Day 1

Sand Point to Pincher Creek

Maps, his lovely wife, Trail Boss, and his lovely mom picked Yard Sale and I up at 8am. After a passport check and some goodbyes, we hit the road and hiker banter began. A bag of chips and tens of stories later, we stopped in Coleman to score our official GDT bag tags at the local coffee shop.

We found our hotel in Pincher Creek and the ominous clouds spewed rain and hail. We had a lovely, filling dinner at a fusion restaurant which left me sleepy. It was an early night with a scheduled 6am departure for Waterton.

Drive to Waterton

Leaving promptly at 6am, we were treated with a world class sunrise and a double rainbow disappearing into the storm clouds over Waterton’s magnificent mountains. We stopped at the Waterton Hotel for some windy pictures of the lake before the sun hid for the remaining morning.

At the trailhead we took a starting selfie and charged down the trail in the cool and damp morning. The thimble berries tasted great and car washed our legs and shoes. We met a family of NOBO deer who casually walked past us.

I was elated to arrive at the monument that I have seen in so many pictures. The weather was overcast but, the spirits were high. It’s tradition to jump off the dock into the water. The cool temps and water made this a reluctant choice.  Embracing the once in a lifetime opportunity, I stripped and jumped in. Shouts driven by the cold water echoed across the lake as Map took photos and we all laughed! Yard Sale was next with a perfect jack knife and Trail Boss with a vertical entry.

Dry clothes back on I added the rain jacket to shield the shower that ushered our exit from the border. The walk back was quiet as we slowly warmed up as we met day hikers with dogs.

We scored some huge burritos and berry margaritas at the taco place before shopping the town and visiting the visitors center. Back at the motel  took a much needed Power Nap before dinner. Soo Sushi had salty pork fried noodles to fill the stores. A stop at DQ and Walmart rounded the evening.

For a Good Cause

This hike is a bit different than my others. We are hiking to support the Ethanmurrayfund.org, a 501c3 organization that helps provide resources for those seeking help with mental health issues. The organization helps to match candidates with counselors and therapists in our community. The “EMF” also gives scholarships to students looking to pursue education in the mental health field. You can find out more at Ethanmurrayfund.org

We pull out tomorrow for the first full day of adventure on the GDT!

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This morning I was up bright and early and was feeling energized by the prospect of heading into town. I only had 31 miles to go to get to the road where I can hitch into Chester. And only had 23 miles to go to reach the PCT halfway point! Today is only day 41 of my hike along the PCT. Which means I walked from Mexico to the halfway point in 41 days. That is around 1330 miles. Which means I’ve averaged about 32 miles a day on the PCT. I’m very happy with that.

The sun had barely come up by the time I was packed up and leaving camp. Data was having breakfast so I said goodbye to him. He’s also planning on going into Chester today so maybe I will see him later on today. It felt nice to hike out on my own this morning though. It’s super fun hiking with other people, but I think I’m just way too used to my own routine. At this point, I’m spending all of my time hiking alone for the most part. That’s just something I’ve gotten really good at. And I’m especially really good at zoning out and letting time slip away when I’m going solo. So this morning I was looking forward to just putting my head down and crushing some miles.

I was pleasantly surprised to wake up this morning feeling at least a little bit better after all my falling yesterday. My left hand is still incredibly sore but a little bit more usable than last night. I still definitely can’t get water bottles out of my pockets or even unscrew a water bottle with my left hand. But it doesn’t hurt nearly as much when it’s at my side as it did last night. Last night it was throbbing with every single step that I took. Today it was just pretty sore and off limits for use. My right hand was also pretty sore, and two of my knuckles were super bruised. At least you don’t really use your hands very much while hiking on the Pacific Crest trail. Because now I have two bum hands.

The train this morning was really nice and easy. I really didn’t have too much elevation gain to do at all. But I did wind up getting some really nice and exposed views as the day went on. Today was another day of walking continuously through the damage of the Dixie burn. The PCT in this area is just completely decimated. All that remains are the black remnants of trees. And the small amount of fresh growth that has come into the forest over the last few years. I guess the monotony of the views in a way did help the day to go by quickly. Because time just seemed to fly. I was also quite motivated by getting into town to relax.

