Hello 2025 (well spring 2025). This year instead of focusing on two or more walks spread across the globe, I figured I would spend my last year of semi retirement walking from Mexico to Canada (at least that is the plan).
PCT MAP with SOTA Summits, resupplies and other stopping points along the way
I am starting in early April and here it is late March and I am finally doing those last minute shoppings, and will add a gear list, and I may even dork out on the weight. Normally I am not a weight weenie, and I typically come in around 30-35 lbs “packed” (with food and water etc). Since i have been doing this walking thing a while, I have the fortune of not needing to dump a cool few thousand on all new gear, but that said I did pick up a new Durston X-Mid 1. I got some good usage out of the OG (gen 1 Drop version) X-mid, and am looking forward to the added width of the new one.
Pack: I’m still rocking an Atom Packs MO 50L, but replaced the hip belt, and I replaced all the bungee with a different color, and picked up some repair patches as well from AtomPacks.
Kitchen: is an MSR Pocket Rocket Deluxe, a snow peak spork that I have been using for years. My pot is a GSI Outdoors haullite 1.7L pot. Yah my kitchen could use some weight trimmings but it’s hard to justify spending money when I have gear that is fine. My base kit of the big 4 comes in at just around 9lbs, light enough for me, but heavier than others i am sure. My food bag for the first week is 4.2 kilos, or 8.5lbs. That is about a pound, to 1 1/2 pounds too light for a 6 day jaunt.
Summits on the Air: I will be carrying a Summits on the Air kit on this walk, and after much toiling have settled on a mid-band QMX (40-15). That total kit adds an additional KG to the pack weight, the penalty is the 5aH battery, but I am fine with that as it will reduce the amount of times i need to charge up; I should be able to get 10-15 activations depending on how much time I activate. Pretty much anytime I hit the RV I’ll do a top off balance charge. Speaking of, why would I want to walk some 2600 miles and do this whole side quest thing? Is walking from Mexico to Canada not hard enough with all the other logistics involved? Yes you are correct, I am adding a bit of an extra bump in difficulty to this journey by taking on these side quests, however after a few long distance walks with SOTA I do have some ground rules. The ascent to a peak should never be more than 30 minutes in one direction (so < 1/2 mile and < 500 feet elevation gain). AT the end of the day, unlike the AT which has close to 200 peaks where the trail traverses the AZ, on the PCT with those ground rules, I am looking at just shy of 100 peaks, which would add about 1-2 weeks overall to the walk time (if my maths are right).
Resupply Logistics: Since my earlier days of the JMT, and the section hikes I have done in the past things have gotten much simpler. For one, the amount of places you need to mail a resupply to yourself is much lower now (or worse yet, back in the day when you had to march your resupply in ahead of time and hope it was still there month(s) later). It also helps that I have someone who is going to meet up with me from time to time to help with those resupplies. I am trying to reduce the number of Zeros or Neros on this journey this year. According to my happy planning spreadsheet there are about 30 resupply spots, 12 of which would be a mail in. So < 50% and those are mostly the way off places.
Time to head back to work, that is all for now. I will try and chime in from the trail after I start.. FWIW, current pack weight, with that 1st weeks worth of food (oh it will change) is sitting at 20lbs, but none of my layers have been put on the scale yet.. (sleeping shorts, puffy, etc..) so yah I’ll be hitting ~30lbs. That is about par for me.
The Scotland Great Outdoor Challenge (TGOC), what is it?
This is not your typical thru-hike. For starters, its a coordinated and organized walk that you sign up for. Next once you are “approved” you create your own bespoke route. You are given a list of 15-20 starting locations on the West Coast of Scotland, and a list of 10(-ish) finishing locations. From there you draw some lines, and connect some dots (resupply) to make your route. You route does go through a vetting process with feedback to keep you on the rails. Once that whole planning process is done you show up in May with 300-400 others and start walking East.
Maybe you have done a ton of walking, and have planned plenty of excursions, but the added logistics of connecting two dots 200 miles apart with the various tracks, roads, munros (mountains) and Scottish right-of-ways does spice things up a bit, thus why there is a vetting process. This is one of those elements in my opinion where people find out whether or not they do not know what they do not know.
Given that you can pick your route, you can make it as hard, easy, long or as steep as you want. This also allows you to make it as remote or as civilized as you would like. I chose a mostly low mix of a route because this is my first crossing (however not my first time walking in Scotland). Because of the issues the “mankle” was giving me on the Pennine Way last month, this may work to my advantage.
If you are someone who enjoys a multi-week jaunt with solitude, this walk is not for you. Despite the fact that you sign up, and even pay a fee to enter, the Challenge fills up quickly. They limit the number of signups to 400, and I would guestimate 300 or more end up setting off from the various starts, folks scattered aboot all heading in one direction, you do the maths. However that also means signing up as a solo will give you plenty of opportunities at developing tramilies as well.
My Route:
I picked Shiel Bridge as my start, and had planned to finish in the seaside village of Inverbervie. I started out following the Afric Kintail Way, then broke off to take some non named walking tracks to Fort Augustus (first restock). Then I took an old military road (see Jacobite rebellion) over the Correyairiack Pass towards Kingussie (second restock). This first half of the walk was the easiest for me to plan and put together, and I have had some experience with this part of Scotland, so the route was pretty much memorized, other then deciding to cut a day way short hoping for another great viewing night of the Aurora I stuck to my plan.
After Kingussie I got a little creative in the field doing some on the fly reroutes to take in some of the more interesting sights. I was on the trade route and had met up with a wonderful walking partner, so on we continued together for the next few days. Up through Glen Feshie to the Ruigh Aiteachain bothy for a tent night (with about 40 other participants). It was the first night in a few days I saw some new faces.
