Hi Allison
Nice blog. I liked the introduction - thought it showed forethought and of course it had the disclaimers.

Welcome. It appears to me that you are having a good time and writing a fun blog - good for you. It obviously was not meant to be a complete informative training session - which is impossible considering the time we spend argueing every point. Some people will argue just because thats the way they interact with the world, don't let them get you down. The fact that you brought your creation here for us to critique shows that you do not consider it a "complete" piece.

Solo hiking covers a lot of space - its hard to define and any specific advice has to be in context of where you are going. Is this a solo hike in a forested level spot - etc etc, but you mentioned 48 "peaks" so this sounds like "solo easy peak bagging".

At 22 your experience is simply limited and as you have more failures and bad experiences, the value of your advice will increase until you become 62 like me and have had so many bad experiences based on poor judgement, that everyone assumes that you have learned better, or you would not have survived that long. We have a lot of very serious and experienced outdoorspeople here, and we can never agree on anything. There are about 7 correct ways to do anything and about a million wrong ways. You pick what works for you. Other 22 year old hikers may read your blog and go no further because after all - its just about taking a walk in the woods right? What can go wrong? go wrong? go wrong?

My main comment is that this was perhaps mislabeled and in my own opinion, it has nothing to do with solo hiking safety as a generic activity, but simply describes your own experience and opinioons based on your own experience. (read my signature line). People jumped on you because it is not really a discussion of safety while solo hiking.
Jim
P.S. I almost always hike, backpack and mountain climb solo - I consider it safer to not have another person (liability) along. Risk assesment, weather, etc etc, all go into planning a solo trip into dangerous country. There are people here who have gone places that you would never consider going, and returned with their own advice.
Again thanks and we hope you will become a regular and learn and contribute. Midnightsun surely knows how hard it is to pop up here and start giving advice without first proving herself. When you have joined in on many threads and shown your thoughtful consideration - your credability will increase.