PCT 2022: Preparation to Get Back on Trail

Since I got off the Pacific Crest Trail in November 2021 (click here for my PCT 2021 wrap-up post), I’ve been trying to decide if I was going to get back on trail in 2022, either to reattempt the whole trail, finish the parts I missed, or simply do another section.

I am excited to say that I am going to do at least the first 453 miles northbound from Campo (the US border with Mexico) to Agua Dulce, CA starting on Sunday March 27th. This is the “guaranteed” plan (as much as any plan related to thru-hiking can be “guaranteed”). Anything more than that I will decide as I hike (Chuckwalla and Smiley think that I’ll decide to keep hiking, and if my bank account approves, I think they might be right).

I was nowhere near this excited to get on trail last year, and I am rarely an “excited” person, so I’m taking this as a good sign to get back at it.

Preparation this year in comparison to last year has been minimal. Partially because I feel so much more confident in my long-distance backpacking skills, partially because I plan to use my spreadsheets from last year as references, and partially because I didn’t have very much time to prepare because I decided on my official plan about a month before I started and had a bunch of projects to wrap up for work I’ve been doing for some family and friends.

Practice

I haven’t exactly been running ultramarathons to prepare for hiking the PCT (Me? Run?!?! In my father’s dreams). But I have gotten a little exercise and skills practice in.

Chuckwalla and I did a 36 mile hike in Big Sur on the Pine Ridge Loop in less than 36 hours. 24 steep, steep miles of which were accidentally all on the second day. We had chosen that trip to try to get a river crossing in to prepare a little for the Sierra in spring, but the river was more of a big creek. We did practice some rock hopping, and I accidentally slipped one foot into the river on a failed jump. We both took our shoes off and waded knee deep through the freezing water for awhile until we couldn’t stand it anymore.

Simon, Smiley, Chuckwalla and I also headed out to Mount Tahquitz near San Diego to get some snow practice in, also for the Sierra. The two guys and I shoved our feet into clunky mountaineering boots (picture narrow ski boots, hard plastic and all), strapped on crampons (real ones, not just spikes) and clutched our ice axes in the uphill hand as we climbed a couloir up towards the summit. I got my first chance to practice self arrests with an axe, but the snow was so wet and sticky that I didn’t feel like it was the perfect example for arresting, since we had to actively throw ourselves down the mountain to try to get a good slide in. We did practice 4 different types of arrest, though! There was a small section when we should have been wearing the crampons but weren’t, and I thought I was going to slide right off the mountain and freaked out a little. Blake had to come back and help me get down to a safe spot where I took a moment to cry out the panic and put the crampons back on. On the decent, those boots really messed our feet and shins up since they were pretty cheap rentals.

David and I spent 6 days (4 days with 2 days of travel) in the Sacred Valley of Peru, at 9,000+ feet of elevation. Right off the plane, with less than 34 hours of sleep under our belts, we hiked around some ruins at 10,000+ feet and I thought I was going to die. My legs were literally shaking on the intensely steep downhills.

I also dug so many holes and pulled so many weeds for the various gardening and landscaping projects I’ve been working on this last month, that I feel like that has to count for something.

Money Money Money

Once I got out of Post Trail Depression (PTD) (click here for my PTD tale), I realized that I needed to start making some money.

Good timing too, since my grandparents were downsizing and moving homes and needed someone to help pack and store the stuff they wanted, sell the rest, prepare the landscaping for listing and help get the paperwork together for the sale of the home. My mom also needed help around her house with some major indoor changes and landscaping. My dad wanted help selling his car. And a friend’s mom was looking for someone to help maintain her amazing garden.

I also sold some of my older backpacking gear for a little bit of extra pocket change.

I made a few bucks to restore the money I’d spent on trail (thank you friends and family for the work!), and I’ll definitely be good for a month or so, but more than that is yet to be seen.

Gear

For Christmas and my birthday I very gratefully received the Zpacks Nero 38 backpack and the Zpacks Hexamid tarp tent shelter with storm doors, finally bringing my base weight below 10 lbs. I am finally ultralight at 9.13lbs!!!

I cut some straps and extra bits off of things to lose some extra weight as well. We’re counting fractions of an ounce now, baby.

With 4L of water, 4ish days of food, and my not-real backpacking fanny inside, my pack-fanny combo weighs 26.7lbs. 25.2lbs without the fanny and fanny contents, which is right around the max weight recommended for the pack. For the most part I probably won’t have more food or water than that, since the desert has a lot of access to towns for resupply, and there is a lot more water in the Spring season.

The only things missing from the gear spread pictures are my phone (used to take the pics), my sun gloves which were in my pocket, and my new fanny that literally arrived at my house 6 hours after I left to head to the trail. Grr. Thankfully, my fairy godmother and trail angel extraordinaire Andrea has offered to ship them to me in Mount Laguna.