Over the course of the morning and early afternoon, I went past a bunch of hikers. I actually wound up running into Happy Meal, a hiker who I met back at a water cache after leaving Julian. He was hanging out and sitting with another hiker named Jay, who I had messaged back-and-forth with on Instagram prior to meeting. It was so cool to see Happy Meal again and we actually wound up walking together for at least maybe a mile or so.

Then we went past another hiker who Happy Meal knew, and he veered off to go talk with him. After that, I just continued along solo as always. I would go past a ton more hikers over the course of the day. Lately, it seems like I’ve been playing one of my least favorite hiking games a little bit too much. With all of the hikers that I’m seeing on trail, I often come across people who want to race. Today I had two hikers come up super fast behind me and passed me going at least 4 mph, which is totally fine!

I was actually doing something on my phone at the time so I was going even slower. But I certainly don’t go 4 mph. So they got by super quick and then got up ahead pretty fast as well. My thing is I either want someone to pass me or fall behind. I really don’t like walking in a train with a bunch of people. Especially when you’re not hiking together or talking to each other. I really don’t want to be able to see or hear anyone unless we’re hiking together. Maybe that’s entitled of me? But it’s at least my preference.

The thing that’s been happening a lot lately though is that a hiker will blow past me going 4 mph, and then almost immediately slow down. It’s totally fine if someone wants to pass me. But I don’t understand the logic of speeding up to pass someone just to slow down again. It’s like cars! That is just as annoying on the road as it is on the trail. If everyone just hiked at the pace they are comfortable with then this wouldn’t be a problem. So a couple people over took me and then not long after that I wound up passing by them. I asked them if they wanted to get up ahead again because their pace was fast. And they seemed confused and just wound up going behind me. And I never saw them again.

That’s just happened a few different times now and isn’t my favorite thing. I don’t mind passing people along the trail and I don’t mind them passing me. But I really don’t wanna be bouncing back-and-forth repeatedly. It just takes away time and honestly feels exhausting for some reason.

The rest of the day absolutely flew by. I wound up getting to the PCT halfway point just after 1 PM. Which meant I was already 23 miles into the day and was making great time. There were actually like seven or eight hikers sitting by the halfway monument. I asked one of them to take my picture and then just continued along. I was super excited to bang out the next 7 miles and get into town for the night.

From there on out, it was basically all downhill to the road into town. Other than a small hundred foot climb here there. I was feeling fantastic and just kept my head down and kept it moving. I stopped off one more time to grab a little bit of water, but other than that, I just kept on hiking. As I got closer and closer to town, I could feel a shift in the wind and the temperature dropped. It seemed like some bad weather was rolling in.

The closer and closer that I got to the road the worse the weather turned. It seemed like any second now is going to start raining. I actually wound up getting some service when I was a few miles out from town so I checked the weather. And sure enough, it was supposed to rain right around 4:30 PM. I was on track to get to the road right at 4 PM. Now my mission was to be sure that I got a hitch and into Chester before the rain started. It is pretty difficult to hitchhike in the rain, as you might imagine.

By about 28 miles into the day I was just feeling pretty tired mentally. My body felt really sore from falling yesterday. As more time has gone by I think that it just set in a little bit more. My right arm and shoulder are quite sore. My right knee is sore and very scraped up. My left hand is incredibly bruised and swollen and I really can’t use it at all. And a couple fingers on my right hand are super swollen and I can’t close those fingers into a fest. In the grand scheme of things these are all very minor injuries. But compiling with all of the mileage that I’m doing every single day it’s just an added factor.

Now today, I was just feeling a little bit worn out and ready for some rest. I’m so glad that Jay is connecting me with trail angels in Chester because I could really use a zero day tomorrow! Honestly, the timing couldn’t be better considering my fall yesterday. Then today, of course I’m running as quickly as I can to get to town so I’m feeling pretty fried. But since I got service toward the end of the day, I was able to put a couple videos on to distract myself. And that made a huge difference and really helped to pass the last 30 minutes to an hour before I got into town.

When I did finally get out to the road, the weather was looking worse and worse. I was starting to hear thunder crack off in the distance, and the clouds were so dark. But I had made it before the rain started!