After this I continued along Glen Feshie into Braemar for my last resupply. I diverted off my path down to Loch Callater lodge for a very social evening (guitar play, sing alongs and was fed some awesome food). The next day was up and over Loch Nagar and rejoined my route at Spittal of Glenmuick (Balmoral Estate). I walked past the Sheilin of Mark Bothy to Muckle Cairn, then down through Tarfside. Again I had to leave my route thanks to some thunder and lightning moving into the area, so diverted to Edzell. This set me up for a 15 mile road walk into Montrose instead of my OG planned finish of Inverbervie.
If my math is right, I walked about 185 miles with a few very short days (active rest days) and a couple of 20+ days, but most days I was clocking in about 15 miles. For nights, I ended up sleeping in a bothy 1 night, Hotel/Hostel 4 nights, and 8 nights in a tent with a combination of at bothies, at one caravan park and wild camps.
What was in my kit:
I scored a house sit in Belfast, so that allowed me to prune down my kit a bit more from when I left the US at the beginning of April. Gone was the Sunmits on the Air kit (about 1.5kg/4lbs), a pair of shorts and my extra sunshirt, ditched some of my First Aid kit (SOAP notes and quick guide etc)
I lived in Montane Terra pants, I like them for all conditions personally, so here is to hoping I do not rip them up and a Zpacks/EvolvedSupply Mirage Sun Hoodie. For the temps and conditions, the weight of this shirt is perfect. I am schlepping an Atom Packs Custom Mo 50L, Western Mountaineering Terralite bag, Big Agnes Rapide SL pad, Durston X-Mid 1P (Gen 1), MSR Pocket Rocket Deluxe, GSI Haulite 1.5L cookpot for my kitchen. Gore Tex jacket/pants (it supposedly rains in Scotland, but I’ve yet to see it), and a light puffy for those cooler nights. 1 smart wool 250 long sleeve, and 1 smart wool 150 short sleeve.
The miscellaneous bag included a 10k and 20k charge block, a few feet of 2mm cordage, some duct tape, sunscreen, midge/tick spray, tick removers, Rawlogy cork ball, UK charge block, charge cables for Garmin watch, iPhone and the battery bricks. On my back with food and water, it felt like about 30 lbs, but I had no real way to measure it for sure.
According to the MBA website: “A bothy was originally farm accommodation for itinerant workers; now a bothy is an open shelter usually in a remote location where travellers might have need of four walls and a roof. Most bothies are old cottages and at least several hours walk from the public road.” Reality is they are nicer than any of the lean-tos on the Appalachian Trail.
Highlights of the Trip:
I met a lot of wonderful people while walking. Unless you intentionally plan a socially isolated path (good luck) you cross paths with quite a few other TGO participants. This year’s starters totaled 337 people, with about 40 dropping out within the first few days. I was consistently encountering 20-30 people on a daily or bi-daily basis while scooching along my route.
Seeing the Northern Lights: As an amateur radio operator, I tend to have some clue what is happening with the sun. For those not in the know, we are at the peak of the 11 year solar cycle (aka Solar Maximum). What I did not know though was that a G4 class solar storm had spewed solar material at the Earth on May 9th. I managed to snag some cell service and my app popped that I had a 100% chance certainty to view the Aurora Borealis in my location if the sky was cloud free. This Aurora may be the most magical thing I have ever seen before.
Doing the typical swimming in mountain rivers, which Glen Feshie came at the right time in the right place and the right temperature.
Sleeping and hiking to high locations in a tree free environment. Okay lets face it, that Scotland is tree free maybe is not a good thing, however it does make for some amazing views from the tops of the munros. At one point I was walking along three lochs (lakes), and the juxtaposition of new forest growth being backdropped by windmills and a three loch gravity hydro electric system in place was cute.
The night at Loch Callater with the gathering of folks, the shared good food, and the sing along in the lodge with the two guitarists. Loch Callater was not part of my original route, and I intentionally diverted just for this experience.
Getting there: (a four day adventure to itself)
I had already been on that side of the Atlantic for a month given my failed attempt at the Pennine Way. After spending some time in the Wicklow Mountains in Ireland, and scoring a house sit in Belfast it was time to move on to Shiel Bridge, the start of my crossing. If you are not familar with the public transit in the UK, it is amazing.
From Belfast I took a ferry back over to the other Island. From our landing spot in Cairnryan Scotland I took the city connect up to Glasgow and stayed the night. The next day the goal was to visit Montrose to drop spare clothes and other parts of my kit not going on the walk. After Montrose move up to Aberdeen and if there was time to take the bus out to Braemar and back to drop off my last resupply. I managed to make all those moves in a single day using nothing but the UK’s public transit. Speedy train from Glasgow to Montrose, bus to Aberdeen and buses to Braemar and back. Once you know and understand their system, it is quite easy to move around.
The next day I moved over to Fort Augustus as a single move. Train to Inverness (my first visit). Inverness was not what I expected. You come out of the train/bus station and you are met with all the major outdoor shops and a few local ones too. It does make sense though as Inverness is the Northern end of the Great Glen Way (on the list). I did not want to get to Glen Shiel too quickly, plus I had not visited Loch Ness yet so I moved on down to Fort Augustus for a night. Compared to Fort William (end of the West Highland Way), Fort Augustus seems to be well kept. Fort William is cute, but it seems to be run down. There is also part of the Caledonian Canal system there and so of course I watched as boats (BIG and small) moved up/down the 5 tier lock between Loch Ness and the Canal heading South. There is a great Fish and Chips shop to be had in Fort Augustus, and no it is not the one where you get off the Bus station, it’s down by the Canal.
