[pct-l] Is WILD good for the PCT?

[Anthony Biegen]

shon mcganty <smcganty at yahoo.com> wrote:

>I have not heard of "I promise not to suffer," I will have to check that
one out.  It sounds better than "Wild."

I stumbled on "I Promise Not to Suffer" by accident and was surprised that
I hadn't heard of it before. Turns out it was just published this year.
Piper and I figured out that she must have hiked the trail with her husband
in 2004, although there was no mention of the year in the book. It is
similar to Wild in that it is written by a professional writer, not a
'professional' hiker, if there is such a thing. While she talks about
things that happened off trail, her boots are planted firmly on the trail.
You feel that you are hiking the trail again. While reading Wild I
occasionally wondered if she had hiked the same trail that I am hiking. I
liked "I Promise Not to Suffer" as an augmented trail journal. I also liked
Wild as a life changing experience that happened to take place on a trail I
love.

I hiked a 210 mile section of the trail this year but did it early to avoid
the heat. I also wanted to avoid the crowd of Wilders that I expected would
overrun the trail. I didn't run into a single thru-hiker in my two weeks,
which was disappointing but somewhat expected. I missed the best part of
the trail; meeting other people who love doing what you are doing. I didn't
meet any Wilders, but I was secretly hoping to. I didn't know if they would
be naive dreamers or not. It could be that many of them started out like
Piper and I; lots of hiking experience, some backpacking experience; always
dreamed of hiking the PCT but thinking that it wasn't possible. I think
that Cheryl's book opened up that possibility for many people and that is a
good thing.

I will add that although the Wilders are mentioned when there is abuse at
the caches or hinted at when there are wildfires but people not tipping the
Angels and people making unnecessary fires have been with us for a long
time. The story of the people proud to have only drunk from caches is
several years old, not new to this year of the Wilders.

-- 
TrailHacker