Some of the most diverse terrain in the world can cause all sorts of problems. Photo: Unsplash
The Pacific Crest Trail (PCT) has become one of the most popular thru-hikes in the world. Nearly 10,000 people are listed as having completed the gargantuan 2,650-mile trek that spans the U.S. west coast from Mexico to Canada. The trail follows some superbly stunning terrain through the desert and mountains of California and the thick forests of the Pacific Northwest.
While it’s easy to day dream about the serenity of leaving your office job behind for five months in the mountains, completing the PCT certainly comes with a unique set of challenges. The mental and physical obstacles of a hike this long cannot be understated.
To paint the picture of those challenges, we asked four hikers who completed the PCT this year to share their most harrowing or difficult moments. Between overcoming record-breaking amounts of snow, literally dodging death from falling boulders, and the toll the monotony can take on one’s mental state, the stories didn’t disappoint.
Al “Lookout” Marriott
40, London
Vlog: Adventure Together
The most challenging part of the trail was easily the High Sierra Nevada section in California. This section is tough in any normal year, but this year was a high snow year. In fact, it was the largest snowpack in recorded history. I was in a group with six hikers, all carrying the heaviest packs we ever had. Mine was 50 pounds because of all of the extra equipment plus food for the seven to nine days between supply points. We had to start our hikes at 2 a.m. because this was when the snow had frozen and was hard enough to walk on. It was the consistency of wet mashed potatoes by 10 a.m., and we would slow to just one mph until we reached camp around 5 p.m. We had to cross hundreds of rivers. Sometimes wading, often using a fallen log as a bridge, and on one occasion, having to swim across a wide glacier creek, which put one member of our group into hypothermic shock.
The trail was under many feet of snow for the entire section, which meant navigating was trying to find the safest way based on the topography, not where the trail went. This was mentally exhausting, and we often got decision fatigue, as well as almost consistent physical fatigue. All of this snow and water meant that our shoes and socks were always wet, which caused them to freeze overnight. The terrain was the toughest I’ve tackled in my life. The many hours of micro ups and downs were exhausting and made hiking a drudgery. We often had dangerous traverses along snow-covered mountainsides, which could have been the death of us if we slipped, or worse, the snow gave way. All in all, this section was 32 days of hiking, 390.25 miles, and a total elevation gain of 57,888 feet. It was the toughest hiking I’ve ever done. But every step was worth it.
Mentally, the toughest part was surviving a rockfall on the last leg of the High Sierra. While scrambling up a boulder wall to reach the trail a 3’x3’x2′ boulder was knocked loose by a member of my hiking group. It hit me and sent me and the boulder tumbling down the cliff until I came to a stop when my pack wedged me upside down between two large rocks. The pain was unbearable. I thought the impact had broken my foot. My hiking partners helped me up the mountainside, and I sat on a rock. As soon as I did, I burst into tears. I was in shock. I thought it was the end of my hike. I thought that all of this work, money, and time was all for nothing. I slowly hobbled and hopped into town, and that night, alone in an Airbnb, I broke down into tears again, crying into my dinner. I cried myself to sleep, where I relived the whole horrid moment over again. As luck has it, the foot wasn’t broken, and three days later I was hiking again. That was the most traumatic experience I have ever had while hiking.
Donaat “Alpianist”
31, Belgium
In Southern Oregon you drop in elevation and basically all of the trail is in forest, even if you scale a hill. It’s called the green tunnel. This means that you’re always surrounded by trees and only very seldomly get a scenic view. Although some people really like being in the forest all the time, I really like scenic views of the high alpine more. So for me it was some challenging days.
I had a mental low, as a lot of people do, because the views were gone and thousands of mosquitoes constantly wanted to eat you alive. This meant you couldn’t really stop for a break. As a result, hiking became like a job. Get out of your tent with your rain gear on to avoid the mosquitoes, hike all day with a head net, and barely stop before you set up the tent again and go inside still with your rain gear on to avoid the bites. That is one point where I know a lot of people quit. I thought about quitting, too.
