She spent the next five months hiking, listening to others tell their stories, telling her own story, gaining confidence, exploring her options in life, and deciding she needed to spend her life doing something she enjoyed instead of sitting behind a desk.

Suitably, Pharr Davis selected the trail name Odyssa when she started her hike because she thought about what the name meant and considered that maybe she was a wanderer on a long journey back to her home. Her thru-hiking adventures began immediately after graduating college as a classics major. Jennifer Pharr Davis offers insightful perspective and chronicles a transformational journey of her five-month hike of the Appalachian Trail, a 2,185* mile footpath that stretches from Maine to Georgia, in her first book Becoming Odyssa: Epic Adventures on the Appalachian Trail. Jennifer lives in Asheville, North Carolina, with her husband Brew and their daughter Charley and son Gus.She tells stories, runs a business, inspires women young and old, encourages people to spend time outdoors, and hikes long distance trails at record-breaking speeds. She is also a former board member for the Appalachian Trail Conservancy and an ambassador for the American Hiking Society. She is also a professional speaker and the founder and owner of Blue Ridge Hiking Company, a guiding service that strives 'to make the wilderness accessible and enjoyable' for hikers of all ages, genders, and ability levels. Jennifer has authored books and written articles for the New York Times, Outside magazine, Backpacker, and Trail Runner.

Jennifer has also backpacked over 700 miles in her 2nd and 3rd Trimesters of Pregnancy, walked across the state of North Carolina while nursing her son, and set foot on a trail in all 50 states with her daughter. By doing this, she claimed the overall (male or female) fastest known time on the 'A.T.' and became the first woman to set the mark.

In 2011, Jennifer covered the 2,185-mile Appalachian Trail in forty-six days, eleven hours, and twenty minutes, maintaining a remarkable average of forty-seven miles per day. Jennifer Pharr Davis is a hiker, author, speaker, and National Geographic Adventurer of the Year who has covered over 14,000 miles of long distance trails on six different continents.

Becoming odyssa book