i mean health wise. i have heard some horror stories. the idea of hiking is seems cool but then i think about the personal Hygiene and heard horror stories of nasty people on the trail and how filthy they are. any comments that can help?
If you are a clean freak, backpacking for more than a few days probably isn’t for you. After the third or fourth day on the trail you pick up a funk. You can’t smell it but non-hikers sure do. Packs and shoes are always the thing that smell the most. Clothes can be washed on zero-days in towns or in the field. “Horror Stories?” That’s all relative. If muddy boots, dirty legs, sweaty clothes, a funky pack, and eating some occasional dirt in your food is unsanitary in you mind, then I suppose it’s a Horror Story. However, since most cooked food requires boiling water for the preparation, you can easily sanitize your eating and cooking utensils prior to dinner. Water filters and purification chemicals will kill or remove almost any microbes found in the water sources along the AT. Hot water can be used to clean yourself whenever you wish. As others have mentioned, carry a few bandannas and some biodegradable soap. (I too usually use Dr. Bronner’s for both personal clean-up and washing my cooking gear.) In my opinion there is a big difference between “dirty” and “unsanitary”.

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