Are you more limited by miles per day or miles per week?
I've done a lot of backpacking trips over the past 40 years but very few have been more than 9 days and only one had a "town stop". Next summer hopefully I'll do a 5 week hike with several interesting towns to stop in (thinking of the Colorado Trail).
Reading many trail journals I appreciate how much the body has to endure, and heal from, in the course of weeks and months on the trail. It seems many mere mortals are able to crank out amazing daily mileages, but often need recovery from these big feats.
So for a 55 year old like me... Is it likely the daily miles or the weekly miles that is more limiting? I'm aiming for about 90 miles per week. That works out to about 13 miles per day. If I hike 6 days it's 15 and if 5 days it's 18. I'm thinking a solid two-nights in town sounds pretty sweet, but it means more miles per hiking day than with fewer zeros. From my sofa it seems that the zero-day recovery (and drying out, and eating...) is worth more miles on hiking days.
What do you experienced thru hikers think?
Thanks.