What made us choose the PCT?

Great question! The PCT isn’t the easiest long distance walk to start with, and for someone not from America it actually comes with a lot of admin. The idea to walk the PCT is actually a metamorphosis of a number of different ideas that got drawn together over time.

Jenny and I had always been a fan of travelling, especially Jenny who took a gap year in between school and university to travel South East Asia and Australia. Joal, having grown up with a mother who was an international schoolteacher also had a lust for travelling as well. Unfortunately both of us had taken the ‘sensible’ option into work, which was to go straight into a graduate scheme and try and progress through the corporate ladder. Having been at work for 5 years in large financial institutions it was time for a change.

The original idea was to buy a white sprinter van, deck out the back and try and get to the tip of Malaysia from London. This goal, on reflection, was far too ambitious. There were places along the journey where we’d have had to have hired armed guards or skipped out sections completely. It started to look more like a patchwork quilt of places, rather than a continuous journey. So we switched tack, looking instead at Canada and the USA. The plan was to find a run-down bus or van, convert this and try and make a big horseshoe from Quebec down the east coast and then back up the west, through to Alaska.

With the USA in mind we started to look at national parks and trials we’d walk from the van. This is when we stumbled on the Pacific Crest Trail. Rather than spend 6 months in a van, we’d walk the trip. At this point we also had done the West Highland Way in Scotland and had really enjoyed it! From tossing up the big three trails (Appellation, Continental Divide and Pacific Crest) the scenery on the PCT looked the best. A couple of YouTube videos later and we were sold. The most notable one for us was ‘this is not a beautiful hiking video” below:

Now that daydream has become a reality, which comes with the admin of planning food, water and shelter! Nevertheless we remain committed to the goal, and we’ve had to learn everything about how we make that happen, as we get closer to making this a reality.