The final day I took an early bus out to Shiel Bridge so I could setup in the campsite before the scheduled rains were set to move in (there is that Scottish Weather I have heard about :D). I met my first co challenger on that last bus.
The Day-by-Day breakdown
Day 1: Along Glen Affric
Today started out a bit of a cloudy threatening day. I left my campsite, and walked up to the Kintail lodge to “check in” (sign-out) to start my route. Shiel Bridge is usually the popular starting location, but this year was ranked 3rd. That said there were still 40 people on the list to start here. The walk started out with about 2 miles of road walking before joining the Affric Kintail way and heading East through Glen Affric.
Because the walking track was a farm access road for sheep farmers, the walking was very pleasant. Eventually I reached the first bothy along Glen Affric, the Glen Licht House. This makes for a good lunch and rest spot. After here the next couple of miles is a 1000 foot climb into the upper Glen.
There are plenty of options to sleep along Glen Affric. There are three bothies and plenty of wild camps along the way. I pushed a mile or so past the Glen Affric Youth Hostel and found a quiet spot along the River to call it a day. Day one ended up being 14.25 miles. A lot of sheep, some amazing uphill walking along a beautiful glen, and a first night campsite with only a few neighbors.
Day 2: Affric Kintail to River Enrick.
Today was a twenty mile day, but it was well worth it. I also dealt with a bit of an emotional state, go figure. One of those it’s hot, this sucks, the views are gone now that I am out of the Glen type days/internal monologues I battled with for a few miles.
I bumped into one chap that was asking me about my route, and then started talking up some route to Cougie Lodge. Consulting my maps I was unable to find this location, and it was not part of my original path, so when I did finally see the sign that said “Cougie Lodge this way” I opted to continue along my own planned path. That whole not venturing into the unknown. It did not help that the path looked pretty rough. nor that the individual I’d talked to did use the words “right boggy mess”. I was still fresh off the mess of the Pennines so avoiding bog at the expense of extra miles was worth it.
Sometime well into mid afternoon I finally reached my turn off the Affric Kintail way to venture over a hill towards the the town of Tomich. It was starting to get later on in the day, and hunger was talking to me pretty loudly so I stopped off at a small wood with trash cans to do some dinner and a “cuppa”. Afterwards I continued on to where I was hoping to stay the night, and uh..well what was on most maps as a bothy actually ended up being a rather pricey (and locked up) holiday home on a lake. It was here that I flipped my phone on and got the alert from the Aurora App (100% chance if no clouds).
This changed the mission of my day. After pouring over my map hoping to find a high, and dry spot near a good water source I was back on the move by around 2000. The target was a body of water a few miles away so I picked up the pace on what was an old Forestry Scotland trail and logging area. I made it to said body of water just before sunset, and quickly realized it was not suitable. The location was very boggy with no flat spots anywhere and the “body of water” was a large bog hole with no easy way to get water. I made my way back to the “trail” and continued along until the next Glen (Valley) that I had spotted on the map at the confluence of two rivers. This area would serve me well, even though there were dirt roads near by, it was obvious these roads were there to serve the nearby wind farm, and not regularly travelled.
Camp was made, and around 2300 a very interesting light show started to emerge. I stayed awake until about 0130 watching an amazing and very magical light show. All kinds of crazy colors to be had all around me. This was not the first time I’d experienced the Aurora Borealis, but this was by far the best one I have ever seen. I actually joked to myself at one point “well nothing else on this walk is going to top this, so I could quit right now and not be bothered by the decision”.
Day 3: A wee little move
Last night’s light show was amazing, and supposedly the storm was big enough that tonight was supposed to be even better. I decided to take a short day and walk to the top of the last hill to go over before Fort Augustus. A couple of hours later, I had walked a short three miles up the hill to Loch ma Stac. Nearby was a Victorian era shooting lodge being retrofitted by the Mountain Bothy Association.
I would like to think “Loch ma Stac” translates to Lake of the Sky. I am thinking it is something more simple like “stacked lake”. This is the top loch of a gravity hydro electric setup. I setup my tent in a suitable area well away from the structure which was reinforced with scaffolding. I did check out the lodge, and on the roof were inscriptions going all the way back to the 1970s.
Today seemed like a nice enough day, no clouds or anything in the sky until I decided to lay down around 2100, (and set an alarm for 2300 for hopefully another light show). At the end of the day though the clouds had moved in and the sky was completely obscured. If there was another light show it was well above the clouds so I opted to just roll back into bed and call it a night.
Day 4: to Fort Augustus
By the time I woke up the clouds had moved on, and another nice sunny day was on tap. The first mile was along the edge of Loch ma Stac, and then downhill on the access road past two more Loch’s and dams. I ended up calling today “the Dam walk” for that reason. It is a bit concerning though that in May the three lochs were all pretty low. The logging industry as well as Forestry Scotland could take some lessons from the US West in what happens after years of drought, and cash crop forests not properly managed. Peat also has a nasty habit of burning for months on end underground. In my opinion if the current weather pattern stays as is, then in 5-10 years Scotland could have the same issues with fire the US west has.
Next up was the village of Invermoriston for some lunch. After lunch I had six miles of the Great Glen way down to Fort Augustus at the Southern end of Loch Ness. The Great Glen way does get quite a lot of walkers, so there was no shortage of folks to chat with who were heading N towards Inverness. Fort Augustus was finally a place to get some laundry done. It was also my first food resupply. The local/convenient store here at the one gas station had enough for me to put together a good menu for the next 3 days. Bubble and Squeak Idahoan Potatoes, ramen, cous cous etc., and a stack of flapjacks for lunch.
