Hiker Trash Radio
Join Doc and his guests on Hiker Trash Radio, the outdoor adventure podcast that takes you on a myriad of trails. With interviews from thru hikers, skydivers, adventure athletes, big wall climbers, and more, each episode is packed with trail talk, gear tips, and hilarious misadventures. And if you thought the great outdoors was all sunshine and rainbows, think again! Tune in for tales of blistered feet, helicopter evacuations, and Type II Fun that will make you appreciate the comforts of home. Settle in and get ready to trade the city for the wilderness. It's time to embrace the suck!
Trail Stories - Top of the World with Chris "Rad" Carter
About the Guest
Chris "Rad" Carter is a Triple Crown thru-hiker (PCT, CDT + AT in a single calendar year), mountaineer, adventure filmmaker, and senior editor at Switchback Travel, where he runs the climbing, mountaineering, travel, and backpacking categories. Born in the United States and raised in Nairobi, Kenya by NGO parents, he came to America for college in 2014 and fell deeply in love with the country through his thru-hikes. In June 2025 he summited Denali — the highest peak in North America — as cameraman for Brandon's "Seek Your Summit" 50-highpoints record attempt. He is based in Chattanooga, Tennessee, recently married, and...The Route Makers - Episode 2: The Proving Ground
The Route Makers, Episode 2: "The Proving Ground" — Rue McKenrick, Kevin Koski, Wesley Tils, and Andrew Skurka on what it costs to prove a route no one has walked.
Last episode, we watched five people look at a map and see a line that wasn't there. This episode is about what happens when the paper runs out — when a route stops being a plan and becomes a body on unmapped ground.
Because a route isn't real when you draw it. It's real when someone walks the whole thing, corner to corner, and comes back to say it g...
Your Time is Limited - Jada "Flo" Lippincott (Part II)
About the Guest
Jada "Flo" Lippincott is a 27-year-old thru-hiker, splitboarder, canyoneer, packrafter, and full-time truck dweller based in Big Sky, Montana. Originally from Fairfield, Iowa, she discovered the outdoors through a college exchange semester in Fairbanks, Alaska and found long-distance hiking after a catastrophic snowboarding accident that shattered her leg. Three days out of her walking boot, she boarded a plane to Arizona and started the Arizona Trail. She has since logged over 9,000 miles across the CDT, Arizona Trail, Grand Enchantment Trail, Great Divide Trail (Canada), Hayduke Trail, Colorado Trail, and Sierra High Route (partial), all while...Your Time is Limited - Jada "Flo" Lippincott (Part I)
About the Guest
Jada "Flo" Lippincott is a 27-year-old thru-hiker, splitboarder, canyoneer, packrafter, and full-time truck dweller based in Big Sky, Montana. Originally from Fairfield, Iowa, she discovered the outdoors through a college exchange semester in Fairbanks, Alaska and found long-distance hiking after a catastrophic snowboarding accident that shattered her leg. Three days out of her walking boot, she boarded a plane to Arizona and started the Arizona Trail. She has since logged over 9,000 miles across the CDT, Arizona Trail, Grand Enchantment Trail, Great Divide Trail (Canada), Hayduke Trail, Colorado Trail, and Sierra High Route (partial), all while...Trail Stories - Your Time is Limited with Jada "Flo" Lippincott
About the Guest
Jada "Flo" Lippincott is a 27-year-old thru-hiker, splitboarder, canyoneer, packrafter, and full-time truck dweller based in Big Sky, Montana. Originally from Fairfield, Iowa, she discovered the outdoors through a college exchange semester in Fairbanks, Alaska and found long-distance hiking after a catastrophic snowboarding accident that shattered her leg. Three days out of her walking boot, she boarded a plane to Arizona and started the Arizona Trail. She has since logged over 9,000 miles across the CDT, Arizona Trail, Grand Enchantment Trail, Great Divide Trail (Canada), Hayduke Trail, Colorado Trail, and Sierra High Route (partial), all while...The Route Makers - Episode 1: The Map Moment
The Route Makers, Episode 1: "The Map Moment" — Andrew Skurka, Rue McKenrick, Kevin Koski, and Donovan Rice on the birth of a long-distance route.
