Long trails in sections: walking between working weeks

A working hiker’s account

Sarah Lesiecki wanted to keep her flight-attendant job while hiking the Appalachian Trail. In her 2019 introduction she describes working with the schedule she was awarded each month and traveling between home and the trail to work. She covered about 680 miles that summer before returning home for commitments to a second job.

References: The Trek

In 2022, she wrote that she had started section hiking the trail in 2019 and had completed about 80 percent at the time. Her author page says she completed it in sections in 2023. The sequence is a useful answer to a working hiker’s question: her route was neither a continuous six-month absence nor a series with an immediate finish.

References: The Trek · The Trek

Lesiecki’s September 2023 Maine account describes the ninth and final day of her 100 Mile Wilderness section. Read alongside her earlier plan, the dated installment makes the final return concrete. Her writing also discusses flying with a backpack from the perspectives of both a section hiker and a flight attendant.

References: The Trek · The Trek

Pulenaz: returning to the next stretch

Pulenaz’s walking videos follow a coastal route in separate weekend visits. The first walk ends at a village; the next begins there, with a quick look back at the path before she continues along the shore. A packed lunch and a change in weather take up more screen time than a mileage announcement.

The series returns to the same route over several years. An early episode ends at a harbor, a later one starts at that harbor and follows the next bay, and a final return connects the last unfinished stretch. Pulenaz includes a short clip from the first outing beside the last, making the passage of time visible.

The appeal is the continuity between outings. Each episode has its own lunch stop and change of view, while the recurring endpoints let a viewer understand how the separate days fit together.

A challenge measured in returns

Pulenaz keeps a list of the route’s sections and crosses off each one after a visit. One planned weekend is missed, leaving a gap between two completed stretches. A later video returns to that gap rather than pretending the route was walked in an unbroken sequence.

That return gives the longer challenge a clear finish: the last unchecked section joins the two earlier walks. The series makes room for both the small satisfaction of a day outside and the larger pleasure of completing something over time.

Sources and attribution

1. The Trek

   Tips for Flying With Your Backpack from A Flight AttendantPublished Oct 19, 2022 · Recorded Oct 29, 2026

2. The Trek

   The Last Section Part 13: Out of the 100 Mile Wilderness!Published Mar 4, 2024 · Recorded Oct 29, 2026

3. The Trek

   1,512 Miles to Go: Welcome to My Appalachian Trail JourneyPublished Dec 6, 2019 · Recorded Oct 29, 2026

4. The Trek

   Sarah Lesiecki: AuthorPublication date not listed · Recorded Oct 29, 2026