See “Need Convincing”. Papa Smurf’s last post mentioned the Hiker Shuffle. And lingering foot problems. In my naive thought process I’m expecting that if I get the right boot, the right sock and break both boot and feet in properly, feets won’t let me down. What did I miss?
Jim2
I’d recommend seeing a podiatrist before the trip. I wish I had. We ended up taking a week off in the middle of our hike because of foot problems due to a 20 year old minor injury. Never bothered me before, but the day after day pounding your feet take will do it. The last 2 months of our hike, I had to soak my foot in cool streams several times a day and take vitamin I multiple times. It still bothers me on long hikes. (Like the 27 miler we just did from Duncannon to Boiling Springs last Saturday) I have an orthotic now; it would have been nice to have before the hike…
Bramble
I didn’t have a problem with cronic pain but every hiker wakes up with sore muscles and pains. When I hiked 20+ miles in a day I was especially sore the next day. My wife had cronic pain which was a factor that ended our 2001 hike.
Your feet will change shape and your boots will wear out. If you start having pain after a weeks or even months check your shoes and make sure they are still supportive. I had to buy new insoles which made all the difference in the world and my comfort. I think I went through 3 pair of super feet.
Darth Pacman
I went to a podiatrist. My problem started when I was skinny dipping in Laurel Creek near Kencora hostel. Flame yelled someone is comming and I started to run and stepped on a fist sized rock in the arch of my barefoot. That bruise developed into tendenitis that bugged me until Happers Ferry. The doc said the foot takes a beating walking 2000 miles in the length of time that hikers do it. No matter how good your orthodics. The rocks, roots, and miles take their toll. Plus, my feet are 56 years old and have numerous injuries from many years on the baseball and football fields. When we finished I was on my fourth pair of boots and third set of Superfeet. My feet didn’t hurt except late in the day and first thing in the morning. I just hopped around like everybody else. I’d start today on another thru-hike if I could get away. No rain, no pain, no Maine.
Papa Smurf
Take care of your feet and they will take you down the trail. If you don’t, they will put you off the trail. Foot problems, blisters and such, put many AT hikers off the trail within the first hundred miles. One hiker this year broke his ankle ending his AT hike. Read REI’s “learn” info under “hike/camp” and read about boots and socks. I recommend heavy duty footware and socks to protect your feet and ankles. Also keep that pack weight down as much as possible. Keep on hiking. Good Luck.:cheers
Maintain
As for heavy duty footwear… Well, that’s absolutely an individual thing. My footwear ran the range from heavy boots, to appraoch shoes, to sandals. Gotta say that the last 1200 miles (including all the rocks from PA to ME) were in sandals, and my feet felt so much better than in the heavier footwear. (I wasn’t ultralight, either.) I just couldn’t get the blister thing under control for the first 700 miles, and sandals were the last resort, shy of ending the hike. My husband wore full boots, and he was the one who ended up with the fractured heel - go figure!
I certainly do not advocate sandal hiking for most people. Frankly, most non-thruhikers that saw me thought I was nuts. I just wanted to emphasize that we all have to wear footwear that is appropriate for us as individuals.
Just because an outfitter tells us that we have to wear shoe type “X” because we’re traveling a crertain type of trail, carrying a cretain amount of weight, or are heading out for a certain number of days, really doesn’t mean much when it come to thruhiking. Don’t get pigeon-holed into a category. If you feel good in boots, great. If you hike barefoot, also great. All that’s really important is that our feet and ankels are happy enough to get out there and keep going day after day after day.
I didn’t see anyone out there who didn’t have some signs of the hiker hobble syndrome, regardless of footgear. After all those miles, your feet and lower legs stiffen up really quickly - even just stopping to take a short break. For most of us, though, it wears off after a few minutes of walking. My hiker hobble took about 6-7 weeks to resolve. I actually miss it. 
chipper
Your feet will hurt, to some degree. Nature of the beast. Mine hurt horribly, every day, every night for 1000 miles until I could sleep. It’s one reason I did very few 20s, I hated them, wasn’t worth it, my feet would start hurting around mile 6-9 every day.