And I shit you not, as soon as my feet hit the pavement, a man parked at the trailhead came out of his car. He asked if I was a PCT hiker and said he had driven by and decided to sit and wait for a few minutes to see if any of us would arrive. Then he asked me if I wanted a ride into Chester. I wanted nothing more in the world than a ride that easy into town.

His name was Steely Dan and he’s done a lot of sections of the trail. When he went by the trailhead today, he figured he would just hang out for a little bit and try to give some hikers a ride into town. His timing could not have been better. None of the hikers I’ve passed along the trail were super close by so it didn’t really make a lot of sense to wait for them. It had been a few miles since I’d seen anybody on trail. Steely Dan drove me into town and brought me over to the Best where I would be spending the night. Then he dropped me off and headed on his way. It could not have worked out any better.

I checked in to my room super quick and threw my bag down. Then walked across the street to the pine frosty, a classic burger and milkshake joint in town. They have a 32 ounce jumbo milkshake which I was in desperate need of. I got a giant coffee milkshake, a chili burger, and cheese curds. Then walked across the street to the gas station next door to grab some drinks for tonight. And after that, it was back to the room to devour my feast and start doing my chores.

I wound up taking a shower and pre-washing my socks. I’ll probably just do laundry tomorrow at the home of the Trail Angel that I’ll be staying with. Which saves me from having to go down the street to the laundromat tonight. After I showered, got things charged, and got everything situated, I just decided to walk down the street to the grocery store. I wanted to get even more drinks and some random goodies for tonight. And on my way back, I picked up steak hibachi from a restaurant right next to the hotel.

I spent the entire rest of the night in the hotel room as god intended. I watched TV, but mostly just got a ton of video editing done and writing. I’m not sure what the circumstances will be like tomorrow at the trail angel house, so I got all of the voice to text and video stuff done first. That way if I don’t have a private space to do voice overs and other editing then it won’t be a big deal.

It felt so nice to be relaxing in bed for the night. My body really needed this after yesterday. And I ate so much delicious food, drank a ridiculous amount of soda, and of course, some chocolate milk.

Now, tomorrow morning, my plan is just to sleep in at the room and check out at 11 AM. Then I’ll get in touch with the Trail Angel in Chester and head on over to their place for the day and night. Life is good!

If you enjoyed this blog and would like to support my hike by buying me a soda or a snack along the way, there is a “Tip the Author” button below! It links directly to my Venmo. Any and all support is incredibly appreciated!

Last night I had made plans with Taylor to get a ride back to trail this morning around 6:30 AM. My hope is to be hiking north once again right around 7 AM. Which considering I stayed in town last night, is about as good as it’s going to get. It was hard waking up this morning because I stayed up super late last night. But I had bought myself a giant piece of raspberry cake which I ate for breakfast. That sure helped. Then Taylor drove me back to trail.

Even though I didn’t spend a ton of time in Quincy last night, that was absolutely amazing. It’s crazy how just sleeping in a bed and taking a shower can be such a major reset. Even after doing a big day and not getting much rest. It definitely feels like more of a reset than just ending the day in my tent for the night. Plus, I got to get in tons of calories last night.

Now today, I am only about 23 miles from the town of Belden. A tiny town with a general store, motel, and RV park, which the trail passes right through. And the overall structure of the day today is actually very similar to yesterday. The first 23 miles of the day there isn’t a ton of elevation gain. I think I’ll have one or two small climbs. Then I drop down 4000 feet to get into Belden. And leaving Belden I have to climb back up 4000 feet again.

The morning wound up being really nice and easy. Plus the temperature was super cool. When I was in this part of Northern California in 2022 it was during a heat wave. And this area is just absolutely brutal when it’s over 100°. Because of all the damage from the Dixie burn there really isn’t a lot of coverage. So I’m incredibly grateful that this time around my experience has been the polar opposite. The temperature has been really moderate most days and even cool at times.

Yesterday it felt like there were a ton of blowdown along the trail, and I went through a good bit of fire damage. But today it was basically all fire damage all day. The entire trail is just completely burnt, and the trees are left behind like a little black toothpicks. Some sections of trail do have a good bit of new growth. But shocking other sections of the trail really don’t.