Every trail feels permanent. The Appalachian Trail, the Pacific Crest, the Continental Divide — they seem as fixed as the mountains they cross. But every one of them began as a line in a single person's imagination. Somebody drew it. Somebody walked it first. And somebody gave up years of their life to make it real for everyone who came after.
In the premiere of our new five-part documentary series, we meet the peop...
The Full Range - Carolyn Highland (Part II)
About the Guest
Carolyn Highland is a writer, outdoor educator, and endurance athlete based in Anchorage, Alaska. Her second essay collection, The Full Range: Essays from a Life Outside, is published by Rocky Mountain Books. Her first collection, Out Here, was published during COVID. She writes primarily about skiing and the outdoors for magazines including Backcountry Magazine, and has been keeping a journal since age seven. She taught fourth and seventh grade at an outdoor school in Truckee, California before moving to Anchorage, where she and her husband recently honeymooned by fastpacking the Alta Via 1 in the Dolomites. <...The Full Range - Carolyn Highland (Part I)
About the Guest
Carolyn Highland is a writer, outdoor educator, and endurance athlete based in Anchorage, Alaska. Her second essay collection, The Full Range: Essays from a Life Outside, is published by Rocky Mountain Books. Her first collection, Out Here, was published during COVID. She writes primarily about skiing and the outdoors for magazines including Backcountry Magazine, and has been keeping a journal since age seven. She taught fourth and seventh grade at an outdoor school in Truckee, California before moving to Anchorage, where she and her husband recently honeymooned by fastpacking the Alta Via 1 in the Dolomites. <...Dark Miles - The Longest Swim with Chris Carroll
On January 8th, 2026, Chris Carroll was on a hotel balcony in St. Croix when the beach got loud. He heard someone yell for a lifeguard. He knew there were no lifeguards. He swam out.
Chris is an emergency nurse, a former firefighter, and a waterman who has spent his entire life preparing to be useful when the moment came. It came on a Caribbean beach. He got to a drowning woman, assessed her injuries, and towed her back to shore through water that had turned bright crimson red.
The whole thing took nine minutes. She...
Trail Stories - The Full Range with Carolyn Highland
About the Guest
Carolyn Highland is a writer, outdoor educator, and endurance athlete based in Anchorage, Alaska. Her second essay collection, The Full Range: Essays from a Life Outside, is published by Rocky Mountain Books. Her first collection, Out Here, was published during COVID. She writes primarily about skiing and the outdoors for magazines including Backcountry Magazine, and has been keeping a journal since age seven. She taught fourth and seventh grade at an outdoor school in Truckee, California before moving to Anchorage, where she and her husband recently honeymooned by fastpacking the Alta Via 1 in the Dolomites. <...The Big Year - Bonus Episode: "This is Gonna Hurt"
Brandon Weis is from Ottawa, Ohio — farm country, flat, not a hiking family. He grew up playing football and basketball. His first experience in the mountains was a 2018 university group trip to the High Sierra, where he earned a trail name by carrying sixty to seventy pounds of group gear because he was the biggest one there. They called him Horsepower.
Three years later — one pandemic canceled PCT permit later, hundreds of hours of research later, one Jeff Garmire book later — he stepped onto the Appalachian Trail in Georgia on January 13th, 2021. His stated reason: Garmire's account of com...
No Limit - Lindsay Phenix (Part II)
About the Guest
Lindsay Phenix is an elite ultra-marathoner, two-time Badwater 135 finisher, run coach, and podcast co-host based in Los Angeles, California. She has completed approximately 145 marathons and ultramarathons combined — including a serious stack of 100-mile finishes — and is a featured athlete in the Amazon Prime documentary on the Badwater 135 ultra. She also appeared on The Wheel on Discovery Channel, a survival show filmed in South America. She coaches remotely through Ornery Mule Racing and co-hosts The Dirt Trail Running Podcast.What's Covered in Part 2
Dad — The Family Race DirectorHeight and Ultrarunning
145 Marath...
No Limit - Lindsay Phenix (Part I)
About the Guest
Lindsay Phenix is an elite ultra-marathoner, two-time Badwater 135 finisher, run coach, and podcast co-host based in Los Angeles, California. She has completed approximately 145 marathons and ultramarathons combined — including a serious stack of 100-mile finishes — and is a featured athlete in the Amazon Prime documentary on the Badwater 135 ultra. She also appeared on The Wheel on Discovery Channel, a survival show filmed in South America. She coaches remotely through Ornery Mule Racing and co-hosts The Dirt Trail Running Podcast.What's Covered in Part 1
Trailblazer's Toolkit — Burt's Bees Peppermint Lip BalmThe Hiking Poll — Score: 4...