I thought having Superfeet was helping, in the end it was probably hurting my particular feet. Tried to see a podiatrist in H.F. but I picked the week he was on vacation in July, so I hiked on and just started stretching them. Wish I had visited a doc before leaving for advice on that. The stretching helped and then after ditching the Superfeet I started to have some relief. Like everyone has said, don’t get pigeon holed into “having to have thus and so” I have gone back to flat factory insoles (and I have a high arch!) and my feet do fine. That’s just me, experiment. But don’t expect that having the right combos will mean you’ll be looking to dance every night. It does go away after the Trail. I had such thick callouses on my heals that caused the bottom of my feet to feel numb. Once those went away last fall, my feet felt normal again and I no longer winced when I stepped out of bed in the morning. There is a certain sadness that none of these things bother me anymore, except my ass! from sitting behind a *&%$ing desk again!! 
Bluebearee '02
This is Jim2 orginal question: "See “Need Convincing”. Papa Smurf’s last post mentioned the Hiker Shuffle. And lingering foot problems. In my naive thought process I’m expecting that if I get the right boot, the right sock and break both boot and feet in properly, feets won’t let me down. What did I miss? "
You are not naive----if you are absolutely 100% prepared for the trail, feet, boot and backpack wise, then you will have few if any problems----some, but less than most hikers. You need to do lots and lots of pre hikes, that is section hikes with full backpack and get you body and feet in tip top shape. Then you will be ready for the AT and you will do well. I think most folks that drop out in the first 100 miles or so, many drop out in the first few days with less milage, did not prepare themselves well physically for hiking the AT. The best gear in the world will not do it for you, if you are not in shape to do it. So lots and lots of hiking/walking/backpacking before you start.
If you and your feet are in super fantastic shape, then you can hike barefoot and be okay—providing you have been hiking barefoot and have gotten your feet in shape for it. Shoes have only been around for maybe 10,000 years or so and man has been here for about a 1,000,000 years—so do you really need shoes/boots?
There are lots of right answers to your question, which may be right for the person answering the question. But there is only one right answer to your question for you. And that is whatever works for you and is right for you. Pre hiking, lots of section hiking should help you find the right answer to your question. Get out and hike/backpack as much as possible to prepare.
If you read many journal entries, you will see that many of feet problems are brought on by pushing too hard “Got to do that 20 mile day, day after day” or by accidents “in a hurry, steped on a rock the wrong way” or carrying too much weight and trying to do too many miles with it.
Heavy duty footware and socks will protect your feet. They may save your ankles from being twisted or broken. But make no mistake about it, you can still break your ankles and twist them even wearing 9" high boots, but it’s a lot less likely. We wear shoes and boots, even flip flops, to protect and cushion our feet—to keep them confortable, unblistered and uncalloused, but the fit needs to be right and everything else associated with it----and we need to condition our feet to the shoes/boots and they need to be the right size, etc. etc.
So once again the learn section of the Camp/Hike section of the REI website has soom good advice on footware and socks/sock liners. It also has some good advice on conditioning.
So the bottom line is that everyone is right—Papa Smurf, Chipper, Bluebearee, etc. etc. and me----but you must find what is right for you. Good luck. Keep on hiking.
Maintain
Thanks for the advice, Maintain, and all. The range of experiences related in Forums is huge, from the Barefoot Sisters, to Scamp’s day-two fractured ankle. I guess the answer is, “Go see what works.” I’m kind of from the leather boot and Merino sock school, with Teva’s thrown in for light walking and wet crossings. Definitely not a barefoot person, but I like the sandle approach. I’ve been walking with a staff for years, ala Colin Fletcher, so that will continue a part of my approach.
Fair skies and flat trails.
Jim2
I heard lots of people swearing by the superfeet. I didnt use them. Instead I had my feet cut off and sewed on a hoof. This works much better on steep hills, resist water and dosen’t hurt half as bad.
Virginian
I must be one of the lucky ones. I didn’t get sore feet or have any foot problems during my hike in 02. I didn’t have expensive boots either, mine were $75 Hi-Tecs, they were very comfortable, but I did go throug 2 pairs.
I put my good fortune down to walking barefoot for 2 months before I started hiking. I toughned up my feet by walking barefoot around my neighborhood about 5 days per week working up to about 2 miles per day. When I first started I could feel every pebble and twig. After 2 months I could walk along pebble paths without flinching. To me this was confirmation that my feet were ready for the trail.