I stayed at Morag’s Lodge, which was a hostel right off the GGW a few minutes walk from the town center. There is also a good chip shop in town (not the one at the bus stop). At the bar in Morag’s there was quite the gathering of TGO walkers, so plenty of stories to be shared, and new friends to be made.
Day 5: Over Corrieyairack Pass
Not sure why I was worried about the walk today, but this was going to be “the Forester pass” of this walk for me. Okay, maybe that is a bit of an exaggeration but the first ten miles covered an elevation gain of 2500 feet. At the base of the climb up, I met up with another individual who I had met at the bar last night. Mark from California, and despite being taller than me, and a former Marine we both walked about the same pace. The nice thing about walking with someone else, is you cover a bunch of miles and do not even realize it. At the top of the climb is the remains of an old telegraph station. The walk down the backside is a lot steeper, and the knees were a little miffed when it was over. We continued walking along the General Wade’s Military road with the intention of staying near Garva Bridge. The last few miles we ended up on tarmac. We managed to get our tents up and dinner cooked before the rains moved in. Most people stayed at Margrave Bothy a couple of miles back, so it was just myself, Mark and two other Challengers, plus a lady and her dog in a van. It was the first night ticks were an issue too.
Day 6: Newtonmore
Today’s path was through Laggan, with a stop off at the Laggan Cafe. My original goal was to stay near the “Centre of Scotland” marker and finish at a caravan park 30 minutes from Newtonmore. Challenge Control was hanging out at a hostel in Newtonmore, and Mark was headed there so I decided to knock out that last couple of miles. This choice set me up for yet another 3 mile day for Kingussie which was my next resupply. Pushing along, Mark and I made the Laggan cafe where I utterly destroyed their menu. Two mains, two deserts, two pints of beer and 2 coffees. As lunch went on a nice gathering of TGO crossers formed. The food was quite good, so if you do come this way it is worth it for a stop in. After lunch, and hearing my plans to walk past the Centre of Scotland Mark decided to stick with me. To get to Newtonmore there are two options out of Laggan. One is to head North through the East Highland Way. The other is continuing along General Wade’s Military road which is now A and B roads through the countryside. The high route would have been easier on the feet, but as I said, I wanted to walk by that marker :D.. Misguided goals?
Once we were on the A889 we quickly came across a place called “The Monarch”. What intrigued me was the remains of an old Chapel. Yes I get it, old and falling apart chapels are a dime a dozen in the UK. We chatted up the owner who was there doing the lawn etc preparing for an incoming party. A couple other chaps (Rob and Graham) ended up walking with us until the Caravan park, but we pushed on ahead the last mile or so into Newtonmore. Why did I want to continue on to the hostel? Well TGO control was setup there, and it allowed me to check in a day early, and it setup an easy day into Kingussie. More time at the bar?
It was also here I ended up meeting my walking partner for most of the rest of the trip. Newtonmore is at some strange crossroads as well, just on the outskirts was a very US looking truck stop. No, not a modern day Love’s or Bucees, but like what they used to look like. A diner with showers etc. More on that later since I snagged breakfast there the next day. Life in a hostel is always fun, ie..meeting other trail walkers and such (and hoping no one snores).
Day 7: Sauntering along to Kingussie
Since this was another three mile day, and others were taking a zero at Newtonmore I decided to lag about a bit. Off in search of Breakfast with “The Beaver Lady” and her son and nephew we ventured back to the truck stop (Newtonmore Grill) at the edge of town. This was an odd place to find this kind of restaurant, but a lot of truckers do run through here from various locations. Breakfast for dinner, dinner for breakfast, whatever your fancy. So I opted to build a cheeseburger with an egg on top, almost like a bacon western bacon burger. Lindsay (the Beaver Lady) was fun getting to know and I was in need of a new walking partner. Since her son was about to bail on her with her nephew I offered to walk with her since this was her 6th crossing. She was however zeroing today and I was moving on, so we agreed to meet up the next morning where I was staying.
Back at the Hostel I grabbed my kit and started walking out with some others pushing onto Kingussie. Rob and Graham, the two gents we met yesterday were also heading to Kingussie so we walked together, man those guys had some long legs and a long stride. Most folks over there really do walk about 1/2 mph faster than I, so it was a fun struggle. Granted this was a good area to speed through, this was more of a ranching/grazing valley so not a lot of views to be had.
As the day went on though, plenty of us gathered about the area campsites, hostels and hotels in the area, and ultimately overan an outside beer garden at one of the hotels. Fun gathering hearing old stories, and making new friends, and well showing off the images of the Aurora a few nights ago. I guess i am one of the few backpackers who bothers to view the night sky in all it’s wonders.
Day 8: Into Glen Feshie
The OG plan today was about 8 miles to setup for a SOTA peak however that was no longer part of this walk, and a lot of folks had been talking up the bothy at Ruigh Aiteachain. Today’s distance ended up 11 miles. Along those eleven miles we encountered the Ruthven Barracks from the 18th century. A wonderful swimming hole mid day (it was a hot day). So after a dip we suited back up and headed into a wood. So the story with this bothy is that there is an individual who stays in the bothy for most of the year as kind of a care taker.
This particular bothy because someone hangs out throughout most of the year was nicer than most. Equipped with a cooking stove. The Bothy was already filling up, but I had opted to pitch out on the grounds elsewhere. After a hotel night, I wanted to be back under the skies and trees.