Other than that I had what some call the Sierra blues. In Northern California, after exiting the Sierra, you have a lot of burn area without the Sierra views that you had for the last weeks. You get to the halfway mark and realize that you still have 1,325 miles to go, only just halfway. The first half you live on the adrenaline of hiking towards the Sierra. When that’s over it’s tough mentally.
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Emilie Burditt
25, Oconomowoc, Wisconsin
In the last six days* of my hike, I got stuck in a two-day blizzard in the Sierra. In order to get off the trail by the end of my permit date, I had to pull a 36-hour “day,” which included hiking over Glenn Pass, Forester Pass, and a sunrise summit of Mount Whitney. It was a wild (and somewhat scary) experience. My fingers were cold from a wet sleeping bag and wet gloves due to the snowstorm, and my body itself was exhausted from all the elevation gain and loss. During the snowstorm and tough climbs, I kept referring to one of my favorite books, Into Thin Air. I reminded myself that I didn’t have frostbite. I could still pick up my feet (unlike some of the explorers in that book), so I could keep going. I absolutely went into adrenaline mode to get it done. It was a harrowing time, but I exceeded what I thought I was capable of mentally and physically. As I move forward to other challenges in life, I know that at the end of the day I can count on myself to get me through anything. I gained so much confidence from this experience and from the PCT in general.
*Emilie skipped the Sierra section due to snowpack, but returned after reaching Canada to complete the hike.
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Kyle “Cake” Diemler
33, Cincinnati, Ohio
There was a huge amount of uncertainty heading out of Bishop and into the second section of the Sierra. This portion of trail had a known damaged bridge at the South Fork of the San Joaquin River, though no one had been there yet this year – no rangers, no mountaineers. Perhaps one solitary hiker that had pushed ahead of us alone had tried it, but no one knew for sure, and the only data available to anyone was a single, blurry photo of the snow and ice covered bridge from February. We had to plan our resupply with the possibility of having to turn back – 12 days of food, the most any of us had ever carried on any trail. In Bishop we weighed our packs in horror. For some members of the team, it was an amount equal to more than one third of their body weight. With all the snow gear and the heavy resupply, my own pack weighed in around 70 pounds.
In town, I had been given several pieces of bad news from home. A relative’s marriage was ending. A coworker I liked and used to discuss my hikes with had passed away suddenly. A recent ex had officially moved on. It all cut deeply as I left the dirt and hiked out onto the snow for what would be the last time for days. Sleet fell and wind howled. I have never moved so slowly. It felt like there was a thousand pounds on both my back and my heart. I ended up miles behind. A complete unknown on the trail laid ahead, and I had learned in the beginning of the Sierra just how dangerous the terrain and conditions could be. I have never been so tempted to quit a thru-hike as I was on this day.
On the seventh day of the section, we found ourselves descending into the deep valley where the broken bridge should be. The metal bridge was twisted, warped into a corkscrew by the immense weight of the snow. But it was still there. Beneath it, the deadly San Joaquin River roared with teal and whitewater, ready to sweep anyone who fell into it down the valley and into bone-breaking boulders and waterfalls downstream. Among the members of my group, I had the fortune of having a man who, in his normal life, had worked as an orienteer and civil engineer. With his analysis, we found our way across the river, and pushed on.
On the ninth day, I watched another teammate fall on a traverse above me, and in seconds, slide out of sight into a deep tree well. I held my breath until I heard her speak again, confirming that she’d survived and narrowly avoided serious injury. Moments like this would continue regularly for the remaining days. I had to process the idea that I could possibly watch one of the teammates I’d grown to love and trust end their hike, or even die, in front of me. Knee injuries plagued the group, broken traction devices slowed us to a crawl, and a persistent fight or flight response left us all constantly in a sickly, adrenaline-fueled state. I felt the ever present pressure of facing my own mortality, staring down traverses at certain death if only one step was placed wrong. I could not have done this section alone. Had I not been with a team of strong, encouraging, determined people, the PCT would have won. On the final day of the section, all of us were so battle worn from fighting the conditions of the trail that we decided to hike 29 miles over countless ice and snow traverses in order to finally escape it. By 2 a.m., we arrived in Mammoth. We’d done it. Facing all of that fear and risk and overcoming all of that heartache was worth it when it was finally traded for victory.