Downunda
Thoughts:
Keep in mind that the body works on the SAID principle, which means “specific adaptions to imposed demands.” The point is, your feet will need to, and will, naturally strengthen in response to the new stress (positive stress) of hiking daily. The cycle is: walk, rest, recover (during which phase strenth increases). What you need to avoid is damaging, or “breaking down” the structures of the foot by giving it more stress than it can recover from in the time you’re allowing for the recovery (negative stress). Once breakdown occurs, you must allow time for full recovery, or it will only get worse, the pain will increase, and you’ll soon be off the trail for good – and miserable as a result.
Back to the SAID principle – start off slow, listen to what your feet are telling, keep in mind that our feet are among our most durable, trouble free and pain free body parts; don’t be afraid to go slow, doing few miles at first, and downshifting (going slower) if that makes your feet feel better. The simple truth is, you need to allow your body time to adjust to your new lifestyle of hiking.
Good footwear is critical. Function, not weight, is most important. The more support in the footwear, the less stress on your feet. Your musculature, higher up in the body, may work somewhat harder, but minimally so, and the tradeoff will be healthy, happy, pain free feet – without which, your hiking will be over.
Human beings are the second greatest endurance animals on the planet, being second only to the wolf. Our bodies are naturally designed for extensive hiking activities; but, our society does not encourage a lifestyle which tends to have us physically ready to easily move directly into extensive hiking. Thus, I repeat, go slow initially, with low miles, letting your body make the natural adjustment. Then, in time, discover how natural, effortless and truly enjoyable hiking is, once the true abilities of your body begin to emerge. And marvel at the unleashing of it all.
Sincerely–Paul English.
Paul English
In Roland Mueser’s book “Long Distance Hiking - Lessons from the Appalachian Trail.” The research indicates that the people who finish are about evenly split between those in condition and those that are not. He contributes success to planning and mental attitude.
Big Red ('02) had never had a pack on when he started his hike last year. He told some of this year’s group at Newfound Gap (while we were doing some trail magic) that he has only been on one backpacking trip in his life…GA to ME. Take it one day at a time, one mountain at a time. On our worst days we found something to enjoy about our hike. Our hardest day on the trail was greeted the next morning with the most beautiful sunrise I have ever seen. If you have time look it up on our journal pictures (Moxie Bald Pond, ME) on this site under Papa Smurf and Flame ('02).
Papa Smurf
Help.
I’ve been doing some day hikes with my pack the last couple of days. I’m leaving for Katahdin in 13 days. I did about 5 miles today, 6 miles today, 35 lb. pack.
Towards the last…oh, hour or so, my feet were killing me. To the point where I didn’t go as long as I wanted to go. There was a sharp pain just about every step on the balls of my feet. I came home, showered and rested, and no blisters, as far as I can tell. Right now, about 4 hours after my hike, my left foot isn’t tender, but my right foot still is. That’s about as descriptive as I can get, I’m sorry I can’t tell you more precisely what’s wrong.
I’ve been hiking about this distance in winter, and it wasn’t a problem. Are my callouses just needing to be rebuilt, or am I looking at having to buy insoles, or some other problem?
Any help would be appreciated.
Love,
Amazin’ Gavo
The Amazing Gavo
You could have nothing, but you could have something. My wife’s feet starting hurting her around Hot Springs. She complained of the Balls of her feet hurting, and between the second and third toe. After getting to WV we got off trail because the pain was so bad.
It turned out that this is something called Morton’s Neuroma. There is a nerve that runs between the toes that can get pinched and causes pain in the balls of the feet and between the toes. If you push it too long with the pain you can scar the nerve and end up with perminent pain. They claim it takes about 6 months to happen.
The pain can be alliviated with wider toe box shoes, more cushioned shoes, and orthotics. Saucony makes a very good shoe for people with a wide forefoot and narrow heal. The orthotics should be made by someone who really knows something. Make sure you get a metatarsal support. It will lift the toes and seperate them to prevent the pinching.
Hope that helps!
Gravity Man
GA-WV 01
Gravity Man
I went to a sports place and they didn’t have Superfeet. So I picked up two pairs of these “ball of foot” insoles for about $5. Helped me out a lot, hiked 5 miles today without any discomfort. Refreshing.
Anyway, the brand is Sof Sole, and what I picked up were “GEL Ball-Of-Foot Cushion.” Anyway, they really helped, so thought I’d pass the word that they worked for me, at least.
The Amazing Gavo