The week leading up to a trip.

I try to go for a couple of long-ish walks, just near my house. If it's a trip that will involve significant elevation gain early in the trip, there's a place I can go way down and back up some steeps steps one or more laps.

If I'm really serious I might toss some water bottles into a day pack on such a walk.

I think it depends very much on what sort of condition you feel you (a) want and/or (b) NEED to be in for your trip. This can vary a lot!

I may exercise a little more before a trip

I usually go for 4 or 5 nights

First day I can go 9 miles and then I'll get generally exhausted. Of course I'm carrying the most weight.

After that, I can go 13 miles with the same tiredness. One day of backpacking will increase my capacity on later days.

I feverishly watch weather forecast and check current fire conditions (Inciweb).

I'll gather maps/Caltopo.com pages to review the route and annotate with pertinent notes.

Trim toenails. Check batteries (headlamp, Steripen) and consumables (deet, sunscreen, soap/sanitizer, meds, TP). If using a filter (Sawyer Squeeze) I'll give it a quick backflush and run a liter of water through it to make sure it's happy.

I try to eat a bit healthier and drink lots of water. I also try to eliminate alcohol a few days before a trip even though I'll sometimes bring some with me.

I normally bicycle commute to/from work so that keeps my cardio up, but I'll sometimes switch to the car a day or two before a trip to be sure that my legs are fresh.

I will scroll through online topo maps and Google Earth with KML overlays. I'll look for water sources and potential places to camp. I try to memorize roadways and civilization in the area. I also drill myself a little on geological landmarks and challenge myself later to find them on the trail. Basically just getting more familiar with the area. The goal is to be able to know roughly where I am and only use the map to confirm it. Although, I got a pretty bad memory and that goal is rarely achieved.

Few days out, I start watching the weather forecast and fire reports for that area. As it sucks to drive for hours on mountain roads and find out there is a controlled burn I'll be hiking down wind of.

Trips over 75 miles, I'll increase my hiking miles and frequency about a month before the trip. I don't push myself too hard, but just try to loosen things up. I'm getting older, and feel like I kind of have to get my knees and tendons use to the idea of hiking for numerous days. Maybe I cut out sugar and try and drop 4 or 5 pounds, and imagine it's like I dropped that weight from my pack.

The one ritual I don't think I ever skip, is I always get some new bit of gear or have a modification to test out. It can be as simple as a new trowel or a squirt cap for my water bottle. Just something to keep moving towards finding a performance increase or weight saving.

Fitness tends to be a year-round thing for me (I don't really let myself get "out of shape"), so a couple days before a trip, I mainly just pack, look at maps, and relax. Watch Netflix. Eat ice cream. Drink beer. Make sure everything at work is in order

I have learned to check that all my bills and rent are paid when heading out for a longer trip.

My best trips are when I don't feel like I am "escaping" from anything

I chew my nails and put everything on the back burner that doesn't have to do with my trip. I don't get sh*t done at work and am in a happy mood.

If you are asking, you are prolly in the same state. Good luck and enjoy your rapidly approaching adventure.

Oh, I pack and repack my bag a bunch of times and then do it one last time, adding water, the day I leave.

I lift heavy to stay in shape. It leaves me pretty tired so the week before I will usually take a deload. However this last time I didn't take a deload and left the day after setting a PR in my squats: 202.5lbs for 4 sets of 3. But I ended up not getting on the trail for 4 days due to car trouble on the way to the trailhead, so I got in enough rest beforehand. I felt like a million bucks. There is no hill that can stop me.