Day 9: Continuing thru Glen Feshie to Red Bothy
We headed out again today following the Feshie River up through Glen Feshie. One of the guys I was walking with was talking about how most people call Glen Affric (see day 1 &2) the most beautiful Glen in Scotland. Which do not get me wrong, it’s raw, beautiful and is flanked by some serious mountains. I will admit though that Glen Feshie does have it’s own appeal. I personally put them as even but for different reasons. Glen Feshie is a bit wider, the mountains are a little smaller. As I called out similar in beauty, but for different reasons. The RAF was out today, so we were buzzed a few times. This was another short, 11 mile day.
I opted to stay inside the bothy, for no other reason than to just have the experience. Then again, I will probably be reminded why shared rooms can be uh…hard to sleep in. Do any of you snore?. The Red Bothy was recently reopened after a year of refurbishment by volunteers with the MBA. In the cooking/gathering room there was a nice family style table, a wood stove, another table and some chairs. A log book, and the usual things you would find in a bothy. The Bothy Code etc. In the bunk room were four double stacks, so room for eight. Tonight though, only four of us were staying inside.
Outside I think there were close to 10 other tents scattered about, and who can blame them. It was a nice clear evening, so after dinner I did a short night wander before finally turning in. Note that since we are getting further into May that it was never actually dark at night. The sun would sort of dip under the horizon around 2200, and make itself known again around 0300. The darkest it ever got was “twilight”.
Day 10: The Red Bothy to Braemar:
Another 12 mile day on tap to a town for resupply and check in with TGO challenge control. I diverted a little bit to a place called Mar Lodge. The custodians of this place put on coffee and snacks for TGO walkers, plus it was a good place to fill back up on water. This was about midway of my day. The lodge also allows you to send a resupply here. That might have been nice to know given the last minute shuffle with the only local co-op in Braemar.
While walking, I bumped into an octegenarian lady on her 9th crossing. Man these Scots are some hard core walkers. One of the walks she had done that sounded really interesting is the “Path of the Gods” in Italy. No not the 5 mile walk along the Amalfi Coast, but some 80-ish mile walk between Bologna and Florence. Okay that’s on the list now :D.
Back on the move I had about a mile of road walking from the lodge to some wood that would drop me into Braemar. I ended up bumping into one of those walkers I had been bouncing into every few days, so we decided to head down into Braemar together. Off in the distance I could see and hear a thunderstorm moving away from us. Always a fun thing to see and hear when it is far away (and not accompanied with rain). Marteen and I strolled on into Braemar and I destroyed the menu of yet another small cafe for 2nd lunch.
I really wish I had taken more pictures of this village. It was very idyllic, but also very posh. There is one Inn there called the Fife Arms, apparently lots of famous people come here to stay. Beer Pints are also £10-15. Despite that this village is way out in the boonies, like 2 hours from anywhere, I can understand why this village is the way it is. Balmoral Castle is about 20 miles to the East. I stayed at the Caravan Park on the South side of town, and I am glad I booked this early. It was a tent city, easily 40 tents pitched on their spare lawn. They had a guy that reminded me of Haggrid directing us where to put our tents so that we all had space. It was about a 5Mx5M square. It was nice to have a shower too.
Back into town after getting cleaned up, I had dinner and headed to one of the local Pubs to reconfigure the next leg. I wanted to divert to a place I had even put on my map during planning. The Loch Callater Lodge is very much worth the stop. It is nestled in a beautiful valley, and you can only access it by walking. Some volunteers who have been a part of the TGO for a while come out with all kinds of food and do up great meals, and sausage and bacon rolls etc. On top of that, well you watched the video above. Even though it would add a day to my total walk, I was still finished within the required 14, but it meant one more 5 mile (rest) day.
I managed to come up with a reroute that put me back on my path only 10 miles outside of Braemar and also put me going over a Munro.
Day 11: Braemar to Loch Callater Lodge:
Well, a wet day sort of. It did rain through the night, but I had time to kill this morning so I was not in too much of a hurry. I walked back into town for some coffee and a second breakfast before venturing along.
Finally on the move around noon, I made it to the Lodge by 1500, and WOW, this place was spectacular. You can either walk along the road (not advisable) between Braemar and Aucallater or stay on the West side of the nearby river. Then you turn up a 3 mile, small climb in on Jock’s Road following and meandering with the Callater Burn (creek/river) to the Lodge.
The hills here reminded me of those early days on the crossing back in Glen Affric. The lodge was nestled on the banks of a loch with an outflow. It was all fenced in, there was a bothy next to the lodge, and an outhouse for doing your business. We were flanked on 3 of the 4 sides by tall mountains too. This lodge also has a connection to the Royals. As I called out above, Balmoral Castle and estate were only about 20 miles away from Braemar, and I was directly south of the Castle. One of the volunteers at the lodge was one of the hunting guides at the lodge. This is where the Royal family would come to hunt the Red Deer that roam the hills. There was a cairn on a little knoll above the bothy commemorating the Queen’s Jubilee.
Just as I was promised, they put on a good show for you. As soon as I walked up to the lodge someone was shoving a bacon roll in my hand. Tea was to be had too. I totally wandered around checking out the surrounding area (as well as spying that steeeeeeep climb out of there for tomorrow). It was a gray day, no rain, but breezy too with a bit of a chill. Another night outside, I pitched on the green around the Lodge, as did another 15 of us. Remember what I said about snoring? This might be one of the first times I have encountered snoring, in stereo while camped outside.
They fed us an amazing pasta dinner too. You would think pasta would be boring, but no it was jazzed up very well, and at some point we all retired into the bar room and did a few hours of sing-a-long. Surprisingly some of the Scottish songs I knew, they also tossed in a fair bit of Beatles, the Eagles, Sir Elton etc. Although I sure would have loved to hear me some “Take me home (Country Roads)”.
Sacked out after one of my more favorite social days on the Crossing.
