Thru-hiking The Appalachian Trail with 15 Kids with Nikki Bettis

0:00Simplecas:When I first heard about thru-hiker Nikki Bettis, I had a lot of questions. Nikki is a single mom to 15 biological children, all from the same marriage. In 2023, she and her kids were all living under one roof in rural Virginia, and they were struggling financially and emotionally. The kids were fighting a lot, and the family couldn't afford a vehicle or even basic resources like power and water. Nikki knew that something needed to change. During this challenging period, she spent a lot of time on local trails to clear her mind. One day, a small hike on the Appalachian Trail turned into a much wilder idea.

0:41Nikki Bettis:I was out hiking one day with one of my kids, and we happened to intersect with an AT. And I was like, what if we just hiked? What if we all came out here, somehow got out to the trailhead, and we didn't have to go home? So I began to plan. And I went home and asked my kids, would you do it with me? So I had some hell no's. And then I had like, let's go. And over a period of about six months or so, I started prepping and really researching. I love to research. And once I did that, I was like, I think we can do this.

1:14Simplecas:With that, Nikki decided to take all of her kids ages four to 21 on the Appalachian Trail. That's a lot of people, a lot of logistics and a lot of miles. But in the back of her mind, Nikki hoped that pushing themselves physically and spending time together in nature would help their family write a new chapter of their story. Spoiler alert, she was right. I'm Shelby Stanger, and this is Wild Ideas Worth Living, an REI Co-op Studios production presented by Capital One and the REI Co-op MasterCard. A note before we start, there's a brief mention of domestic violence in this episode. Please listen with care.

1:59Simplecas:Nikki Bettis, welcome to Wild Ideas Worth Living. You are the super mom. I'm so excited to talk to you.

2:06Nikki Bettis:I think my children would be a better judge of that, but I try to be, so yeah.

2:09Simplecas:Well, let's start with your wild idea. I mean, you have 15 kids, which is a wild idea on its own. And you had this wild idea in 2023 to hike the Appalachian Trail with all 15 of them. I don't even know where we start. We should probably start with, you have 15 kids. That's pretty remarkable.

2:27Nikki Bettis:Yes, I do. Lots of people ask why. There's a lot of why's. Why do you have 15 kids? So I'll backtrack a little bit and kind of clarify that. I was raised, I was born into a very upper middle class, normal American family.

2:41Simplecas:I just have two siblings.

2:42Nikki Bettis:But in my early teens, my mom and dad kind of got a hold of a belief system that was very kind of cult minded. And I think it's important to note, too, that I don't fault them. Like, I love both of my parents. And I think as parents, we just do the best we can. And when you see something that has good morals, good values that you want for your kids, you tend to go down those roads. And I think they did. So with that in mind, we went down that road. And it did not go so well.

3:15Simplecas:the religious community that Nikki was raised in had strict rules about how women and men should act and dress she was taught from a young age that having kids was a way to be blessed by God and at age 23 Nikki had her first child over the next 20 years she gave birth to 14 more kids

3:39Nikki Bettis:so I married into that belief system just for familiarity sakes and I stayed in it for 20 years that's another question I get asked a lot why didn't you leave sooner how did it take 15 kids to come to the devastating end that it did but I think it's important to know that when you marry into a very patriarchal stereotypical system that it's very hard to leave it because you fear it's very mental and you fear punishment from god um punishment from your spouse and then you're also shunned from the family which makes it very difficult to leave and especially when you love the person on the other side of it and your whole entire life is just built to do the honorable thing and to love that person so when you see someone going downhill you want to help them but it took um alcohol abuse and it finally turned into domestic violence and so eventually once the domestic violence started I tolerated it for a long time because it was just to me and I kept thinking if I would do better if I just loved more that he would get better and it didn't work like that but when it finally transitioned over into the kids we had one incident and um so he was taken away in a domestic violence call.

4:52Nikki Bettis:And after that, we did not hear from him or see him. He just disappeared. And I say all that to say, this is how the Appalachian Trail began to take shape is because of our past. So the whole family kind of imploded. We lost power. We lost water. We didn't have a vehicle. We didn't have phones. And it crushed my heart because everything I worked to build up in the kids and their self-esteem and independence and all the things you want to see in your kids began to just fall apart and their relationships fell apart. And so during that time, I was out hiking one day with one of my kids, like little four seater cars.

5:25Nikki Bettis:And I had one or had two of the kids with me, one older and one younger. And we happened to intersect with an AT. And I was like, what if we just hiked? What if we all came out here, somehow got out to the trailhead and we didn't have to go home? And at the time, my little one was three, but she could do about 11 miles because my motto is once they reach three, I am not carrying you anymore. You got to walk. So I was like, if we could do 11 miles a day, could we do the AT and just stay out there? So I began to plan. I went home and asked my kids, would you do it with me? And there was a lot, I mean, you get that many and you get all kinds of opinions and they're all very outspoken, very feisty.

