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Fotzers on a training trip in Wyoming

Greetings All!

Welcome to the journal that will catalog what is to be a grand adventure. We plan to spend four to five months of the year 2009 hiking the Pacific Crest Trail from the Mexican/US border to the Canadian/US border. Some of you have been filled in on what this involves, but for the sake of those of you who might be thinking, "What?", I'll fill in a little bit.

The Pacific Crest Trail stretches about 2700 miles from the Mexico/US border near Campo, California to Manning Provincial Park, British Columbia. In that distance, it traverses deserts and rainforests, passes by active volcanoes, scales mountain passes, and enters six out of the seven "life zones" found in the United States (every one except tropical). It crosses three states, seven national parks and countless wilderness areas, national forests, state parks and other recreational areas. The PCT was conceived in the 1930's, declared a National Scenic Trail in 1968 by the National Trails System Act, and officially "completed" in 1993, though ongoing re-routing and trail work continues to this day. The route is really a conglomeration of many smaller trails that roughly follow the crest of the southern California mountains, Sierra Nevada and the Cascades, with an aside into the Trinity Alps of northern California for good measure. Elevations vary from 13180 feet at Forrester Pass in the Sierras (the trail passes less than 10 miles from the peak of 14491 ft Mt. Whitney), to around 200 feet above sea level on the Columbia River at the Oregon-Washington border. Needless to say, a through-hike (the common term for completing the entire route in one season) of the PCT is quite an undertaking. A typical season will see only a few hundred noble (foolish?) hikers attempt a through-hike, and many fewer will actually succeed. Those that do describe days full of muscle soreness, fatigue, injuries, lack of water, lack of food, rain, snow, heat, cold, and general discomfort.

By now you're probably wondering, "Why the heck would you want to do that?" Well, many very typical answers come to mind: because we like hiking, because of the challenge, because of the adventure, for the amazing views, etc. Those are all true, of course, but there's more to it than that - there has to be, otherwise it's not really worth it. This is probably the hardest part of this journal entry to describe gracefully, so I'll just get down to the meat of it. We are not satisfied by what our American society describes or demands as a "normal" life. By this, I mean working hard 50 weeks a year in exchange for your two weeks of vacation and the opportunity to start a family, buy a house, build a career and maintain these things until you retire or die. If you save up your hard-earned cash, all those adventures you dreamed of in your youth can still happen after retirement...hopefully by then you're not too old and tired to enjoy them. (A disclaimer here: this is our perception and ours alone. We don't judge or resent anyone who chooses this life path - after all, you have to find your own happiness. I'm just saying it's not for us - we want our adventures now.) And our adventure is the PCT. I'm sure it won't stop there, but this year, this time, this is what we're going to do. I'm sure not everyone will understand, but that's okay, because we know what we want.

And then there's Uffizi. Yes, we're taking the dog. I can't imagine this trip without her. Some dogs are great house pets, some like walks in the city, some like playing fetch and doing tricks. Uffizi is something else entirely. Born of the mountains, boulders for bones and glacial melt for blood. Tough as a bear, athletic as a puma, and always at her happiest when in nature. We would be doing a great disservice to Uffizi if we did not take her on this adventure, and as much as we hate to see it, she's getting older. In a couple years, she might not be able to come with us, so the time for the trip is now. This means that we'll have to make sacrifices - we not only have the responsibility to get ourselves in shape, but her too. We'll be carrying extra food, water and gear for her (we prefer to take the extra weight than to burden her with a pack) and the extra planning for her is immense. She is not allowed in the National Park backcountry, except for North Cascades, and trying to find a way for her to bypass 300+ miles of trail is at best a logistical nightmare. Once that's all done, we will still we responsible for her well-being on trail, and we'll be watching her for signs of injury, fatigue, etc, closer than we'll watch ourselves. This is all a lot of extra work, but to us it goes without question that it's worth it.

So here we are in the Franklin house - busy with preparing for the trip, reconciling our current responsibilities and trying to get enough money together to afford all this. Wish us luck, I'm sure we'll need it.

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