Tom Rowland Podcast Episode 32 is my conversation with Jessica 'Dixie' Mills, the long-distance backpacker behind the Homemade Wanderlust YouTube channel. In roughly four years she walked almost 8,000 miles — the Appalachian Trail in 2015, the Pacific Crest Trail in 2017, and the Continental Divide Trail in 2018 — earning the Triple Crown of thru-hiking. The part that floored me is the starting point: before she stepped onto the AT, Dixie had never spent a single night backpacking. Her first three backpacking trips of her life were the three hardest trails in America.
Jessica 'Dixie' Mills is a long-distance backpacker and the creator of the Homemade Wanderlust YouTube channel. She is from Opelika, Alabama, holds a biosystems-engineering degree from Auburn, and previously worked for the Alabama Department of Agriculture and then in the Colorado oil field before leaving engineering to thru-hike full time.
The Triple Crown is the unofficial distinction of completing all three major U.S. long-distance scenic trails: the Appalachian Trail (about 2,190 miles), the Pacific Crest Trail (about 2,650 miles), and the Continental Divide Trail (about 3,100 miles) — roughly 8,000 miles in total. Dixie completed the AT in 2015, the PCT in 2017, and the CDT in 2018.
No. She had done day hikes but had never spent a night on a backpacking trip before the AT. She cooked on her stove for the first time on her first night on trail. Her first three backpacking trips of her life were the AT, the PCT, and the CDT.
Dixie's rule of thumb is roughly 1,000 dollars per month on trail to be comfortable on either the Appalachian Trail or the Pacific Crest Trail. You can do it for less if you are tight, or significantly more. Pre-trail gear costs are a separate expense.
Homemade Wanderlust is Dixie's YouTube channel, website, and social-media presence, plus a Patreon and a Facebook group with roughly 25,000 to 30,000 members. She funds her gear partly through a public Amazon wish list that viewers — what she calls private sponsors — purchase from, layered with affiliate links and Patreon support.
Alone in the New Mexico desert, Dixie tried to look big and holler, then remembered the harmonica in her shoulder-strap pocket and played Mary Had a Little Lamb on the theory that a sound the cat had never heard might scare it off. The lion stared for about a minute and a half, then ran. She filmed the encounter on her phone.
Tom Rowland Podcast Episode 32 with Jessica 'Dixie' Mills is available on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, and wherever you get your podcasts. The video version is embedded at the top of this page.
I went into this one honestly humbled. Across the table was a woman who, in about four years, had walked almost 8,000 miles across the three hardest trails in the country — and who had never slept a night in a backpacking tent before she started. I have spent my life chasing hard outdoor goals, and I could not stop thinking about what it takes to step onto the Appalachian Trail with gear you have literally never used.
A few moments from this conversation do not survive being written down — the tone in her voice describing her legs giving out in a Sierra river, the pause when I asked about her dog. Read this for the route. Press play in the YouTube player at the top of this page for Dixie.
Dixie's path does not start at a trailhead. It starts as a kid at Newfound Gap, pointing at a sign and asking her mom what it meant. Years later she had the recipe everyone tells you to want — engineering degree, a house, two dogs, mountains out the window — and woke up one morning asking why she was not happy. She ran her life backwards to the sign at Newfound Gap, cashed in a small retirement with the penalty, and went. Listen to how she describes that morning.
2017 was one of the highest snow years on record on the PCT, and the danger is not the snow — it is the raging rivers it becomes when it melts. Dixie pushed alone into a crossing she had convinced herself she could handle. She made it halfway, turned back, got to the bank and cried, and then camped right there. Inside thirty minutes four other hikers arrived and made the same call — and became her Sierra tramily. Hear that whole sequence in her own words.
This part genuinely surprised me. Dixie did not want the obligation of free gear for reviews, so she put exactly the gear she wanted on a public Amazon wish list and let viewers buy it — private sponsors, honest reviews, funded kit — layered with affiliate links, Patreon, and a Facebook group of nearly 30,000 people. She built a job that did not exist a decade ago. Listen to how the business actually works.
The two CDT encounters everyone asks about: a mountain lion about 20 feet away in the New Mexico desert that she stopped by playing Mary Had a Little Lamb on a harmonica, and a near lightning strike above 13,000 feet where her graphite trekking poles started humming and her hair stood up. As a flats guy, I have felt the exact same buzz off a graphite rod tip — same physics. Press play to hear both stories.
Listen to the full conversation: ▶ Watch on YouTube
I came out of this with a different idea of what a thru-hike is. Going in, I treated it like an athletic accomplishment — a mileage thing. What Dixie laid out was something else: the Triple Crown was not the end of a path she trained for, it was the way she found out what she actually wanted by walking far enough away from the recipe everyone handed her.
The line I keep repeating is her fix for analysis paralysis: take one small step today — go buy the 40-dollar water filter. That single decision is the commitment that starts everything. Press play and let her tell you the rest.
The Tom Rowland Podcast brings you long-form conversations with the most accomplished anglers, hunters, conservationists, and outdoor professionals in the game. Listen to every full-length Tom Rowland Podcast interview.
Jessica 'Dixie' Mills is a long-distance backpacker and the creator of the Homemade Wanderlust YouTube channel. Originally from Opelika, Alabama, she earned a biosystems-engineering degree from Auburn and worked for the Alabama Department of Agriculture and then in the Colorado oil field before leaving engineering to thru-hike full time. She completed the Triple Crown of thru-hiking — the Appalachian Trail in 2015, the Pacific Crest Trail in 2017, and the Continental Divide Trail in 2018 — roughly 8,000 miles in all, and now documents trail life and teaches aspiring hikers through Homemade Wanderlust.
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