start college a semester later? By the way, most northbound thru hikers start between February and April. Mid-march is peak season at Springer.

[Skidsteer]

Study hard and graduate high school early?

[Trajectory]

You need to go for the gusto, boy. Do your hike before starting college.

Most high school graduations are over by late May. If not, consider skipping the formal graduation ceremony and heading out after the last class bell rings. Do you really want to delay your start by two weeks just so you can trot across the stage? Assuming a June 1 start date, you should be able to finish by October 15.

If it's a close finish, consult with a veteran hiker, such as Minnesota Smith. He'll be able to suggest a strategy and also recommend some good books to read while you're out there, to get a jump on your college education.

[OrionTheRanger]

Can you skip the first semester of a college then join it? Im not talking like a community college here. I want to to go the U.S. Air Force Academy. Im not sure they would be ok with that.

I dont really have a problem with missing the whole stage thing, but I'm sure my parents would. Big time. And is their something special about October 15?

[Skidsteer]

I And is their something special about October 15?

Yeah. Getting to Katahdin before the weather gets bad.

Why not go SOBO?

[OrionTheRanger]

I considered southbound but I know most people go Northbound. It is easier with the dramatic ending, Katahdin. And with most people doing that it will be fun to meet all the people. Make a few friends, tell some jokes, etc.

[Trajectory]

And is their something special about October 15?

There is something special about learning to spell, before you enter college.

[The General]

Get Packing, the Air Force can wait. Leave you parents a note on the refrigerator "Gone Hiking" and head for the wood's.

The road of life is full of pit falls some we will fall into and others we avoid but all will form part of life's rich tapestry. Don't wait until tomorrow it may never come.

[OrionTheRanger]

hehe, I sure hope I enjoy that hike because afterwards I would be killed...

i really couldnt care less about my spelling online. be glad im not using things like "omg i heart u so much ur so kool!" like most kids my age do...

[Nest]

i really couldnt care less about my spelling online. be glad im not using things like "omg i heart u so much ur so kool!" like most kids my age do...

Haha. Ok, as far as the Air Force Academy goes, I would talk to someone involved with the Academy about starting later. With a University it wouldn't matter, but military academies are strict. If I were you I would call them and ask. I also wouldn't give them any personal info like address, school, or especially your age. At 14 they all assume that you are young, stupid, and will change your future plans once a week. So they tend to not take you serious, and you might not get good answers. Tell them you graduate in 2008 and are looking at your options. If you can't start your hike until June, you may be pushing it to finish in time. Maybe consider starting your hike in March the year after you graduate. Then you could start college that fall. One year off won't make your forget everyhing from school. Again, if you look at this option call the academy and ask about it. It might hurt your chances of being accepted if you spend a year screwing around before going to college.

Not saying my ideas are right. Just what I would do in that situation.

[Appalachian Tater]

You have several years to decide exactly when you want to thru-hike. You may not even want to go to the Air Force Academy by the time you finish high school.

Try to do your hike as soon as you can, preferably right after high school-but finish high school first! Sometimes people graduate from high school, go right to college, start working, have a family, and then don't get to fulfill a dream like thru-hiking until they are retired. You don't want to miss out on something like a thru-hike and you never know what the future will hold. Life accelerates the older you get.

Looks like you could go after a thru-hike, anyway. Having the willpower to complete a thru-hike at a young age might actually help you get into college. It wouldn't be a bad thing to have on your application.

ADMISSIONS CRITERIA:

Cadets must be between 17 and 22 on July 1 of the year of admission.

Each must be a U.S. citizen, unmarried and have no dependent children.

Applicants must have good grades (generally ranked in at least the top 20 percent of their high school class), be active in athletic and non-athletic extracurricular activities, and be in good physical condition.

[Nest]

Appalahchian Tater has a good point there. It takes a lot of determination and commitment to hike 2000 miles. That is the type of personality the military looks for. It could help you get int othe academy. If you can join the academy at 22, then chances are they will accept you a year after you graduate, so that woudln't be an issue. When they ask you why you took a year off tell them you wanted to do the hike since age "x". That tells them you didn't spend a year laying on the couch and putting off your future.

[OrionTheRanger]

You bring up a good point. It would look veyr good on an Application to say I am a 2000-miler. But if I leave right after high school lets out then I will not onyl miss my graduation ceromony(big problem wiht the parents) and a NOBO is usually started alot earlier. But I am a fast person(as in, I move fast) so I would still catch up to the crowd. I am really looking forward to all the interesting people I would meet on thr trial.

[OrionTheRanger]

Dang, I am not a good typer. I really wish I could go edit the typing mistakes in my post.

[Appalachian Tater]

You bring up a good point. It would look veyr good on an Application to say I am a 2000-miler. But if I leave right after high school lets out then I will not onyl miss my graduation ceromony(big problem wiht the parents) and a NOBO is usually started alot earlier. But I am a fast person(as in, I move fast) so I would still catch up to the crowd. I am really looking forward to all the interesting people I would meet on thr trial.

Graduate a quarter or semester early, start in March, and take a week off the trail for graduation.

No matter what, if you plan to thru-hike, start saving money now. You need more money than you might imagine.

