PCT Prologue

I’m sitting at my friends Sara’s parents house about 20 minutes east of San Diego. I arrived in SD Saturday night and spent the first couple nights catching up with Sara, my old college Roomate and seeing some sights around San Diego.

In college, Sara’s parents came to visit and offered to host me and take me to the trailhead when I told them of my dream to hike the PCT. Here I am, taking them up on their offer, 7 years later.

I left Salt Lake City, my home over the last couple years on March 2nd and drove to Bend, OR where my brother, Ryan, and his wife, Bri, graciously hosted me for the week and allowed me to leave my car there for the duration of my hike.

I spent the week in Bend eating good food, sleeping on a comfy bed and spending some much appreciated quality time with family. I spent some time prepping 8 resupply boxes that Bri will send me for the first half of my hike (my hero🥹) I also got to reconnect with some people I met through highlining and rig and walk a 115 m line in Smiths Rock State Park.

Tomorrow, I will set out on the first leg of my PCT thru hike. The forecast says rain likely, turning into a flood watch over Wednesday night and a winter storm watch starting Thursday. I guess that’s what I get for starting early March.

They say the ideal start date for the PCT is mid April. The way the permit system works is that you get an assigned time slot to pick and my time slot was almost the latest time slot you could get, thus my options were limited. When it was my turn to get my permit, I had the choice of early March or late May. Fires are now very prevalent along the PCT so I thought I’d test my luck with the snow to have a better chance at finishing before it gets too smokey out west.

I have wanted to do the PCT since 2017 when I thru hiked the Appalachian Trail. I always planned on doing it after college and in March 2022 I thought it was the right time! I ended up breaking my leg a couple weeks before my supposed start date and went on a journey of different sorts after that.

3 years have since gone by. I’ve regained a lot of strength but I don’t think my knee will ever quite be the same. I moved back to Salt Lake City and have spent the last few years recovering there. I’ve been focusing on community, routine, stability and highlining.

Everything fell into place in SLC and I achieved everything that I once dreamed of. A fulfilling job, a supportive community, a loving (and handsome!) boyfriend and hobbies that constantly push me. The plan on being in Salt Lake was always temporary, I wanted to get back to the PCT as soon as possible. I tentatively thought about doing it in 2024 but I decided to stay at my job, build up my resume and continue to put down my roots in the area.

I haven’t done any specific physical preparations. I live a fairly active life and plan on starting slow until I reactive my trail legs. I have a rough idea of where and how I’ll get my resupplies and I prepared 8 or so boxes to be sent to me in areas that it might be harder to resupply. I would say I have a fairly strong mental game, and a thru hike is 80% mental so I should be good there, but will inevitably struggle at times. But all things pass 😉

There are a lot of unknowns on the path ahead , and I’d be lying if I said I didn’t have any anxieties or fears. I’m afraid my knee won’t hold up or of having another accident. I’m afraid I’ll create problems in my mind or be rigid in my thinking, not allowing things to be as they are. I am afraid I’ll miss my friends, my boyfriend, highlining, that I’ll focus on what others are doing rather than appreciating what I am doing. I’m afraid I’ll be bored of walking, that thru hiking has lost its luster. I have these fears and thoughts and yet I know everything is always working itself out, one way or another. I trust my intuition, I trust the process and I trust being where I need to be at every moment of my life.

I hope that I enjoy the small moments and the magic that come along with doing a trip like this. I hope I soak in the opportunity to go to bed and wake up with the sun, to sleep under the stars. I hope I am grateful for my body and the ability to carry everything I need to survive on my back. I hope I take my time and smell the roses. That I move with efficiency and grace but not in a rush to arrive. I hope that I make authentic connections with others and freely allow those connections to come and go without attachments. I hope that I find the beauty in even the darkest and wettest and coldest of hours. I hope I allow the path to unfold before me and that I hold gratitude for the lessons that the obstacles have to teach me. That I am humble enough to accept when I am wrong and that my mind and heart stays open.

May my legs be strong, may my body be strong, may my mind be strong.

Thanks for reading, subscribe to get notified of each post, I’ll try to write every town I stop in 🙂

❤️Lynne/Lioness

p.s I plan on keeping my trail name from the AT unless something is bestowed upon me that I deem more fitting this time around. Stay tuned