Category: Uncategorized
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Find Your Rock
While hiking the coast of Washington, I had an experience that has changed me in profound ways. I spent a night camped at what is known as the Chilean Memorial. It is where the eighteen people who died when the schooner W. J. Pirrie wrecked in November of 1920 were originally buried. I don’t usually…
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The PNT Southern Olympic Coast
After leaving the kindness of Kindabird (Rosie) and SOS (Steven), I felt refreshed and ready for my final stretch on the Pacific Northwest Trail. I had what I assumed would be a four but possibly five day walk up the coast to Cape Alava, where the trail officially ends. This is the western-most point in…
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Creating the Change I Want
Ever since I started the Pacific Northwest Trail last year, it seems part of me has been thinking ahead to when the trail might feel easier. Glacier National Park, where I the began the trail, and the area just west of that was difficult last year because there was still quite a bit of snow.…
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Holy Shit Days in the Olympics
The first thing I want to say is plenty of people do what I did without being scared. But the six hikers I encountered the day I went from Moose Lake to Dose Meadows all told me they had been terrified. None of them, including the group of four men, had been able to do…
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The Olympic Mountains
In my last post, I mentioned my trepidation of what I would find in the Olympic mountains. I’m now writing with hindsight and can tell you that some of that trepidation was well placed. Yet I have succeeded and I’m writing this 10 days later after making it out the other side. After leaving the…
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To Each Their Own.
As I reach the milestone of having backpacked over 21,000 miles, I reflect how each trail I’ve done has had its own beauty and its own difficulties. The first time I did the Appalachian Trail I was in 40 days of rain in the state of Virginia alone. The second time I did it in…
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Nipping it in the bud
I’m sitting in my tent in a state park campground on the western side of the ferry which I had to take to complete the Pacific Northwest Trail. Crows are landing on my tent. Squirrels are trying to get into my food and I feel my inner “little girl” feeling inadequate and wanting to cry.…
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What is normal
The older I get and the more people I meet around the country, the more I recognize most all have had significant difficulties in life and for the most part all fall outside of some societal fantasy of happy and normal. This has me wondering what normal is anyway. As always, the first place I…
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Benefits of Letting go of Worry
I mentioned in my last blog how I succeeded in not worrying during my holy shit days of hiking through miles with thousands of blowdowns. I felt a twinge of panic that evening when my phone refused to charge but I have learned when I start feeling that way to step back and give it…
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My second holy shit day on the PNT
This really is two back to back days, so I will combine both days into this one blog. The second day was physically much harder, but the first day had more elements of a holy shit day. When I finally arrived at water at the end of what for me was a long day, I…
