I don't have any videos from Jeff as he is one day six of his journey along the AT Trail - or photos even, but Jeff did make a stunning video of his prep trip - over 40 miles in 4 days on the Appalachian Trail which he took in October 2011 to test his gear, starting from Amicalola Falls in Dawson, Georgia. He also has a blog on Trail Journals of his preparation hikes, some of which were 80 miles long during the fall. I'm hoping he'll let me post some of his email blogs to this site for him when he can't get to a computer where he can download his videos and photos. 
Loner 10/19/2012 
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Then on the three hour drive from Greenville, SC to Amicalola Falls State Park,we stopped close to the park at the most posh Chik-Fil-A I've ever been in. It's in a newly developed upscale section of Dawson and the restaurant was huge and packed, had flowers on each table, servers refilling the tea and was one of the best fast-food experiences we've ever encountered. What a great send off for Jeff - a Chick-Fil-A meal topped with a massive and cheap ice cream cone. 
We were shocked at how packed the entrance was with day-trippers and picnickers. We had to get in line in our car to pay our $5.00 car parking fee to get into the park and then drive around before finding one of the rare remaining parking places.Lots of families of all nationalities were cooking out, having Easter Egg hunts, playing badminton and hiking. It was bizarre. We only saw two other AT thru-hikers at the visitors center and then when we left, Kendall and I saw a van with three packs on top. The ranger told Jeff, 20 thru hikers had taken off that same day so he's probably already met some of them by now. And with those three signing in about 3:30. that may make about 25 for the day. I had expected a quiet, serious and rather sacred send off and I couldn't quite wrap my head around all the colorful frivolity and activity. We spent time there so at the center so Kendall could enjoy it. They have two great displays of all the wild animals he might meet on the trail, one a daytime display and the other a night time scene. It's informative to be able to gauge the size of the actual as opposed to imagined size of the black bears, wolves, bobcats, foxes etc. prevalent in these woods. The first Mountain, Springer Mtn. is 3782 ft. high in the Chattahoochee National Forest, not the tallest of the trail, but still a hefty height. He has already reached it, I imagine. She bought an adorable owl purse (Jeff gave her a lifelike stuffed owl from here for Christmas) and she did the machine where you stamped a penny. Kendall made one with the waterfall scene for herself and one for Jeff with the hiker scene. 
Then we set off on the trail walking through the stone archway, which features the southern terminus - the beginning or ending blue blaze side trail which is described as an arduous 8 mile hike which officially leads to the AT signified by the white blazes on the trees. Jeff wanted us to hike with him on the mile trail to see the majestic Amicalola Falls,which tumble down 729 feet over the mountainside. But unfortunately Kendall was in flip flops and had to walk with her feet stretched out in a Daffy Duck V so as not to slide out of her shoes and go careening in backward somersaults bowling over large families of East Indians, Orientals, Hispanics and Anglo Saxons families causing them in turn to execute backward somersaults, flips and full gainers resulting in avalanche of international proportions. In addition, to put an out of kilter spin on it, she'd had to take Dramamine to survive the road trip due to her tendency to extreme car sickness so, poor thing she was half out of it as well. And she's a city girl, unlike her mom, Beth, (pictured left at age 5 or 6) who I introduced to hiking when she was five.
The Goldens have more than 25 years of hiking experience and have a great Internet site on Georgia hiking, with reviews, ratings, photos and directions for each site, plus important info such as visitors center, lodging, picnic areas and trail features such as views, waterfalls etc. For anyone even considering hiking a section or thru hike on the AT, their site will offer a ton of info to help you prepare for the Georgia section, which has been called the third most difficult of the 14 states on the AT after Maine and Massachusetts. 
I don't know how Jeff does it, but he's been in training so he will do fine. At Christmas he weighed a slim 180, but bulked up on purpose knowing he'll lose a lot of weight on the hike. A week's worth of his food fits in a shoebox. I'm curious to see if it's enough. It wouldn't be for me, that's for sure, either in diversity or quantity. But I've heard AT hikers are a different breed and Jeff has been in that club ever since his teens. I'm an advocate for the development of the individual to the very core of their existence and the extreme fringes of their capabilities and Jeff is one of those people who comes by such a lifestyle naturally. Or at least he makes it appear that way.