6:02Nikki Bettis:And they've all, they're very independent. So I was like, would you do it with me? So we were like, as a family, it's like, let's sit down as a group and discuss this. We already kind of know what it is to go without power and water. So it's got to be better out there than what we're living. And over a period of about six months or so, I started prepping and really researching. I love to research. And so it was like, are we going to die out there? Or could we really actually survive this thing? So I saw we had no money. And so we get everything used. I don't buy anything new. The kids will tear it up and I don't want to spend the money.

6:37Nikki Bettis:So I was Like if I really, really get some good deals, I think I can make it work. So I would just stash any tiny little bit of leftover we had. And I figured we could. It would take a while, but we could. And as I got more and more excited and began to kind of chip away at the education and research aspect of it, I was like, you know what? If I really began to kind of chip away at gears, I think this is possible. So in July, I kind of started purchasing. I would save every little bit I could get and started getting things from the Facebook marketplace and Black Friday sales. I knew that Thanksgiving would come and a lot of stuff we needed would be at that point.

7:16Nikki Bettis:So as I began to tell people our story on Facebook, as I would send messages, it was so cool because I would usually cut them in half. I will never ask for anything for free. I'm just I'm not going to do it. I don't expect other people to provide for my 15 kids. And as I would tell them their story and see if they would come, you know, about half off, the majority of the people, like not even a small percentage, the majority of the people were so moved by our story that they were like, we'll just give this to you. They were so positive and willing to make it work that we were given a lot of our gear.

7:53Simplecas:These random acts of kindness gave Nikki the confidence to reach out to brands for donations, and it worked. A company called Teton Gear ended up sending the family the remaining packs they needed for the journey. Within just a year of forming her wild idea, Nikki and her kids headed to the trailhead at Springer Mountain in Georgia in March 2023. 13 of the 15 kids would do the entire through hike with Nikki and the other two would hike sections. What was that first day like?

8:26Nikki Bettis:very interesting it was so um there's a story to that too we bought a bus because tax return was large that year that was the only money we ever got was tax return and we had to have a vehicle to get us to Springer so we bought this like$1 ,200 bus and uh you get what you pay for in a bus and the brakes went out in Gainesville Georgia we were almost there it was horrific so that delayed I mean the whole trip just started with a bang by the brakes going out so we had Bobby the Greek who was the most amazing trail angel oh my god we still have a relationship with that man and he came and picked us up from Gainesville Georgia and we still were able to get to Springer on March the 7th so we spent the night there and then we after all the chaos and everything we started hiking out March the 8th and that first day was um it was more funny than anything it was just it was the absurdity of what we were doing but we've all got really great sensitive humor and it's just like if you you might as well laugh about it rather than be

9:25Simplecas:miserable and the kids are pretty good about that the very first night this was so great

9:30Nikki Bettis:we didn't know water sources we were still new to it and we camped in like this four-wheeling atv like little turnaround where they were doing donuts and stuff and there was a mud puddle and we drank all our water by that time and so we were actually using our sawyer filters to draw up water out of this mud puddle that had tadpoles in it. And we have videos of the four and six year old going, look at all the tadpoles and don't suck up the tadpoles. So to this day, it's a family joke that we started the trail with Boba.

10:07Simplecas:Slowly but surely, Nikki and her kids made their way north from Georgia on the Appalachian Trail. Each night, they posted up at a campsite with six tents, mixing and matching who slept where so no one got sick of each other. The group did their best to fairly distribute their load between packs, but Nikki had a pretty strict, you want it, you carry it policy. Her kids were responsible for their own needs and specific requests. For example, one of her sons hauled his own hammock the entire 2 ,200 miles. A few others packed honey, despite how heavy it was, because they wanted a sweet treat on the trail.

10:45Simplecas:tell me a little bit about what you ate for breakfast lunch and dinner so i'm a firm believer

10:50Nikki Bettis:i hate to cook i cannot stay in the kitchen and i'm also a firm believer in being independent and do it yourself i'm not cleaning up your dishes i'm not fixing your food so they each have their little pocket rocket you know black friday sale camp stoves and they each individually fix their meals i think that's also part of teaching them independence and building those skills of knowing you can do things. So for lunches we didn't cook. We had a rule don't cook for lunch because it took too long. You get the stove out you got to clean up and all that. So we had tortillas peanut butter for lunches.

11:22Nikki Bettis:Usually we did not cook for breakfast. Every once in a while after we got over the oatmeal phase because there for a while we had oatmeal all the time. But after we got out of that and realized how time consuming it was to cook breakfast were quick lunch were quick and then we cooked dinners and they were usually ramen bombs of ramen and mashed potatoes. But each kid did their own except for the four and six-year-old. And we had people cook for them.

