Remember last week when I thought I had the best day of my life meeting David Tennant? Well, that is still a highlight of my entire existence. But... That was also before I had driven a Ferrari and had lunch at Trump’s National Golf Club. Which happened today. And I’m still not even sure how … Continue reading Day Thirty Seven: ZERO
I woke up around 4:30AM to go pee (as you do after downing 6L of water daily). When I tried to climb out of the tent, I realised I couldn’t walk. My right foot, which had nearly done me in yesterday, couldn’t bear any weight at all now. Using Wilson (my trusty stick) as a … Continue reading Day Thirty Six: ZERO
Today was the day that nearly broke me. Yesterday, my feet were bad. By 6PM tonight, I could barely walk. Maya, Dario and I left at 5:30AM so we would have a head start on Speedy and meet up 11km down the track at the 500 mile marker together for breakfast and photos. I felt … Continue reading Day Thirty Five: 793.4 – 833.0km
The chilled-out, anything goes vibe of Casa de Luna worked its way into the others and our morning was not rushed. It was the very opposite of rushed. I already knew I wanted a sleep in and that pancakes were being cooked right up until 9; I needed the sleep after yesterday and my feet … Continue reading Day Thirty Four: 769.6 – 793.4km
Apologies for the long post yesterday; hope you had a comfy chair to read in! Finding it a challenge to keep up with writing in between adventures, and got a bit carried away 🙈 In the short time it took us to eat some dinner and settle down last night, we could feel our belongings … Continue reading Day Thirty Three: 739.7 – 769.6km
Story time! And one to go down in the books: The best day of my life. June 5th, 2018It started off like any other day. The sun woke me up as it warmed my quilt, I went and poured a cup of coffee, and joined a handful of hikers gathered around a map to figure … Continue reading Day Thirty Two: 731.5 – 739.7km
I had imagined I would have a nice little sleep in and wake up refreshed, happy, and full of peace. I did wake up refreshed, happy and full of peace - there was just no sleep in. The roosters two metres from my head made sure of that. I stretched a little, stayed snuggled up … Continue reading Day Thirty One: ZERO
Tonight, I’ll be in Hiker Heaven. After all my research; my blog scrolling and YouTube watching and internet scouring, it seems surreal that I’m reaching the places I’ve read and dreamt about. Before, they were long off waypoints. They weren’t even real. They were names on pages, pinpoints on maps. Yet here I am, checking … Continue reading Day Thirty: 701.8 – 731.5km
I knew I wanted to cover more ground today. Not only for the sake of miles, but for the sake of weather and water. It would be hot, and there were two long carries. I planned accordingly and woke up, packed up, and walked out before the sun rose. Watching the sun rise does not … Continue reading Day Twenty Nine: 660.4 – 701.8km
Naomi, you deserve to set yourself an alarm! Didn’t we just go over this last week?! 😫 It was after 8AM but the time I rolled myself out of the tent, and past 9:30AM when I had my pack strapped on and started walking through the campground towards the trailhead. Last night, I hadn’t cared … Continue reading Day Twenty Eight: 632.9 – 660.4km
I’ve spent the morning thinking about how hard life would be if you weren’t friends with yourself. It’s not an unknown concept to me - as a few of you might know, my teenage years weren’t too shiny on the inside. I tried to hide it and put on a good facade, but my self-esteem … Continue reading Day Twenty Seven: 594.5 – 632.9km
I know the title says ZERO again... Don’t be judging me. (I judged myself there for a while, so I get it). Also, don’t judge me for the chocolate mud cake we had for breakfast in bed. It had to be eaten today and we were going to leave in the afternoon. However, in between … Continue reading Day Twenty Six: ZERO
First things first. I bet you’re thinking: GET YOUR WALLET! I was thinking: mmmmm I might go stretch a little, grab a coffee upstairs and cut up the rest of this tomato and avo to have on toast with melted cheese. And write a blog post, while there’s wifi. I also had my dose of … Continue reading Day Twenty Five: ZERO
The record has officially been set: six bugs. Six bugs that I inhaled. Not swallowed. Inhaled. They’re little tiny fruit fly type things that get all up in your grill, and when you’re walking up some pretty steep never ending elevation and puffing and panting and trying to make your legs work, continually swatting them … Continue reading Day Twenty Four: 558.7 – 594.5km
Yeeeah... I had every intention of leaving early. But it was freezing outside.. So I may have taken two hours (totally did) to get my act together and start the trail 🙊 Macca’s generally has all day breakfast anyway, so here’s hoping my slowpoke movements wouldn’t cheat me out of hotcakes. It’s a little hard … Continue reading Day Twenty Three: 529.0 – 558.7km
