Here are some resources I have used for information on the trail:

WEB

http://www.appalachiantrail.org/
The home of the Appalachian Trail Conservancy which is the not-for-profit that oversees and coordinates the efforts of all of the local trail clubs. There are lots of useful facts and figures here. And the Ultimate AT Store is the best place to buy maps, guidebooks, or even AT tchotchkies (don’t think I don’t have my eye on that “2,175″ bumper sticker!).

http://www.aldha.org/
The Appalachian Long Distance Hikers’ Association. These guys publish the invaluable Thru-Hiker’s Companion, which they also make available online. There are also good articles and forums here.

http://www.whiteblaze.net/
This is a website/discussion board for all things AT. A great place to get advice (or give it, if that’s your thing…). In particular, some very good articles on gear and resupply planning. It also seems to be a pretty active message board so might be a good way to keep tabs on or contact a hiker.

http://www.trailjournals.com/
Read the blogs of other thru-hikers. I’m not on here, but once I make friends (assuming I make friends…) some of them will be on here.

http://www.cs.utk.edu/~dunigan/at/googleat.php
This kicks ass. It’s a googlemap of all of the AT shelters. If you click on the link, you get all sorts of very rich GIS information. Very grateful to mister ~dunigan, whoever he is. I’ll be cribbing this to set my map pins for wheresloafy.

BOOKS

Long Distance Hiking: Lessons from the Appalachian Trail
by Roland Mueser (1998)
This is an incredibly interesting and useful book.Mueser is a retired scientician, so he takes a very methodical, data-oriented approach, mixed of course with personal experience.

The Appalachian Trail Backpacker: trail-proven advice for hikes of any length
by Victoria and Frank Logue (2001)

The Appalachian Trail: How to Prepare For & Hike It
by Jan D. Curran (1995, updated and revised 2002)

Appalachian Trail Thru-Hike Planner
by the Appalachian Trail Conservancy (updated 2007)

How to Hike The Appalachian Trail (2-disc DVD)
by Lynne Wheldon
I found this to be very very useful. It gave several different perspectives, and quite a bit of detail, via interviews with thru-hikers – midhike!

On The Beaten Path: An Appalachian Pilgrimage
by Robert Alden Rubin
Personal journal of a 1997 thru-hiker. Really very readable, and gave me a great idea about some of the mental and emotional challenges of the trail.

White Blaze Fever: Georgia to Maine on the Appalachian Trail
by William Schuette
Personal journal of a 2000 thru-hiker. Essentially less a book than an edited version of his actual journal. It’s less introspective than Rubin’s, but has much more practical details.

I’ve also used Dan Wingfoot Bruce’s Thru-Hiker’s Handbook, though he doesn’t seem to be updating it any more. It’s essentially analagous to the Thru-Hiker’s Companion. Something about Wingfoot’s writing style made me chuckle a few times, though. Hey, I saw Wingfoot interviewed in the DVD I mentioned above, and I know he’s one of the principle organizers of Trail Days in Damascus, so maybe I’ll meet him?

I’ve also used Doris Gove’s Exploring the Appalachian Trail: Hikes in the Southern Appalachians. Tons and tons of information about history, geology, botany and wildlife. More information than I can usually process, and certainly more than I care to carry with me. But good stuff! I’m reminded of one of my favorite lines from a movie (I think it was Author Author, but I may be mixing two things up. At any rate…) someone is telling the protagonist, who is an author, about a speed-reading class, and he says: “How awful. Now, if somebody could teach me how to read Dostoyevsky or Emerson at the slowest pace possible, now then they’d really be on to something.” I loved that. You have to be very goal-oriented and mile-obsessed to complete the trail in one season. And frankly, that’s one of the reasons I’m doing it. But I must remember to stop and smell the rhododendrons, to read the historical markers, and to turn over a few stones.

I’ve also really enjoyed and benefitted from the advice contained in Don Ladigin’s Lighten Up!: A Complete Handbook for Light and Ultralight Backpacking. I don’t follow every bit of advice given here, but it’s really helped me to change my mindset and re-evaluate everything I thought I knew.

I would be remiss if I didn’t also mention Backpacker Magazine, and in particular their annual Gear Guide. I remember my dad used to refer to the Sears & Roebucks Catalog as the “wish book.” Well, this has been my wish book for years. Not just the equipment, but also and increasingly the trails and trips they review! (side note, my dad isn’t really that old – it was probably just the Sears catalog, without the Roebuck’s…)