The Appalachian Cloud Trail: Hiking, Cloud Economics, and Finding Perspective

What happens when two cloud economists leave AWS  behind and spend six days hiking 60 miles on the Appalachian Trail? Corey Quinn sits down with Caleb Hurd to share stories from the trail, including exploding sleeping pads, heroic shuttle drivers, lost phones, and the unique community that makes long-distance hiking special. Along the way, they draw surprising parallels between backpacking and cloud economics, discussing everything from serverless architecture and cloud cost optimization to the hidden challenges of on-prem infrastructure. It's a conversation about technology, adventure, perspective, and why sometimes the best way to solve complex problems is to step away from them entirely.

Show highlights:

(00:00) Why Hiking Hooks You

(00:15) Meet Caleb on the Trail

(01:31) Trail Miles and Ultralight Parallels

(05:24) The Sleeping Pad Blowout

(07:46) Shepherd Saves the Day

(09:43) Trail Community and Cloud Community

(11:07) Post Trail Perspective and Inside Jokes

(15:35) Back to Work On Prem vs Cloud Pain

(25:47) Server-less Spend and Lambda Sprawl

(32:29) Wrap Up Where to Find Caleb