mail drops

[TrippinBTM]

I was just hoping some AT veterans could give me an idea of where a mail drop would be especially useful, such as where it's hard to resupply, or where its a good place to have maps and equipment ready. I want to use as few as necessary. I saw Fontanna Village mentioned, and Delaware Water Gap, but what about further north? Anywhere in between the two mentioned that would be especially important?

Also, how long will they hold it, generally? Do I have to have someone maill them as the months pass, or can I mail them all at the start? Can you send it to a hostel or motel that you don't plan to stay at? Or do you have to send it to a post office in that case?

[Sugarfoot]

Fontana is often mentioned, but you could instead stay with Jeff & Nancy Hoch at the Hike Inn. They will do your laundry and shuttle you for groceries. Good folk. Instead of Delware Water Gap, you could go into Wind Gap, which offers full services about 1 mile off trail. About all I use maildrops for now are vitamins & maps (if I carry them) and half-rolls of toilet paper. Gotta have my Charmin!

The longer your maildrop sits in a post office, the greater the change of its being crushed, lost, or damaged in some other way. I'm not sure what the official holding time is. I try to mail mine to arrive no more than a week before I do, relying upon a friend to do the mailing. Your friendly UPS store, which also can do USPO mailing, may be willing to hold your packages and mail at the appropriate time. Mine is happy to do it, especially if I share my "adventure" with them so they feel a part of it.

I wouldn't recommend sending maildrops to a hostel or motel without getting their permission first, either by phone or e-mail, even if they are listed in one of the guides as offering that service. Sending them a maildrop and then not staying with them is really really rude. I wouldn't be surprised if they "can't find" your package if they know you won't be staying. It's a hassle for them to deal with your package and you shouldn't expect them to do it out of the goodness of their hearts.

The advantage of using the Post Office is that if you end up aborting your hike, your package will be returned to you without charge (assuming you use priority mail). Or you can send the PO a forwarding card and bounce your box up the trail. Technically once you've opened the package, they can't forward it without charge, but some kindly postal workers will.

[Footslogger]

I was just hoping some AT veterans could give me an idea of where a mail drop would be especially useful, such as where it's hard to resupply, or where its a good place to have maps and equipment ready. I want to use as few as necessary. I saw Fontanna Village mentioned, and Delaware Water Gap, but what about further north? Anywhere in between the two mentioned that would be especially important?

Also, how long will they hold it, generally? Do I have to have someone maill them as the months pass, or can I mail them all at the start? Can you send it to a hostel or motel that you don't plan to stay at? Or do you have to send it to a post office in that case?

======================================

It varies a little from year to year ...with new businesses opening and older ones closing. It also depends a great deal on how much food you are willing to carry at any one point in time.

That said ...and allowing for 4 - 6 day re-supply intervals, I was able to go all the way with 3 actual food mail drops:

Harpers Ferry, WV
Bear Mtn, NY
Glencliff, NH

Made those decisions based on timing and ease of access.

There are some excellent articles available here on Whiteblaze regarding re-supply and some of them are updated annually. Check em out !!

'Slogger

[Grampie]

I would try to live with as few mail drops as posiable. It get's to be a pain to have to go and pick them up especialy if you have them at post offices.
I didn't have any food mail drops and as I recall the only place that I had a problem was the store at Fontana Dam. They had very little to choose from but thar was in 2001 and things might have changed.
It can get expensive to send packages so if you plan to do mail drops to save money, you won't save that much. What you think you will want to eat before you start, will change once you start. All along the trail you see hiker boxs filled with stuff that hikers sent and didn't want. I never had to carry more than 5 days worth of food at any time.
I didn't do mail drops and if I was to thru-hike again I probably would still not do any.
It would be a whole different story if you had to resupply medications of had a special diet. Than you will have too.

[Kirby]

Read Baltimore Jack's resupply article in the articles section of this site, it is quite useful for planning mail drops and resupply points.

Kirby

[bigboots]

Along the same line...I am not planning on any maildrops, instead using a bounce box several times. Has anyone done a bounce box before? This would mean it sitting in a PO for several weeks. Maybe not a good idea??

Bigboots

[Wonder]

I do almost all of my re-supply with maildrops. I find that by dehydrating and sending it...it's still cheaper, and you eat better. I like to have about 1 a week. I use a bounce box when my supply runs heavy. YOu can send it ahead, and if you find that you don't need to open it, you can just bounce it again for free!
I like to keep one going with bath stuff, extra batteries, my letters and cards.......it's fun to open.

[bigboots]

Thats mostly whats going to be in it. Laundry supplies, etc, but also my cell phone (I don't want to carry it on the trail, but is convinient instead of payphones). I am thinking to bounce it every 250 miles. To many to few, and the issue of it sitting in a PO for a while.

Bigboots

[TrippinBTM]

I was looking through that article and going through other threads, but thought I'd ask too. This all seems like a hassel, so I want to avoid any trouble I don't need, thought you folks could help. I wouldn't do any drops, but I don't want to carry all my maps and things I won't need for months if I don't need to... so basically I want maybe 4 drops, and wondered what good places are. Where, for example, is it good to ditch the cold weather gear? Or to pick it up again up north? What towns are expensive or hard to get supplies in?

[Pedaling Fool]

I was looking through that article and going through other threads, but thought I'd ask too. This all seems like a hassel, so I want to avoid any trouble I don't need, thought you folks could help. I wouldn't do any drops, but I don't want to carry all my maps and things I won't need for months if I don't need to... so basically I want maybe 4 drops, and wondered what good places are. Where, for example, is it good to ditch the cold weather gear? Or to pick it up again up north? What towns are expensive or hard to get supplies in?

I do maildrops for the same reasons as Wonder, for me it's about nutrition, I dehydrate everything, including many fruits/vegetables. For me, it wasn't a hassle, because I sent the packages to towns I was planning to stop anyway: Fontana Dam, Hot Springs, Uncle Johnnies (Erwin, Tn), Damascus, Pearisburg, Va, Daleville, Va., Waynesboro, Va, Harpers Ferry, Wv., Duncannon, Delaware Water Gap, Kent, North Adams, Hanover, Gorham, & Caratunk.

As for the cold weather gear, Pearisburg is where I got rid of it and got it back in Vermont (mid-August).