Journey to the PCT: Final Thoughts Before I Go

In 4 days time, I will be wrapping up my first day of hiking on the Pacific Crest Trail. I have a few little odds and ends to finish up but am otherwise ready to go.

The last few weeks have been crazy busy, both with planning and finalizing prep, but also with life. After the West Coast Trail, I took a bit of a breather for a few weeks. I felt confident and validated in many of my gear choices and skills, which was great. However, there was still so much to do! At that point (mid-June), I hadn’t yet figured out what in the world I was going to eat for 6 weeks. I also hadn’t bought any food, or started packing resupplies. That hung over my head for a bit, but I enjoyed a lot of hiking locally in the mountains around Vancouver (training, of course!). We had an unseasonably nice June (sometimes it rains a lot) and I was able to cross a number of objectives off my ever-growing day hike adventure list. Those included Unnecessary Mountain on the Howe Sound Crest Trail (10 miles, 3,600 feet of gain), Goat Ridge (4.5 miles and 3,400 feet of gain), and Leading Peak (6 miles, 3,300 feet of gain). These steep trails helped reinforce my skills – while much shorter than the PCT days ahead of me, they are significantly steeper, harder, and generally require more technical expertise, with things like ropes, exposure (i.e. one wrong step you fall and hurt yourself or worse), and scrambling (requiring hands to ascend). I also took a 10 day trip to California to visit friends and family, and hosted two separate friends who visited me, as well as more family. It’s been a lot of back to back to back and so the last few weeks I’ve been trying to be kind to myself and not force myself to do more hiking, trying to enjoy the little things around my neighborhood and in my community that I won’t get to once I’m on trail – paddleboarding, swimming in the pools and ocean, and just enjoying some great food while seeing friends.

And it really has been a project, and nearly a part time job at that. I mean, I worked part time instead of full time the last 4 months so that I could hike, train, and prepare (and enjoy the summer). This is really, really important to me and I want it to go well. At this point, I’ve done everything I can do to ensure my success, but it isn’t a guarentee. There’s a lot of uncontrollables, but I do feel at least I have ‘controlled the controllables”. At this point, it’s out of my hands, and maybe that’s what is giving me this low level anxiety. Because of course I want to be able to control everything and I can’t. Right now, fires are starting in Oregon and Washington. Air quality is diminished. There’s a heatwave in the Pacific Northwest. I can’t control these things but I’m still going to think about them.

I’m proud of how far I’ve come so far though, regardless of what happens now. I took a large project and broke it into bite size pieces, bite size goals. Every month I had tasks and I accomplished them. I paced them – first was the research phase, then the commitment phase (to the gear, idea, etc), then the prototyping phase (the West Coast Trail), and now the Final Touches.

My backpacking set up is almost completely different now than it was a year ago. I’m operating with new clothes, pack, tent, sleeping bag, food security system, water filtration system – everything. While it’s exciting, it also requires practice and getting use to new things, making sure they fit and work well for my needs. I’m preparing food differently than ever before, which requires more planning. Until this trip, I only ever bought pre-packaged backpacking meals. Easy. Calories and protein are known. No mess to clean up. Now, I’m going to be putting together some of my own meals. There’s a little more flexibility, but more risk.

Before moving to Vancouver, I had done a few backpacking trips, but hadn’t done more than 2 weeks or so of cumulative backpacking over many years. The last few summers I’ve done a couple of nights a summer. Already this summer, I’ve backpacked more than any one of the last few. In many ways, I’m still kind of a beginner. I’ve never backpacked for more than 6 days. I’ve never done back to back weeks. Hell, I’ve never hiked more than 6 days in a row, and never this many miles. The West Coast Trail was 75km over 6 days, and the Berg Lake Trail last summer was about 50km over 2 days, plus a third day of another 20km day hiking. I did a backpacking trip in Norway nearly 10 years ago which was 4 or 5 days and probably 60 or 70 kms. My first week on the PCT is going to be 131 kms in 7 days. 131!

Here are the things I’m worried about, in order of most to least:

1. Chronic overuse pain/injury – plantar fasciitis, stiffness/soreness that forces me off trail.
2. Fire closures and smoke/air quality
3. Not having enough food I want to actually eat / not getting enough nutrients
4. My tent footprint being too big for some of the random campsites on the trail / showing up to a campsite and it being full or nowhere to pitch
5. Long water carries (there are a few dry spots the first week)
6. Boredom / being tired of hiking
7. Bears
8. Stepping in other people’s poop because they didn’t follow good leave no trace principles (gross)
9. Having to pee in the middle of the night (this is my least favorite thing about camping in general)
10. Not being able to take a shower or wash my clothes in towns between sections (believe it or not, I am obsessed with cleanliness)

I’ll be curious to see what actually bothers me in the end. It’s never what you think it’ll be, or so that’s been my experience. What’s the saying? I think about this line from Baz Luhrmann’s song ‘Sunscreen’ A LOT: “Don’t worry about the future. Or worry, but know that worrying is as effective as trying to solve an algebra equation by chewing bubble gum. The real troubles in your life are apt to be things that never crossed your worried mind, the kind that blindsides you at 4 p.m. on some idle Tuesday.“

Ain’t that the truth?

I guess I should stop worrying now :).