CDT Trail Correspondent Jared "Fisherman" Lampal - Check-In #2
CDT Trail Correspondent Jared "Fisherman" Lampal checks in from Montana as he closes in on the northern terminus of the CDT. Settle in and buckle up as Fisherman gives us the updates on Colorado and Wyoming, and what he anticipates from the final state.
Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.
Trail Stories - No Limit with Lindsay Phenix
About the Guest
Lindsay Phenix is an elite ultra-marathoner, two-time Badwater 135 finisher, run coach, and podcast co-host based in Los Angeles, California. She has completed approximately 145 marathons and ultramarathons combined — including a serious stack of 100-mile finishes — and is a featured athlete in the Amazon Prime documentary on the Badwater 135 ultra. She also appeared on The Wheel on Discovery Channel, a survival show filmed in South America. She coaches remotely through Ornery Mule Racing and co-hosts The Dirt Trail Running Podcast.Episode Highlights
The Origin Story — Ten Loops Around the LakeUltramarathon Man — The Seed
Tr...
The Big Year: Episode 4 - The Limit
On New Year's Eve, Madison Blagden and Philip Witmer finish at the southernmost point in the continental United States. Two hikers are there to watch them, about to attempt the same thing themselves, starting the next morning.
The final episode of The Big Year follows the border-to-border Calendar Year Triple Crown: not Georgia to Maine, but Key West to Canada. 10,000 miles. 24 states. One year. Madison becomes the first woman in history to complete it, with a trail name earned in 2022 by going too hard and refusing to stop, and a nor'easter decision late in her year that...
Carry the Damn First Aid Kit - Dave, aka Slowfoot (Part II)
About the Guest
Dave — trail name SlowFoot — is a three-time Appalachian Trail thru-hiker, seven-time Long Trail thru-hiker (including three winter traversals), and among the first to complete both the Eastern Continental Trail and the International Appalachian Trail. He has logged over 30,000 miles across 30 years of hiking in the Eastern United States. A former Forest Service trail crew supervisor, caretaker at Upper Goose Pond Cabin, and wilderness EMT, he holds a master's degree in forestry from the University of Vermont and has worked for AMC, ATC, Forest Service, and the Green Mountain Club. He is the co-founder of Mountain Blaz...Carry the Damn First Aid Kit - Dave, aka Slowfoot (Part I)
About the Guest
Dave — trail name SlowFoot — is a three-time Appalachian Trail thru-hiker, seven-time Long Trail thru-hiker (including three winter traversals), and among the first to complete both the Eastern Continental Trail and the International Appalachian Trail. He has logged over 30,000 miles across 30 years of hiking in the Eastern United States. A former Forest Service trail crew supervisor, caretaker at Upper Goose Pond Cabin, and wilderness EMT, he holds a master's degree in forestry from the University of Vermont and has worked for AMC, ATC, Forest Service, and the Green Mountain Club. He is the co-founder of Mountain Blaz...Appalachian Trail Correspondent Dana Wolf - Check-in from the Trail #1
Triple Crowner and HTR AT Trail Correspondent Dana "Sniper" Wolf checks in with Doc from the trail on her yo-yo hike of the trail. Settle in and buckle up as Sniper shares how it's going, the biggest surprises, and what has changed since her 2007 thru hike of the AT.
Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.
