about us

Pete and Kathy are the Hoppy Hikers. We love hiking and spending time in national and state parks. We live in central Virginia, so most of our hiking has been in Virginia and the surrounding states. We have been to 29 National Parks in the US and too many state parks, national forests, and national recreation areas to count. Most of the hikes in our blog will be in the mid-Atlantic states but we do have a few favorites in other regions we plan to include as well. Over the years, many friends have asked us for recommendations on where to hike. This site includes many of our favorite hikes.

We also like beer. We tend to prefer IPAs—the hoppier the better. As we like to say, a good IPA should be solidly hoppy. Pete does like a stout or porter in the colder months and sometimes a pilsner or lager in the heat of the summer. In our opinion, nothing is better after a great hike than a great beer. Virginia and surrounding states have some of the best hiking trails in the East—and also some of the best breweries.

If we don’t like a hike or think it was just OK, we won’t write about it. We feel the same way about beer. We have had some fantastic beers from independent microbreweries and we plan to include a featured beer or brewery with every hike. If we don’t like a beer, we won’t write about it as there are too many great beers to try and we would rather promote the really good ones. The Hoppy Hikers are all about pairing great hikes with fantastic beers. Life is too short to go on mediocre hikes and then have a bad beer. We especially like discovering great hikes in out-of-the-way places and searching for small, locally owned breweries. This blog will help us share our hiking and beer adventures.