Day 12: Loch Callater Lodge to Shielin of Mark (Muckle Cairn)
A new day, newly refreshed after a fun night. I went looking for Lindsey (the Beaver Lady) only to find out she had already moved on. After getting my fill of Bacon Rolls, I was ready to head up the hill. I am going to repeat that these guys really take care of the crossers, so make sure you bring some paper money with you to kick some back! After all, they are all volunteers giving their time freely. Essentially trail angels, but on steroids. So yah after my fill of Bacon Baps and Coffee I was off.
My goal today was to head to the Sheilin of Mark Bothy and assess if I would stay or move on. First up though was an up and over the hills to get back to my original route. That said I realized i was going to finally come close to a munro (mountain) so I diverged off and decided to walk up to the top of Lochnagar.
Since it was a little wet last night (no real rain, just dew and such) I went ahead and laid out my Durston fly and inner, and my tyvek ground cloth, and then set off for the last 100 yards to the summit.
As usual the Scottish hills deliver yet another amazing set of views, 360 degrees in all directions and for miles. This is one of the reasons why I love being above the treeline (okay to be fair, Queen Vic cut out all the trees to fuel the industrial revolution). That said though while the view to the sea was blocked by the next range, I could see 50-60 miles in every direction. In true typical UK form though the trail off the summit was DOWN..and I mean DOWN. Switchbacks? Never heard of them. At the bottom of the route over Lochnagar I met up with what was my original route, and I was walking into the Balmoral Forest.
I ended up bumping into Rob and Graeme, and we continued together East to the Sheilin of Mark Bothy. By the time we got there the bothy was full, and a pretty good sized tent city was building up. I also knew this was my last night “in the mountains” as it were. After a few nights of very social camping, I wanted some “me” time, so after filling up ALL my water containers I pushed on.
The path from the bothy to Muckle Cairn was known to be a bog without a trail that was about a mile long to the forest roads. Another key factor was if the bog was wet, I would rather finish with wet feet than start with wet feet. Once I made the ridge with Muckle Cairn and with how clear it was (and there being NO rain in the forecast tonight) I decided to camp on top. It was actually cool because I was able to see the bothy I had left behind, and the tent city below. Oh and it was amazingly and eerily quiet.
Day 13: to Edzell (another reroute day)
My viewpoint on Muckle Cairn, looking back towards the Sheilin of Mark bothy gave me a fun perspective. As the morning moved along, and I was grabbing breakie and coffee I was watching the tent city below disappear one by one. The objective today was through Tarfside, and onto a high-ish spot somewhere above the village of Fettercairn. The weather had other things in mind.
The walk down from Muckle Cairn was an old “land rover road” (or maybe Rover road). I saw it referenced both ways. The drop down into the valley passed two bothy’s, both of which would have been good places to stay. From my perspective the one at the bottom of the hill had the most idyllic setting. Both are on the Lee Plantation.
At the bottom of the hill the path follows the Water of Lee. and begins to enter back into some semblance of civilization. At Tarfside the local Elks Club(?) puts on lunch at the Chapel on the west side of town. If you do decide to camp there the hosts put on a BBQ for the campers. I stopped in, filled up the water and moved on. While there one of the TGO challenge folks was warning us the weather was about to turn a bit rough, so I was starting to reconsider my route options. I had heard a few folks talking about the town of Edzell as their next destination. It took me a few extra miles to get to some cell service, and it looked like my only real option was walking along a B road. As I was spying my route off in the distance, and as the TGO folks warned, the clouds were building and turning ugly, so with that in mind, I jumped down to the B road, and booked a room at a place in Edzell and started to put the hammer down to walk that way.
Like day two, around 1800 hunger was yelling at me. So I found a space on the side of the road to make some dinner about 6 miles out. I ended up rolling into Edzell at 2030, just in time to get a beer in the restaurant and meet up with some other challengers. It turns out one of those folks was also a Summits on the Air person. Funny that was now the 2nd SOTA peep I had bumped into totally accidentally while on this walk. All in all with re-route i ended up doing a 23 mile day, about half and half dirt vs pavement.
Day 14: To the Sea, Montrose:
And here we go, the final day, ALL pavement. I knew some rain was in the forecast, and my goal was to try and beat the rain to the coast. Yah failed miserably, but I needed the shower anyway. The bridge on the South side of town was out, so we had to do a little backtracking. Once on the move it was a straight shot along a bunch of B roads, no real elevation gain/loss and the views today were mostly pasture lands. The fields were a great mix of green with yellow (rapeseed), and the usual cow and sheep pastures. Sure enough the weather forecast was on point, and about 2 miles from Montrose the weather opened up on me. As I noted though it was all good, as I needed a shower and my pants had not seen a washing machine in 2 weeks.
Conclusion:
Would I do this again? Oh heck yeah. This was an amazing experience overall. The logistics of planning a legitimate route, learning a new mapping service (OSMaps), and figuring out some of those Scottish Place names was a fun challenge. It might be a couple of years before I do my next one, but I really want to build a path with at least 7 munros on my path. The camaraderie and shared experience with the other walkers, that whole tramily thing. Just like in the US though, each tramily for each trail has its own culture, and that is true for the TGO.
Thanks for the read, and catch you on the next saunter!
Here we go, here we go again, yet another trip to the UK for some distance backpacking. To be honest I just really love the walking vibe in the UK. In the US taking your doggos on long trails adds some serious logistical nightmares, especially since most State and National Parks have a ban on dogs pretty much anywhere outside of “paved” areas. The UK however, there are dogs everywhere, and I just find the walking vibe pretty chill over all. I was already heading to Scotland for the TGO (The Great Outdoors) Challenge. and the wife gave me a pass for a second month so I decided to add the Pennine Way on the front end for the month of April. What is nice about the Pennine Way is there are quite a few Summits on the Air peaks, and I have also added a variation to include the Yorkshire Dales Three Peaks Challenge for an additional two SOTA peaks.
