Advice for Future PCT Hikers

are you planning to thru-hike or either section hike the PCT coming up well I might have some advice for you so this video was actually spawned out of a comment and a question that I got from a viewer here on YouTube and I thought it was a great topic to make a video about and share my advice if you had a friend that was going to hike the PCT in 2019 what are the three biggest pieces of advice you'd give them before they started excellent question and it's something that I actually think about quite a bit now aside from giving the typical advice the cliche advice like hike your own hike or you know make sure you have enough water in the desert or any of the other advice that one through hiker would give to another I thought about what some advice that I would give a future through hiker that had to do with my hike in particular in 2018 so three pieces of advice I'll do you one better I have four so the first piece of advice that I have for anybody that is planning to do the PCT within either the next year the next couple years and whether you're through hiking or section I 'king is don't go out too hard listen to your body folks the first section of the PCT if you're going northbound can be very deceiving now for me when I went out and started my hike in April I started doing 20s every single day and you can do that no problem at all well I was doing 20s and since I was feeling good doing 20s I decided to keep jacking it up and jacking it up and by the second week I was already doing 25 and close to thirty miles a day now in my opinion the terrain is pretty easy and you can put out those miles because it's nice smooth terrain however if you're not used to hiking in the desert it can definitely beat you up fast without you even knowing it the trail itself is very hard and rugged and it can definitely put a beating on your feet and your legs within the first couple hundred miles now I myself got injured in the first 300 miles when I was coming out of Big Bear now the reason I got injured was because I tripped and I tore something in my shin however I'm sure doing 25 and close to 30 s up to that point was not helping my case instead I probably should have just stuck to low 20s maybe even 15 for the first handful of days and don't that strength up so I didn't have the injury later I know a lot of people that got injured in the first 300 miles of the trail I constantly heard about people getting shin splints people getting Planners fasciitis people having sore knees so the first 500 700 miles of the PCT if you're going northbound can be deceiving so listen to your body and don't go out too hard the second piece of advice that I have for any through hiker or section hiker planning to do the PCT is take advantage of trail towns so in Southern California up until about Mammoth Lake so right after you leave Bishop you get to Mammoth Lake that is basically the last trail town now when I say trail town I'm talking about towns that have a lot of hiker services that have good resupply points like nice big grocery stores they have Outfitters they have hostels they are more catered for the through Hecker or the section hiker now once you start getting into Northern California from there on trail towns just kind of disappear now out on the Appalachian Trail there pretty much the entire trail but when you're on the PCT they go bye-bye after Mammoth Lakes so take advantage of those trail towns in the first seven hundred miles when you go into one of those towns take a little bit of time make sure that your gear is dialed in go to the Outfitters maybe buy a new pair of shoes and send them ahead maybe resupply for further on down the trail box it up and bounce it up to yourself so in that first seven hundred miles go into places like Ottawa go into places like Tehachapi go into Julian have a good time experience those trail communities stay at some hostels meet some trail angels because for me a big part of through hiking or section hiking is experiencing the trail culture and you're not going to experience any better trail culture than the first 700 miles of the PCT the third piece of advice that I have for any through hiker or section hi and this one pertains particularly to the Sierra Mountains make your own calls now this year in particular and I'm sure that it's every single year there was a lot of fear mongering and misinformation about the trail there was a lot of other hikers businesses Outfitters that were fear mongering people about the Sierra now this year on the PCT we did get a lot of snow and I personally got off of the trail in Bishop because of a big snowstorm that came in however there were a lot of hikers that were getting fear of monger whenever they were in Kennedy Meadows not to go into the Sierra people that hadn't been to the sea-air yet telling people that the snow was too bad you needed all this gear are you needed to wait and there were a lot of hikers that either didn't go into the Sierra State put in Kennedy Meadows for weeks on end or they flipped up and switched their hike and most of that was because of fear-mongering by people that weren't in the Sierra and didn't know really what was going on there was one outfitter in particular that actually used my name and stole a picture off my Instagram to scare hikers into buying more expensive gear and gear that they didn't really need at their outfitter my advice to any future through hikers or section hikers is get to Kennedy Meadows look at the weather report maybe look at some reliable sources like find the Facebook group and see people that are ahead of you listen to people that are experiencing the trail at that time and then make the decision for yourself you know me personally my whole thought was leave Kennedy Meadows get into the beginning of the Sierra and if it looks like it's gonna be a bad situation if it looks like it's not something you're gonna hike in make the decision and turn around or there's plenty of places that you can bail out before you get to Bishop there's two points that you can get out to go into Lone Pine so if it looks like it's gonna be bad are you hearing bad weather reports get out there make the decision for yourself and make sure that you're not changing your hike because of what someone says or how someone else feels okay and the last piece of advice that I have for any future through hikers or section hikers is create something during your hike now what do I mean by create something well document your hike while you're out there if not for someone else just for yourself journal about your hike do a blog shoot photos make videos use your phone and record a podcast from the trail create something while you're out on the trail you're out there from four to six months and you're having this awesome experience with other people with yourself you're in your own mind a lot of different thoughts and ideas come to you whenever you're on the trail a lot of hikers that I've talked to and I personally get very creative while I'm on the trail and I think it's because you simplify your life a little bit why you out on the trail you take all the extra stuff out of your life and you're basically just left to your own devices so a lot of people including myself get very creative it's something that I've said in the past that I wish so much that whenever I was out on the Appalachian Trail in 2015 that I would have recorded my hike and took a lot more pictures and it's not just because I started a YouTube channel but it's because I would love to personally experience that again whenever you get off trail it starts to fade away the whole journey you start forgetting about certain parts you start forgetting about certain hikers that you met you forget about certain towns that you went to certain views that you saw so take that time and create something again even if you don't want to share it with the world like making YouTube videos or making a blog or something have it for yourself because it is an amazing trip and an amazing journey that you're taking in your life so document that have something for yourself so you can look back at that or maybe even share with your family and friends one massive gift that the trail has given me over the years is teaching me to be a more creative person whether it's through video or photos or writing about it and sharing my experience with others which is why I encourage you to do the same all right so hopefully some of that advice will help you if you're planning to do the PCT in the future have you through hiked or section hike the PCT what's some advice that you would give a future hiker planning on going out there leave something down in the comments and let me and everybody else know your thoughts you haven't had a chance yet go over and check me out on Instagram and posting a ton of new photos lately of some of the things that snows and I have going on throughout the week plus some pictures from some past tags if you found any value in this video go ahead and hit that like button subscribe to my channel if you haven't already and as always guys thanks for watching you

