Trail name Hops has a simple idea: hike the Appalachian Trail again, 30 years after the first time. He first set foot on the AT back in 1989 in Virginia, climbing Mt. Rogers before the Thomas Knob Shelter even existed. A chance meeting with an older backpacker — carrying a pack nearly as big as Hops himself — who said he was 'hiking to Maine' planted the seed. That seed became a full thru-hike in 1997, and now, at 50, he's gearing up for the class of 2027.

Hops isn't your average weekend hiker. He lives in Franklin, North Carolina — a proper trail town on the AT — where he works as a brewer at Lazy Hiker Brewing and spends summers backpacking and paddling, plus winters on ski patrol at the local mountain. The first 110 miles of the trail from his doorstep are, by his own admission, known in his sleep. The Great Smoky Mountains are effectively his backyard, and he climbs 6,000-foot peaks for fun. He's also logged serious time out west, playing in the Tetons in Wyoming and skiing in Colorado.

So why redo the AT rather than take on a fresh challenge like the Continental Divide Trail? Culture, he says. The AT has a pull on him — living in a town where thru-hikers pass through every season and chatting with them has kept the trail front and centre in his life. The idea of walking the same route exactly 30 years apart sealed it.

What's changed between 1997 and 2027 is almost a story in itself. The trail is the same, more or less, but the experience around it has been transformed: gear is dramatically lighter, paper maildrops have all but vanished, and route-finding now lives in a phone app rather than a bundle of maps and guidebook pages. For anyone curious about long-distance hiking, his re-hike will be a neat real-time comparison of two eras of the same 2,190-mile footpath.

For travellers, this is a good reminder that the Appalachian Trail is not just a bucket-list slog for the young and unemployed. Sections around Franklin, the Smokies, and Mt. Rogers in Virginia make superb multi-day trips for ordinary holiday time, and trail towns along the route have built whole small-business cultures — breweries included — around welcoming hikers. Whether you fancy a week on the trail or just a basecamp town with good beer and mountain views, the AT's corridors deliver.

Hops will be documenting the build-up and the hike itself, with a gear rundown promised in a future post — worth following if you're weighing up your own long trail, at any age.