Trail Stories - The Old World with SlowFoot
About the Guest
Dave — trail name SlowFoot — is a three-time Appalachian Trail thru-hiker, seven-time Long Trail thru-hiker (including three winter traversals), and among the first to complete both the Eastern Continental Trail and the International Appalachian Trail. He has logged over 30,000 miles across 30 years of hiking in the Eastern United States. A former Forest Service trail crew supervisor, caretaker at Upper Goose Pond Cabin, and wilderness EMT, he holds a master's degree in forestry from the University of Vermont and has worked for AMC, ATC, Forest Service, and the Green Mountain Club. He is the co-founder of Mountain Blaz...The Big Year: Episode 3 - The Record
Jeff Garmire completed the Calendar Year Triple Crown in 2016. When asked if there was a Fastest Known Time for it, he said it wasn't really a competitive thing, people just want to finish. Then he was asked directly whether anyone had hiked it faster than him. He said he thought he was among the faster ones. That's how the FKT era begins.
Episode 3 of The Big Year follows two men who came for the number afterward: Billy Meredith, who aimed at a 236-day ghost record instead of the official 252-day FKT, started in May instead of January...
Vibe Drinking with the Beans Lady - Maria "Beans" Romfoe (Part II)
Maria "Beans" Romfoe — AT and PCT thru-hiker, CDT finisher-minus-New-Mexico, and the internet's foremost beanfluencer — joins Doc for her first-ever podcast appearance.
Beans traces the origin of her trail name from a can of Bush's Beans on an Alaskan summit through a viral sponsorship dare to her current partnership with Eight Trak Foods, the woman-owned organic bean company whose founder sends her hand-drawn care packages on trail ("She's my bean lady"). She defends the engineering of a nine-pound base weight built around canned goods, recalls the three family-sized cans of barbecue baked beans that snapped her pack frame in t...
Vibe Drinking with the Beans Lady - Maria "Beans" Romfoe (Part I)
Maria "Beans" Romfoe — AT and PCT thru-hiker, CDT finisher-minus-New-Mexico, and the internet's foremost beanfluencer — joins Doc for her first-ever podcast appearance.
Beans traces the origin of her trail name from a can of Bush's Beans on an Alaskan summit through a viral sponsorship dare to her current partnership with Eight Trak Foods, the woman-owned organic bean company whose founder sends her hand-drawn care packages on trail ("She's my bean lady"). She defends the engineering of a nine-pound base weight built around canned goods, recalls the three family-sized cans of barbecue baked beans that snapped her pack frame in t...
Trail Stories - "She Just Wants to Exist" with Maria "Beans" Romfoe
About the Guest
Maria "Beans" Romfoe is an ABNM Triple Crown hiker — Appalachian Trail, Pacific Crest Trail, and Continental Divide Trail minus New Mexico — a beanfluencer, and the sole representative of what she describes as the bean community on the internet. A Wisconsin native who found her way to Alaska and then Washington State through a trail crew and outdoor studies background, she has been hiking with cans of beans since her college days and is currently sponsored by Eight Trak Foods, a woman-owned organic bean company. She posts on Instagram as @thebeansbabeoutdoors and plans to finish the CDT...The Big Year: Episode 2 - The Year
The plan looks clean on paper. Then you start hiking.
Episode 2 of The Big Year follows the year through all three trails. The Aqueduct in the Mojave, hiked at night for four nights straight. A wildfire in Northern California that sends one hiker sprinting five miles downhill with a 30-pound pack while his partner waits at a parking lot, initially mistaking the chaos for trail magic. Two months of snowshoeing in Colorado that leave a hiker with frostbite and the growing sense that the year might never end. A Sierra bridge crossed at 1:30 in the morning, hours...
Dark Miles - If I Slow Down with Casey "Vegas" Huffman
Casey “Vegas the Pied Piper” Huffman thru-hiked the Appalachian Trail in 2023 and the Pacific Crest Trail in 2025, and six weeks after telling Hiker Trash Radio that nothing would stop his 2027 Continental Divide Trail Triple Crown finish, an unclipped auto-belay in a Las Vegas climbing gym left him with two broken ankles and a shattered sense of self.
Drawing on three appearances across 18 months, this Dark Miles episode traces the full arc: the medicated childhood and the yes/no tattoos on his palms, the “letter from Hogwarts” at Annapolis Rock, the AT hike he privately treated as a Hail Mar...
When the Wand Breaks - Casey "Vegas" Huffman
️ In This Episode, We Discuss:
The Coworker's Lodge Floor: Why Vegas is recording from a room that smells suspiciously good, surrounded by floral decor in Silver Gate, Montana.
