PCT Day 72 – SoBo Flip – What 1,000 Miles Feels Like

Fowler Lake Junction (mile 1243) to A-Tree Spring (mile 1220)

Total PCT miles hiked: 1018

Due to our early start Keith (Starman) and I arrived at the Sierras when there was still a lot of snow, and decided it wasn’t safe to attempt a crossing given my skill level. We elected to flip up to northern California and hike southbound (SoBo) back to where we left off near Lone Pine – giving the snow a chance to melt out. During this flip the PCT milage will be counting down, but I’ll include a tally of our total milage hiked so that you can keep aprised of our progress in a linear fashion.

A thousand miles feels like waking up every day with tired feet, tired body, soreness, and fatigue. Because, surprisingly, there is some truth in that fitness poster cliche and hiking never gets easier, you only get stronger. You can hike more miles, cover more elevation gain, and do it all faster, and so you do. And in this way each day is no easier than the last. Additionally, the change in strength as observed from the drivers seat of your own body is nearly imperceptible, there is no sudden arrival of fitness, no switch that’s flipped between desk jockey and mountain goat. The much talked about “hiker legs” more often feel like the carrot at the end of a telescoping stick, just a little forever out of reach. Hiking one thousand miles feels like sweat dripping down your nose, leaning on your trekking poles even though you just want to sit down more than anything right now, more than town food or a cold drink or a shower, my goodness you just want to sit. But you know that if you sit down in the middle of this climb it will just be harder to get up and so you hike on. Hiking one thousand miles is trying to stand and making the sort of deep gutteral grunting nose that would frighten children and the elderly. Moaning like two rinos making love as you extract yourself from the tent and hobble steps around your camp as your tendons relengthen into walking position.

Sometimes hiking one thousand miles feels like hearing someone utter a genuine amazed “wow” and having your attention drawn to a glorious sunset or river or mountain valley. It’s seeing the sort of natural wonder that you know, you just know, that if everybody could see the world in this light they’d all want to save it as much as you do; to swear their fielty to this irreplaceable blue dot instead of whatever is the political religious ideology du jour. Other times it’s picking your way down a slippery mud stream in the rain wishing you were anywhere but here.

Hiking one thousand miles feels like unenthusiasticly eating the only food you have left in your bag and being grateful that it’s there anyway. It is a dozen itchy mosquito bites under your sock and aching feet at the end of the day when you’re still two miles from camp. It’s cold mornings and hot, sticky afternoons. Bad farts and worse smelling shoes, salt crusted clothes, sunburn, pack chafe and raw spots on your hands from where your trekking poles rub.

A thousand miles feels like drinking the coldest, clearest water of your life, silently watching a sunset, the way the warm afternoon light hits the trees in that special way that makes everything look ordained with beauty. It feels like trying to breathe while laughing at bad jokes at altitude, like sharing snacks in the shade, like running away to never never land where you wake up every morning in this indulgent landscape through which you are obligated to do nothing more than walk.

Hiking one thousand miles feels like letting your spine sink into your crinckly sleeping pad your favorite person laying next to you as your tired body falls thankfully into sleep; the forest coming alive just beyond your thin tent walls.