About 4 miles into the day I crossed over another major road. This is the second road where you can hitch into Quincy. And it’s the recommended road for hitching into Quincy because it’s a lot more populated than the road that I got picked up that last night. After crossing over the road, I began a very gradual climb for the next few miles. Then I was basically just up for a while riding along the ridge. Even though I was mostly just looking at burn, I did get some really beautiful views of Bucks Lake in the distance. I can only imagine what the Bucks Lake wilderness looked like prior to this fire. It must have been really beautiful.

The walking today felt a little monotonous at times. But on a bright side, it also felt like the time went by really quickly. It looked like I would be getting into Belden before 4 PM. Which was amazing because I was planning on going in and out quickly and then hopefully doing another 10–12 miles. I was also really dreading the descent into Belden. In 2022 this is where Peg Leg came to be. I was having really mild IT band problems prior to this decent. Then the trail dropped 4000 feet over 5 miles into Belden. And I think on that downhill I was going about a mile an hour.

I wound up spending a couple days at the RV park in Belden. Then somehow continued along and made it to the town of Chester. In Chester, I took another few days off for injury and eventually got everything sorted and started my road to recovery. It’s just so funny being back here where the name was born. This time around though I was pleasantly surprised by the downhill. It was graded really well and wasn’t nearly as bad as I remembered. I actually wound up enjoying it honestly.

I got down into Belden just before 4 PM and headed into the store. OutsideJay had left me a box with some resupply goodies. I also bought some cold drinks and soda. I knew it was going to be a very hot and exposed climb coming out of town. So I wanted to hydrate a bunch and also take a lot of goodies with me.

At this point, I was planning on potentially doing this entire upcoming climb this evening. It was about 13 miles of uphill. So I chugged a Red Bull, ate an ice cream, and got rolling. I had seen one other backpack outside of the store while I was there, but the hiker never came by. Not long after I got moving again, though, they came running up behind me. They must’ve asked the clerk about me or something like that. Because the clerk told them my name and I think they came to catch up to me.

This hikers name was Data, and our paths actually crossed earlier in the year. There was one late night where I set up my tent by a water source with one other tent nearby. Apparently next to him and his wife’s tent. The next morning when they got up, I was super apologetic about whether I might have woken them up the night before. But they said they hadn’t even heard me. Since then, his wife has gotten off trail because of a combination of things. But he’s planning on continuing to finish.

We got to talking and then fell in line together and making our way up the climb. I think sometimes it’s hard for me to hike with other people. I simultaneously crave the connection while also craving the routine that I’ve created for myself. I find it really easy to hike by myself, make big miles, and allow time to slip away. I think sometimes when I hike with other people that time also flies by quickly. And sometimes when I hike with other people, it makes it more difficult for time to go by quickly. That might not make a lot of sense, but it’s just something that I’ve thought about recently. Every instance is different.

It was nice having someone to talk to and we walked and talked for the next few hours. The climb was graded pretty well, which allowed us to keep chatting. We were basically just continuously going uphill for the entire rest of the day. Thought it was the perfect time a day and was starting to get a little cooler. We also started getting brief segments of shaded trail. As the day went on the trail would get more and more shaded as well.

An hour or two after leaving Beldon though I took a really bad fall. It was just one of those perfect falls where your foot get stuck on some thing and you’re not able to free it. But my backpack is super light right now so I’m hiking without my hip belt attached. Which means when I fell forward, my backpack basically tried to jump up and over me. Which just made for a much harder hit onto the dirt and rock covered trail.

I knew almost immediately that I was completely fine. I could tell I had definitely roughed myself up a bit, but hadn’t done any major damage. Data seemed super concerned as I sat there on the ground. But I just always need to take a minute and slowly get up on my own.

A couple days ago I took a soft fall and scraped my knee a little bit. Now this time I re-scraped the knee and had ripped all of the skin off. So that was bleeding a little bit. But it definitely didn’t hurt as bad as the time earlier this year when I fell and smashed my knee on a rock. The only other damage done was that I smashed my left hand into a rock or onto the hard ground. It was super sore pretty much right away. But considering how hard I hit the ground, that actually didn’t seem to be too much damage.