The Tahoe Rim Trail Victory Lap: A full trip report of Vegas's 9-to-10 day TRT run counterclockwise (the "SOBO" way) alongside AT and PCT legends Million Bucks, GT, and Swampy.
The Excitement Gauge: How an "emergency trail crap" became the ultimate indicator of a beautiful mountain pass experience.
The "Beefcake Vegas" Downfall: The split-second auto-belay mi...
The Big Year: Episode 1 - The Call
The Calendar Year Triple Crown doesn't recruit. It gets into people — through a sign above a bar, through a podcast episode, through the quiet math a hiker does at the end of a long day when they realize they want more of this, not less.
Episode 1 of The Big Year opens with Billy Meredith describing the moment he quit his office job to hike the Appalachian Trail — the hardest thing he'd ever done and the most amazing thing he'd ever done, at the same time. Three weeks into that hike, in a bar in Duncannon, Pennsylvania, he read...
The Full Traverse - Mr. Fabulous is Everyone
The Full Traverse is Hiker Trash Radio's narrative documentary series, drawing from years of conversations with a single guest to tell their complete story.
This episode: Derick "Fab" Lugo — author, speaker, and Triple Crowner. From zero experience in 2012 to the Appalachian Trail, the Continental Divide Trail, the Long Trail, and the Pacific Crest Trail.
Derick's books:
The Unlikely Thru-Hiker (2019) — his AT memoir. Made-up curse words included; safe to read to your kids. A Fabulous Thru Hike (Mountaineers Books, 2026) — his CDT memoir, out now. Available wherever books are sold; ordering through his website supports him most d...The Full Traverse - Mountains Don't Care with Ben "Ginger Ballz" Vaughan
The Full Traverse is HTR's long-form narrative format, drawing from multiple years of conversations with a single guest to tell the complete story. This is Episode 3.
Guest: Ben Vaughan, trail name Ginger Ballz — Navy Lieutenant Commander (retired), Triple Crowner, Hayduke thru-hiker, dog musher, Iditarod trainer, whitewater raft guide, and operations manager for Dallas Seavey's kennel operation.
Trail name origin: Earned on the AT hiking with a younger trail family who progressed from "Old Man" to "Old Man Ginger Balls" to "OMGB" to "Ginger Balls" over the course of approximately zero trail days. He accepts this. Th...
The Full Traverse - Thoughts on a Zero Day with Eddie "Bard" Janicki
The Full Traverse is HTR's long-form narrative format, drawing from multiple years of conversations with a single guest to tell the complete story. This is Episode 4.
Guest: Eddie Janicki, trail name Bard — Triple Crowner, civil engineer, amateur musician, and the only known person to hike the full PCT with a guitar.
Trail name origin: Given two days into the PCT in 2018 by a fellow hiker after Eddie arrived on trail carrying a guitar, a harmonica on a neck stand, and various other items that did not survive the first week. The trail name One Man Ba...
The Source Material: Episode 6 - Barkley's Mad Genius
Guest Featured
Lazarus Lake (Gary Cantrell) Creator of the Barkley Marathons and the Backyard Ultra in direct conversation with Doc Key Themes Laz on the design philosophy of the Barkley with uncertainty as the core principle The Name Game: Laz's one-sentence portraits of the finishers in his own words What Laz sees when he watches the race each year and what he's still looking for The race's future: what happens when the edge of the possible keeps moving Laz on the fame: the BBC, the Netflix documentary, the viral photographs The question Doc has been building toward for...Walking Away From a Life That Worked - Jeff "Bluey" Lewis (Part II)
Picking back up, Bluey traces the real origin of his AT dream back to childhood summer camp, where two counselors disappeared for a season to thru-hike the trail and came back changed men — planting a seed that took him over two decades to act on. He talks candidly about the conversation with his wife that preceded his decision to go, including her quietly handing him a Christmas gift that said more than words could: an expensive base layer, no note attached, her way of saying she'd support him even if she didn't want him to leave.
The co...