Why the Pennine Way?
What drew me to the PW first was I wanted to make sure I was in walking shape for the TGO, and I am essentially walking to Scotland along “the spine of England”. During our Coast to Coast last year we crossed paths with the PW near Keld. Since I missed out on some travel last year for some personal things and after my success of doing SOTA + Thru-hiking on the WHW, I wanted to step it up one more level with a trip that was >200 miles. The PW offers that, and M1EYP did a similar style trip back in 2013, plus my 3 peaks challenge variation gives me plenty of distance to get strong. I am allowing 20 days total on the PW and looking to mostly wild camp it, however I do have a couple of nicer stays which will also be resupplies. Also when in a town named “Once Brewed” and a pub named “Twice Brewed” you have to pay the extra just to check it out. Of course I will be finishing with the Border Hotel before moving on.
And then Scotland?
After the Pennine Way, I have about 15 days before I need to be in Glen Shiel for the start of my TGO Crossing. I’ll probably get up there a little early as the 5 sisters of Kintail looks pretty enticing from a hiking (and Summits on the Air) perspective. The Lakes are calling my name as usual so I may roll that way some too! Kendal here I come for some Mint Cake!!
The TGO Crossing starts somewhere in the second week of May and finishes two weeks later. I only have 3 days to get from WAY up North back to London. Lets go, fingers crossed for no train strikes!!
So now for the nitty gritty, this whole trip like is one big backpacking trip (albeit a posh one), and I will do everything with a single backpack. Note: Trekking Poles, tent stakes and a few other things will have to go under the plane, and I’ve got a few ideas for that.
So what does the gear load out look like for this trip (and keep in mind I am not a weight nerd. Plus I am comfortable with 20 mile days at 40lbs, so I am shooting for 35lbs just to be safe. Although keep in mind, food tends to be what pushes most pack weights into the ‘uuugggghhh’ realm, and with this being the UK there are chippies, kebab shops and cafes everywhere so I’ll probably only ever have 2-3 days of food on me at any given time. I will have to up that to 4 days though once I start the TGO.
Packing List:
So what gear am I taking for 2 months on the road/trail/travel? (note other than the Drink LMNT link, all other links are not affiliates and go direct to the manufacturer were possible. I am not getting paid/sponsored/asked just including the links because it is gear I believe in). The list is kind of long, and I will skip the little odds and ends and stick the macro items. AS of the time of this writing and for the things going with me, the pack weight is at 24 lbs. Once I add in food (mostly breakfast since I am wild camping most of the walk) I’ll be closer to 30lbs
I’ve embedded my walk through video at the bottom if you do not want to read it all, it’s about eight minutes long.
The Big Three: 7.15lbs
Backpack: Atom Packs Custom Mo 50L. I really do love this pack.
I would normally also carry a SotaBeams carbon 6 with an EFRW, however I am going to try out Elecrafts smaller “compromise” whip antennas. Consider this a dry run for the possibility that I end up getting a KH1, which would drop about 1.5 lbs off my base load out.
Two days in Guadalupe Mountains National Park for a day of hiking the Texas State High Point
In the quest for state high points and available time for getting up to the PNW we spent two nights at Guadalupe National Park. The Guadalupe Mountains are a North/South running chain in the West of Texas and South East of New Mexico. This area is also close to Carlsbad Caverns which if you have the time is worth a stop over as well. This mountain range at one point was a reef bed and many of the fossils date back to some 40M years ago during the Permian Age1.
Where to stay in the park:
There are two main campgrounds, plus a horse corral. The Pine Springs Campground is at the base of the hike for Guadalupe peak which was my goal on this outing. The Pine Springs CG uses part of the parking lot for 13 “RV” sites, and there is a separate loop in the same area for tent campers to make for an easy leisurely start to get up Texas’ state high point. This area is really close to the Central/Mountain Time Zone line, so at times your phone will present with one or the other. Hopefully while you are there time is not that important because it’s hard to know what time it really is :D. My Garmin once I started my GPS track was using MST even though my phone was still showing CST.
The Hike:
The steepest part of this trail, and the part that is going to make or break you is the first two miles. Lots of steps made by people with long legs and a short torso, so for those of us who are say…average height (or shorter) and are a 50/50 torso/leg split do have a bit of extra work. The other option is follow the others up the side of the rock steps creating new erosion channels (see principle 2 of LNT for why you should not do this). I wanted an early start because as usual the goal was Summits on the Air, and hopefully some EU/UK DX. I was moving pretty early on and greeted by the park volunteers at the bottom of the trail with the usual questions of “enough snacks, enough water, layers?” etc. Today’s weather was calling for high winds and temps in the 40-50s, towards the top there was also some snow, ice and mud on the trail. Also this is a pretty arid area so a good amount of water even on a day like today is necessary. An interesting combination of conditions to really have to prepare for.
Up I went making a good pace ahead of my hiking partner as I knew I would be hanging out on top, and wanted some time to setup. Normally I would not say separate from your group, but this was a pretty straight forward trail with out any real turn offs to end up in the wrong area. I made pretty good time overall for maintaining a consistent pace; the ascent is a tad more than four miles with an elevation gain of about 2900 feet. The Munter method would put this at a 3:45 minute hike, I knocked it out in 2:16. All that walking (and swings and squats) pay off :D. As far as the ascent went and I had an idea that because the trail is on the canyon side of the hills that we were getting a funnel effect. At about 1.5 miles the trail hooks hard left at a rock out cropping and this was the worst bit of the winds this day, but after about 200 yards you end up in a tunnel of Pine trees that cut the wind down for the next bit. I will note that this trail has a bunch fo exposure, which made for a fun descent (more on that later). The last mile was where the snow, mud and some ice was. I was quite surprised to see ice given the semi arid location, but some winter/wet weather had ripped through a few days before. So, be aware that winter weather is a possibility.