Channel: Darwin onthetrail

Views: 117,871

Rating: 4.9666514 out of 5

Keywords: UL Hiking, UL Backpacking, PCT, Pacific Crest Trail, PCT Thru HIke, Advice, PCT 2019, PCT 2018, Thru-Hike, Hiking, Backpacking, Sierra, Adventure, Hiker Trash, Long Distance Hiking

Id: sqBVJPDM5ng

Length: 10min 1sec (601 seconds)

Published: Thu Nov 29 2018

Reddit Comments

[u/sechristi]

This man's eyes alone could thru-hike the PCT

[u/mvia4]

I don’t understand his point about the trail towns. Maybe his criteria for what makes a good town are different from mine, but I had a lot of fun in towns north of the Sierra, especially in Washington. Just because a town is smaller and harder to hitch to doesn’t make it “not a trail town.”

[u/sbhikes]

I did the majority of my longest hikes in 2008 (1500 miles) and 2009 (1800 miles) but I have hiked a few hundred miles of the PCT almost every year since then. Here are my 3 pieces of advice:

1. Hiking the trail is not going to the moon. If your gear doesn't work for you--and guaranteed some of it won't especially if you don't listen to the advice of people telling you not to wear leather boots and carry heavy stuff--you can actually shop for new gear on the trail. You will see the gear other people have and then you can order it and have it shipped somewhere. I did this. Almost none of the gear I started with was the same that I ended with. Also, like gear, your plans will fail. You're schedule won't work, you'll hate your food, you'll hate your shoes, you're crazy ideas to solve problems that you thought up during the planning phase will prove to have been totally idiotic. Be flexible and enjoy the ride. Most of your problems can be solved from the trail.

2. You are not a failure if you don't finish the whole trail. Even if you finish the trail, the trail will call to you the rest of your life. The experience changes you. For many people it ruins you. Many people suffer extreme post-trail depression. It has been 10 years since my first long hike, I still section hike every year, and still there are those days of longing. So do your very best to have the most complete experience possible and then try not to label yourself a failure if you don't finish the whole trail, know that the trail will always be there, accept that you will be somewhat broken for the rest of your life whether you finish or not, and try maybe to have a plan or find something after the trail that you can be immersed in that will give you a similar kind of joy that the trail gave you. I found that in learning how to play old time music.

3. Go solo. You will meet nice people to hike with, possibly even on day one. If you get tired of them, you're hiking solo anyway so it's no big deal to leave them behind. If you get attached to them and they leave you behind, remember that friends are just people you haven't met yet. You'll make amazing friends. And then they will disappear into anonymity because you don't know their real names, or even if they don't disappear because we have social media now, this whole world that you live in together disappears once you leave the trail and it's never quite the same.

[u/numbershikes]

Looks like someone in here is shadowbanned. Post says "1 comment" (prior to this one), but no other posts show up.