11:42Simplecas:Nikki, tell me how many miles you did on trail every day.

11:45Nikki Bettis:We started with five in the beginning and they were very humble beginnings, full of dire predictions from people. And then we ended the trail with our highest day being 24 miles. It was a huge success. We evolved and we grew a lot during that time. So hold up, the four-year-old did 24 miles? Yes, she did. She absolutely nailed it. so given the okay granted that was Pennsylvania Pennsylvania is very flat it's very rocky but very flat but we happen to love the rocks people hate them but we loved them and she absolutely nailed

12:15Simplecas:it how did you get her to go 24 miles like that's got to be a record for a four-year-old like I can't even get my seven and ten-year-old niece and nephew to do a mile with me it was I think by that

12:26Nikki Bettis:time we've been on trail like five months at that point and so I could never just put a four-year-old on a trail and expect 24 miles. So those are very through hiker legs. She very much had her trail legs by that point. And so I think it's important to note too, when all these other parents asked that no, a four year old is never just going to go out there and do 24. But after five months of doing it day in day out, she's a kid and kids are so resilient with so much energy and their body adapts. And she was like a hiking machine by the end of it. She outpaced me. That kid stayed up there with the fast group the whole time and never out of breath, just laughed and talked.

13:05Simplecas:She was great. She's amazing. Did you guys each have a trail name? I know having a trail name is a huge part of all these big trails. Did all 15 of you or 16 of you each get a trail name?

13:17Nikki Bettis:Yes, we each gave each other trail names. The rule was you couldn't have one when you first started and you couldn't make one up yourself because that's not authentic. You had to earn it. So it took everybody about a week or two to get a trail name. And by the end of it, we each had trail names. What was your trail name? Hot shower. Hot shower. Why is that? My kids gave it to me because they were so fed up. We would get into town and all I wanted was a shower and I would be the first one. They were always so kind and considerate. So they would let me take a shower first up until they realized I used up all the hot water.

13:52Nikki Bettis:After that, they're like, I'm going first. and the youngest is not oatmeal. Yeah, the youngest is not oatmeal. That kid, man, for the first seven days,

14:01Simplecas:the only thing she would eat was oatmeal.

14:04Nikki Bettis:Man, she would not eat anything else. And then she OD'd on it. And after that seventh day on trail, she has never eaten oatmeal again. She cannot stand it.

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16:13Simplecas:My morning routine these days looks like this. A cup or two of coffee with my AeroPress, then out to the ocean to catch some waves before an interview. And as much as I love being in the ocean, what I genuinely look forward to is using my AeroPress again the next day. It's that good. If you've never tried AeroPress coffee, you're in for a treat. It's a French press, a pour-over, and espresso machine all in one. It uses a completely unique brew method, which means you get a cup of coffee that's rich, smooth, and genuinely different from anything else. And it's fast. It only takes about two minutes to brew your coffee and clean up.

16:53Simplecas:Lately, I've been using the AeroPress Go Plus. It's a complete travel coffee system I can take to the beach or out on the trail. Everything packs into a double-wall insulated stainless steel tumbler for storage and travel. It's compact, durable, easy to use, easy to clean, and it makes great coffee no matter where you are. I just unpack it, brew, and pack it back up. To ensure you never have bad coffee wherever you are, visit your local REI or head to REI.com to grab your AeroPress. That's A-E-R-O-P-R-E-S-S. It's time to ditch the drive-thru, toss the French press, and say yes to better mornings fueled by better coffee.

17:50Simplecas:In 2023, Nikki Bettis took her 15 children with her to hike the Appalachian Trail. Sometimes it's hard enough to get one kid to go hiking, Imagine getting 15 of them to log more than 11 miles a day. As you might guess, there were plenty of hard moments on the trail. Grueling tantrums, sibling arguments, and certainly times when everyone wanted to throw in the towel. But for the most part, the family was resilient and were able to make it through even their worst days. It helped that they know how to make each other laugh. What was the funniest day?

18:29Nikki Bettis:um we had a lot a lot of good days um the funniest that they still look back on is when we got frozen in our little tent jail our coldest night out there i think the actual temperature was like four degrees but the windchill was i think minus 15 or 14 it was cold and we camped up on a summit because we didn't know better at the time we just wanted the views but uh it was we could not get out of our tents. We were actually frozen into our tents. Do we still laugh about that? What do you mean you were frozen into your tents? Like it wouldn't zip open? Yeah, the condensation from all of us being inside because we had cramped so many people inside for body warmth and to keep warm, which actually was really toasty in there, but it built up condensation and it was so cold that night that it froze the condensation on the zipper and none of us could get out of our tents.