Spent another night in the wild without being attacked by beasts ✔️ I sleep pretty well on any given day - I can fall asleep at will, and if I’m tired I’ll lie down, set a timer for 14min and wake up that 14 minutes later feeling right as rain - but I think my … Continue reading Day Twenty Two: 504.4 – 529.0km
I woke up, packed up, and began walking. Standard day really. I crossed creeks via logs. I crossed rivers via bridges. I crossed the 300 mile marker. I crossed fields of gold and passed more mountains. More of my standard. The path today ran along a mountainside that dropped off steeply down to a creek. … Continue reading Day Twenty One: 460.0 – 504.4km
We were promised that it would be super easy to hitch back to the trail from town. We were also told there was an hourly bus that went directly to the trailhead; if the times matched up we were happy to do that instead. I was with three of the boys who agreed that we … Continue reading Day Twenty: 428.3 – 460.0km
I should have known I wouldn’t do any walking today. No further than lunch, or the supermarket. I was feeling a little off this morning. There’s not much alone time on trail. It’s a bit hard to describe, because it sounds silly. Most people hike all day by themselves - myself, included - but whenever … Continue reading Day Nineteen: ZERO
I SAW MY FIRST BEAR TODAY. So by default, no - I did not get murdered by any ghosts last night. Those angels must have stood guard well. I left early so Speedy could catch up and we'd have lunch together (otherwise his average wait time for us is 2hrs+). I felt the sun rise, … Continue reading Day Eighteen: 396.7 – 428.3km
I was told that women who finish the PCT come out looking like gymnasts (and the fellas end up looking emaciated... life is unfair sometimes). While I’m still waiting for my legs to thin out that much, I’m fairly certain I won’t be doing the splits too gracefully now or later - despite how thin … Continue reading Day Seventeen: 364.0 – 396.7km
The forecast was for wind... I just didn’t expect this much wind. My first half hour was a veerrrryyy slow one; straight down a bitumen road, and after yesterday’s efforts, my knees hadn’t yet forgiven me. Nor had my feet, actually. I’ve got a few blisters going - some already popped, some I just let … Continue reading Day Sixteen: 331.1 – 364.0km
A 20 mile, 9,600ft descent didn’t mean much to me yesterday. It does now: It’s a Bloody. Long. Way. Down.For everyone bar the Americans, it means a descent of THREE KILOMETRES over THIRTY KILOMETRES. Still hard to wrap your head around? Don’t worry, it was for me too. My body certainly understood it pretty well, … Continue reading Day Fifteen: 301.8 – 331.1km
Skydiving. Right before skydiving. Like, when I was on the bus with my family, heading toward a little plane we were about to jump out of. My insides were an uneasy mixture of fear, anticipation, terror, annoyance (this was a family Christmas present from Mum and Dad so I couldn’t get out of it), a … Continue reading Day Fourteen: 285.2 – 301.8km
Thirteen is my favourite number. Thirteen was my favourite day on the PCT? Mmm... just about. But we didn’t do any [real] walking, so I’m not entirely sure it counts. Three more of our posse were due to rock up in the afternoon, we needed to resupply, and the Swiss offered to cook dinner, so … Continue reading Day Thirteen: ZERO
The plan was to get to Idyllwild. We were more than ready for a town: beds, showers, laundry, no tents, clean feet, pizza, more supplies.. The setback was, it was going to be a hike and a half. More than 30 kilometres - doable - but the vast majority of which were going up, with … Continue reading Day Twelve: 252.6 – 285.2km
I once drove out to the Devil’s Marbles with a man I loved deeply and thought was just about the closet thing to a soulmate I’d find. In a way, the end of my journey alongside him sparked the beginning of the journey I’m now on. He’s a great man, and I have no big … Continue reading Day Eleven: 231.8 – 252.6km
Well, I figured it couldn’t last forever, right? It didn’t. I got up at stupid o’clock (4AM) and continued to press snooze for half an hour.. then it still took me until 5:20 to have my life fully packed and walking away from my tent site. My knee still ached, but at least it was … Continue reading Day Ten: 196.4 – 231.8km
The law of averages promised that I’ll have a few not so stellar days out here. Today was one of those days. I mean, it started off alright? I’d slept in a little, because it was going to be a cold one again so sunlight didn’t really matter. I’d picked up a snazzy pair of … Continue reading Day Nine: 176.2 – 196.4km
A ‘zero’ is a day where you walk ‘zero kilometres’ along the track (this does not take into account walking to/from a local restaurant, post office or bottle shop). I had my first zero today. Did anyone notice I mixed the days around last post? Oops! Time is already getting muddled. I mightn’t have remembered … Continue reading Day Eight: ZERO
