We are Russ and Betsy Bevis. Married, 30-something, DINKS who have decided to throw convention and "the standard life plan" into the wind. We have quit our jobs and we are going to pursue our life long goal to thru-hike the Appalachian trail in 2017.
That statement usually leads to about a billion questions (huh, when, why, where and how) but we are going to back up a few paces and tell you a little bit about ourselves and then get into all your burning questions in our next few entries.
HIGHLIGHTS (<- first Hamilton reference of the blog)
Russ Bevis - husband, Mechanical Engineer by education, and Mr. Can-do-anything by lifestyle. Russ grew up in Burke County, NC and has loved the outdoors since he was a child. He was outdoors skateboarding with neighborhood friends, entrepreneuring lawn maintenance and power kites with his best friend, fly fishing, soccer, camping, boy scouts and driving jeeps into mud holes, but maybe not in that exact order.
Betsy Bevis - wife, graphic communicator by education and risk taker by default. Betsy grew up in Lancaster, SC and also loved the outdoors as a child. She spent her time in forts her dad built in the surrounding woods around her home, making mud pies in the stream at the end of the driveway at the mountain house, girl scouts, soccer, lifeguarding, and driving as fast as possible with the windows down. The latter never ended up well but she has slowed down... a little bit.
As individual people we are pretty great but together we make an amazing duo. We met at the end of our sophomore year at Clemson University. (GO TIGERS!) We started dating and knew we had a lot in common from the beginning. Car camping and tubing were on the list of adventures that first summer together. Later, we signed up to take a Backpacking leisure skills class together the following semester. That's when we realized we found something great in the woods.
After the class, we decided to complete the foothills trail and drive around North and South Carolina hiking to every waterfall we could find. Our friends thought it was a bit strange when I received a backpack as an anniversary present from Russ, but my love and excitement over it proved that it was the best present ever. We then started planning our next adventure.
Six years later, we were married in the fall on the side of a mountain. We wouldn't have had it any other way. We have skied Western NC, hiked red rock canyon NV and picnicked in the Grand Canyon. We rode horses in Jackson Hole, fly fished the snake river and hiked around the Grand Tetons. We have spent numerous weekends at the National Whitewater Center in Charlotte and have run from Chattanooga TN to Nashville on a Ragnar relay team of 12 for 200 miles. We have accomplished so much but know that we have so much more to do.
We have decided to that our next adventure will be to hike the Appalachian trail, 2190.3 miles, from Georgia to Maine this year and we couldn't be more excited.