Walking Away From a Life That Worked - Jeff "Bluey" Lewis (Part I)
Jeff "Bluey" Lewis joins Hiker Trash Radio to talk about walking away from over 16 years in nonprofit leadership and business strategy at age 40 to thru-hike the Appalachian Trail in 2025 — all 2,198 miles of it, Georgia to Maine, in five months. The experience became the basis for his upcoming memoir, Midlife Hike This: Walking Away from a Life That Worked to Find What Really Mattered.
Bluey explains the origin of his trail name — a rock-paper-scissors bet gone wrong with an eight-year-old at an outfitter in Franklin, North Carolina — and why he's stuck with it for life, win or lose. He tal...
The Full Traverse - Hike or Die with Wesley "Megaman" Tils
The Full Traverse is HTR's long-form narrative format, drawing from multiple years of conversations with a single guest to tell the complete story. This episode covers Wesley "Mega Man" Tils.
Guest: Wesley "Mega Man" Tils — Triple Crowner, Fourth Crown Route originator, archaeologist, and the only known survivor of a sustained predatory grizzly bear encounter on the Continental Divide Trail.
Trail name origin: Earned on the Appalachian Trail while hiking southbound with a stress fracture, combining "Mega" (the slang term for southbound AT hikers, from the Maine-to-Georgia abbreviation) with his childhood love of the Mega Man vi...
Trail Stories - What Would Your Dead Self Say?
About the Guest
Jeff "Bluey" Lewis spent 16 years in nonprofit leadership and business strategy before resigning at 40 to hike the Appalachian Trail, Georgia to Maine, in 2025 — 2,198 miles in five months. The hike became the foundation for his memoir, Midlife Hike This: Walking Away From a Life That Worked to Find What Really Mattered, releasing September 4, 2026 — the anniversary of his Katahdin summit. He lives in Baltimore.Episode Highlights
The Trail NameThe Man at the Pool
Eric
The Pennsylvania Tantrum
Coming Home
Writing the Book
Trail Wisd...
The Source Material: Episode 5 - Whistling in the Dark
Guest Featured
Jared Beasley Journalist and author of The Endurance Artist: Lazarus Lake, the Barkley, and a Race With No End (Simon & Schuster) Key Themes The writing of The Endurance Artist: what three years of reporting looks like from the inside What Jared found that surprised him most about Laz The Barkley as a cultural phenomenon: Netflix, the New York Times, the viral photographs Laz on his own fame, the quote Jared captured that appears nowhere else What the race means beyond sport, the philosophical argument of the book The difference between the Laz the public sees and...The Four Corners Loop - Kevin Koski (Part II)
About the Guest
Kevin Koski — The Animal — is a nuclear engineer for the U.S. Navy and the creator of the Four Corners Loop, a roughly 2,400-mile self-designed route through the American Southwest. He has hiked the CDT (2004), the PCT (2014), and over 11,000 miles of trail across Washington State. He retires from the Navy next February at 51 and plans to hike the Arizona Trail to celebrate.What's Covered in Part 2
The Sabbatical PhilosophyProving the Loop — Permit, Interruption, Return
Fourteen and a Half Liters
The 54-Mile Stretch and the Owl Biologists
The...
The Four Corners Loop - Kevin Koski (Part I)
About the Guest
Kevin Koski — trail name The Animal — is a CDT (2004) and PCT (2014) veteran, a nuclear engineer for the U.S. Navy, and the creator of the Four Corners Loop (FCL), an approximately 2,400-mile, self-designed circular route connecting wild public lands across New Mexico, Arizona, Utah, and Colorado. He has logged over 11,000 miles of trail in Washington State alone and is a volunteer with Olympic Mountain Rescue. He retires from the Navy next February and plans to hike the Arizona Trail as a retirement gift to himself.What's Covered in Part 1
The Trail NameThe...
The Big Year - Trailer
Three trails. One year. Fewer than 30 people in history have done it.
The Big Year: A Calendar Year Triple Crown Documentary is a four-part narrative audio series coming soon to Hiker Trash Radio.
It starts with a sign in a bar in Duncannon. It ends on New Year's Eve in Key West, with two hikers finishing and two more waiting to start.
In between: the longest snow year on record in the Sierra. A helicopter evacuation at 3,000 miles in. A wildfire. A cardiac ICU. A tent that slid downhill on the first night. 10,070...
