Mara 
& 
David

We met in Dahlonega, Georgia in April 2013 the day before we both started hiking north along the Appalachian Trail (AT). We ended up hiking the whole way together. Somewhere in those 5.5 hungry, sweaty, stinky, tiring months we decided we wanted to have our future adventures together.

After the trail, David moved from Washington to Michigan and we settled into life, buying a house, selling it and buying another, spending time with family and friends and our stepdogs. 

Eager for another long distance adventure, we began preparations to hike from Mexico to Canada on the Pacific Crest Trail (PCT) in 2018. We were on the trail somewhere in Yosemite Valley when we found out Mara was accepted to a graduate program at West Virginia University. Two months after finishing the PCT we moved to Morgantown, WV.

For two years we hunkered down in the Mountain state. Mara studied nonstop and became addicted to caffeine. David worked from home and made great friends on the golf course. After graduation, Mara took a job traveling as a Pathologists’ Assistant. Now we get to move around the country, exploring new areas for weeks or months at a time.

At some point in 2021, we were both trying to get ready in our tiny apartment bathroom when we started talking about weddings. We decided that if we got married, it would need to be on October 1st, the day we happened to finish both our AT and PCT thru-hikes. 

And that is how we got engaged. We bought rings from Etsy (well, Mara bought them and David sent money via Venmo) and then...did nothing else. No planning, no announcements to family or friends, nothing.

After months of procrastination, we finally decided how we wanted our next adventure to start: in the woods surrounded by those closest to us. We completely missed the boat on October 1st, though.