[pct-l] PCT without food mail drops?

[Sean 'Miner' Nordeen]

If you want to buy as you go, I would still make a few food drops on the trail and mail them forward to places with limited to no resupply options.  Counting on discards in hiker boxes (which some hikers have done) isn't exactly my idea of eating well.

This is what I saw in 2009.  In SoCal, Warner Springs had limited supplies.  Kennedy Meadows also has limited stuff and it may be cleaned out when you arrive (there was nothing left when I arrived).  If you want to supply at Muir Trail Ranch or VVR in the High Sierra, you'll need to mail a package.  In NorCal, Belden and Old Station had a very limited selection and Burney Falls State Park is just junk food (so hitch into the town of Burney if you need supplies and don't want to mail a box).  Many of the resupplies in Oregon other then Ashland and Sisters are just resorts with mostly junk food (though one had those hotdogs in the wamer you hate) so you will need to mail something to many of them (most hikers buy stuff in Ashland,OR and mail it forward).  Most hikers mail stuff for much of Washington from Cascade Locks as many places have limited supplies, though Stehekin is probably the only place impossible to supply at.

Yogi's PCT handbook has good info on trail towns, the services they offer as well as supply options.

-Miner



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Check my 2009 PCT Journal out at http://www.pct2009.lifesadventures.net/Journal.php