We kept moving after that and the climb just went on and on. As time went on, though, I could definitely tell that my left hand was more hurt than I’d realize. It was very clear that it wasn’t broken. I took a similar fall on the Appalachian Trail in 2023 and my right hand hit a rock so hard that it turned purple almost immediately. This was clearly not as bad as that. And that also wasn’t broken. But over the next hour or two my hand started to throb and was incredibly uncomfortable. I also basically couldn’t use my left hand at all for anything. Which meant I couldn’t take my water bottle out of my pockets or do just about anything with my hand.

As we continued up the climb, the trail crossed over a lot of water crossings. A couple of them were a little bit tricky to get across with dry feet. I had actually read someone’s comment that they wished they had just gotten their feet wet because they hurt themselves doing one of the crossings. And at one point when I was crossing one particularly easy river I made a grave error.

I stepped out onto a rock that seemed super sturdy. But it was slick like oil and I just couldn’t tell. When I actually put weight onto it, my foot immediately slipped off of it, and I fell sideways partially into the river and partially onto some rocks. Once again, it was the type of fall that I knew immediately that I was ok. Honestly, the worst part was now half of my body was wet at 7 PM.

Data was behind me and saw this happen and ran over so quick. I thought it was hilarious that this man was here to witness two of the only falls I’ve taken in the last thousand miles. He seemed so incredibly concerned when he ran up to me. But I said that I was definitely fine, just soaking wet. The only thing that I did notice right away is that I had hit my right hand on a rock when I went down. I had a couple cuts on two of my fingers from smashing into a rock. So now both of my hands were sore.

On the bright side, it was only 7 PM and we were planning on hiking until just around dark. Which meant I had plenty of time to dry out before camp. I figured I’d still be a little damp later, but definitely not as wet as I was after falling in the river. It seemed like Data was originally planning on doing a slightly shorter day. But I said I was going to go up to the top of the climb and he wanted to tag along. Sometimes it’s easier to hike later into the evening or go further when you’re hiking with somebody else.

The last couple hours of the day the trail was basically the same as it had been. The elevation gain wasn’t too bad and was just very continuous. Honestly, though, I was feeling super sore after the two falls. Both my hands were throbbing and my right knee really hurt. It was scraped open and bleeding. Neither fall was that particularly bad. But it’s always jarring and bruises you up a little bit to say the least. I was definitely excited to get to camp for the night.

We wound up grabbing water a couple miles before the end of the day. Then had the freedom to continue up to the top of the climb and camp wherever we wanted to. As we continued along, the sun began to set, and it was absolutely beautiful. Then just before it got dark, we got up to the top of the climb. The views of the sunset from up there or even better. Unfortunately, there weren’t a ton of flat spots anywhere anywhere nearby. We just kept walking and walking and hoping we would find something. But eventually we went past some mediocre spots and decided to make the most of them. It just didn’t seem like we were going to be getting a significantly better option anytime soon.

It felt really good to be done for the day to finally be able to lay down. But setting up camp was already ridiculously annoying with my bad hand. You don’t really realize how much you use both of your hands until you can’t use one of them. This is exactly what happened on the AT in 2023 when I bruised my other hand. I’m just hoping that it feels significantly better tomorrow.

Of course, though, after everything that transpired today, the possibility of taking a zero on Friday was sounding a whole lot better. And there was a slight change of plans today that made that dream seemed like a possibility. OutsideJay texted me today and asked if I wanted him to put me in touch with any Trail Angel’s from Chester. I told him that I was contemplating taking a zero on Friday but that there were no rooms available in town. He said he was on it and he would find a person to host me for the night on Friday. So it looks like I might get that zero day after all!

Inside my tent, I didn’t have the energy to do hot dinner. I just decided to eat a bunch of snacks instead. I also didn’t have service so I wasn’t able to do too much on my phone. But I got a little bit of writing and video work done before calling it a night. Thanks to doing a big mile day today, now tomorrow I’m only 31 miles out from Chester.

My plan for tomorrow is to start early and get into town as quickly as possible. I’m going to stay in a room tomorrow night, which will be nice. I’ll be able to get a bunch of writing and video work done and enjoy some privacy. Then the following day, I will hopefully be staying with someone in Chester for the night. Jay makes magic happen so I know that I don’t have to have all of the details to have faith that it will work out.

If you enjoyed this blog and would like to support my hike by buying me a soda or a snack along the way, there is a “Tip the Author” button below! It links directly to my Venmo. Any and all support is incredibly appreciated!