[Nest]

Graduate a quarter or semester early, start in March, and take a week off the trail for graduation.

No matter what, if you plan to thru-hike, start saving money now. You need more money than you might imagine.

Hmm... Sounds like a few graduation presents would pay for a lot of it. You can always get distant relatives to shell out a few bucks for your graduation.

[OrionTheRanger]

You guys are full of ideas. Graduation money for the trail.

I have heard of people who graduate early, but Im not sure that possible, at leats in ym school. Even if I do Summer school(which I was planing to) I dont think my school has that. I need 21 credits to graduate. They are very strict on how I get those credits. Looking through my paper of classes and how credits work, it seems that if I do summer school then the only credit I couldnt get before the first semester of my Senior year is up is my 4th Language Arts credit. L.A. is a year long class, which means it would take me the whole year to get that credit. wonder if theirs some way to get that credit in advance. And theirs still the matter of the parents.

[Nest]

You guys are full of ideas. Graduation money for the trail.

I have heard of people who graduate early, but Im not sure that possible, at leats in ym school. Even if I do Summer school(which I was planing to) I dont think my school has that. I need 21 credits to graduate. They are very strict on how I get those credits. Looking through my paper of classes and how credits work, it seems that if I do summer school then the only credit I couldnt get before the first semester of my Senior year is up is my 4th Language Arts credit. L.A. is a year long class, which means it would take me the whole year to get that credit. wonder if theirs some way to get that credit in advance. And theirs still the matter of the parents.

Just tell your parents what I told mine. When I was 17 I enlisted in the Marine Corps, and this is what I told them to get them to sign the paperwork since I would be shipping out as a minor. I told them if they don't sign, I will leave on my B-day. That means I won't be home for Christmas. So they signed and I shipped mid-summer. Use threats for leverage. Appeal to their parental need to have you home for major holidays. Or tell them it's either the trail or drugs. That always gets them.

[Brrrb Oregon]

Haha. Ok, as far as the Air Force Academy goes, I would talk to someone involved with the Academy about starting later.....

Yes, this is a job for a college counselor. Not your high school counselor aiming you at college, but a college counselor at the college you'd like to attend. Find out from the places you want to go how, in their experience, other students have faced the same conundrum. Maybe they don't know any AT thru-hikers, but they know all sorts of students that want to participate in travel out of the country via an exchange program in their sophomore or junior year.

Were I doing it as a pre-med....hmmm. Generally speaking, the required science courses in the freshman and sophomore year have "trailer" sections, meaning that the "fall" section has a smaller "winter" version and so on. This goes for chemistry, calculus, and physics, but the availability of these "trailer" courses depends upon the size of the campus and the demand for them. At a really big university, you can start the "fall" section during any term, and very often during the summer, too.

For instance, while general chemistry (1st year) is a pre-requisite for organic chemistry (2nd year), organic chemistry is not a pre-requisite for inorganic or physical chemistry (taken in the 3rd and 4th years). Physics, often taken in the first year, may not be a pre-requisite for any courses required of a pre-med until the 3rd year. And so on.

You might be able to use this kind of a course to either "up" or "scoot back" the more regular order of courses, pushing six terms of work into five. That is, if you are an exceptional student, and I do mean exceptional. Even if you had a very good reason for getting a "B" instead of an "A", when it comes time to getting into the post-graduate school of choice, an "A" is what you want, not a good explanation for a "B". If you are merely a very, very good student, I'd consider going on the five-year plan, but if you are a Buckeroo Bonzai in the grade department, a truncated four probably could be done.

The problem with taking off time after you start but before you finish college, though, is that it might cause some headaches with your student loans. Some of those require you to get a job and start paying them back, if you miss school for non-medical reasons. The exchange students don't have that to contend with.

Another possibility is to graduate from high school early, blow off the prom, and arrange to start college in the second term of your freshman year, rather than the first. Were you most 18-year-olds I know, I'd rather you do something like this when you'd already had a bit more time away from home and hearth, but I can think of high schoolers for whom I would make an exception to that.

You will want your parents behind you on this, by the way. Let them in on your plans early, and make it clear that you're intent on doing this without letting your other priorities suffer, by careful planning and whatever pre-hike legwork you need to do. Making sensible preparations as part of a set of long-term goals is good ammunition against the "whim" worry that parents might have about such an ambition.

A more realistic possiblity might be to plan a 3-month section hike your first time out, with the plan of doing the whole ball of wax somewhat later in your careers. Having knocked down that smaller goal will also make it much easier to get the support you need when you try to convince your support network that doing the entire trail is a challenge you understand before undertaking it. By doing the section hike first, you will greatly enhance your chances of finishing the entire trail when you later undertake to do it.

PS You and your hiking partner might be able to get science credits out of your summer on the AT. There is a PCT hiker, Dr. Robert Derlet, who does water-quality research on the PCT (http://www.pcta.org/help/join/magazi...erraWater.asp). You might be able to sign on with somebody like that to do similar work on the AT.

Yes, that's right: you can combine medical research and hiking, both getting you on to the AT and enhancing your friend's prospects for getting into the medical school of his or choice. Your friend might be pretty jazzed about that.