Setup the radio gear in a way to not be too wind effected and the wife was not far behind. She too beat the Munter Method timing by a good hour! For the SOTA stuff, I spent 2 hours activating across 5 bands all cw and managed 58 contacts. Most of the DX came on 21mhz and 28mhz was great for the whole US. DX included France, England, Spain and Switzerland.
The Descent:
One of the rules I hike/peak bag by is “anything you go up you have to come down” and that has served me well, as noted in the Big Bend post I almost broke that rule but today is not about me and my descent. I’d been aware of this one particular group on my ascent and while I was hanging out. As I was about 200 yards down I found a party who had one individual near tears and almost frozen in their tracks. This group had left about 30 minutes before me from the summit and this was as far as they got. I called out a bit ago that there was a fair bit of exposure to this walk, you are above treeline, while the summit area is pretty big the trail is exposed with long steep drop offs on the sides and this individual had reached their breaking point. They were not having it. I decided it was time to engage and pull out all those skills I’ve picked up over the years to walk the group down and overall it was a great experience. The single most important thing you can do if you do engage to help someone is listen to what they are saying.. Not just hear, but LISTEN. I had noticed that this person kept asking us to walk down in front on the harder step down. Basically they were learning what we were doing with our feet, so I made sure to wait every time we came to one of those dicey sections. Now keep in mind, I love it when a hike takes me into evening and I can catch a sunset, and I had an idea that this would happen. At one point because the cellular service is pretty dodgy I ended up having the wife monitor Simplex on the radio just in case we needed other assistance up there. Note yes there is some cellular service but it is dodgy at best, and there are parts of the trail where you go 30 minutes with no service (including no SOS), so plan accordingly. It took us about 4 hours to get down, but we all managed to get down safely. Hopefully this individual was not too turned off by the experience and their group of four does continue venturing out into the hills. I really had an enjoyable time talking and walking with the three who remained with me on the descent.
Key Takeaways/epilogue:
This was a great area to stop and play, and I recommend it if you are in this area, that said book early. We did end up having to move from one campsite to another in order to stay for two days. From a hiking preparedness perspective, this is a reminder too/from me to always turn around on your way up to make sure that when you look down you do not freak out. Of the people I have helped over the years both in the name of SAR and as a good samaritan, the mental hurdle is one of the hardest things to overcome when you are in that exposed out situation. We can always warm up, consume calories etc, but when we are freaking out/disregulated getting re-regulated can be the biggest hurdle to getting back on the move. Not a lot planned for March other then work our way up to the PNW and then back down to SoCal , but that said April and May will be another springtime adventure off in the UK.
After a month in Florida it was time to start westward. Big Bend seemed like a great next place to hole up for a little bit given its proximity to nothing. I was hoping to score a week in the Chisos Basin CG, but that was not happening. We ended up with M-F in Rio Grande Village, and somehow scored the weekend in Chisos. I knew I wanted to do at least one peak (Emory) since it was the park’s high point, and there is enough other stuff to do as well to fill the 8 days we were going to be here.
Day 0: Getting there
At the Rio Grande Village CG there is a “nature walk” that goes down to the river, but also a little hill to go up and watch the sunset. We got there with plenty of time to enjoy both. If you have good photography equipment take it with you. The Sierra del Carmen range light up with some amazing hues of reds and pinks thanks to the color of the rocks. I came back for my night wander to do some stargazing. It had been way to long since I have had a good dark sky.. While the night sky here is good its not middle of Nevada dark, but it is still pretty good none-the-less. I was just stoked to have a great night sky.
Day 1: Ernst Ridge Trail
Today was a fun little jaunt along the Rio Grande to the Hot Springs at the end of the trail. It was supposed to be a 6-ish mile out amd back, but we started from the CG so that pushed us closer to 9 miles. This walk offers a lot of interesting site seeing that covers geology as well as natural amd human history. The walk offers great views of the Rio Grande, the Sierra de (mountains), fossils and petroglyphs on the walls around the Hot Springs. Oh yah and hot springs too, which (so and so ) Langford back in the early 1900s created a resort nearby. After lunch amd some time checking out the area history we headed back.
Day 2: Grapevine Hills
The plan today was to head over towards Grapevine Hills and walk out to a balanced rock, however i checked SOTAmaps and realized I was looking right at a peak. It had been six weeks so the urge overtook me to send Meesh on her way and I opted to run up the hill. One thing i will note is that every kind of plant here wants to stick and prick you whether its a cactus or not. This is not the same as say the whitethorn or manzanita i encounter regularly in Nevada. It was the first peak that I was trying out a new EFRW built with K6ARK’s balun kit. I had been using a linked EFHW for the past couple of years and the polystealth wire was starting to get worse for wear. At the end of the day I wound up with about 30 qsos on 28mhz and 21mhz including on contact with Northern Ireland. Most of the contacts were North American based, so not too bad given the last minute decision and no real alert, or other activators in the hills today. Tomorrow we are headed to the Lost Mine trail and I will snag Casa Grande Peak.
Day 3: Casa Grande Peak
I wanted to do some Summits on the Air after my day on Grapevine Hills, and I had been eyeing Casa Grande or it’s neighbor Lost Mine Peak located in the Chisos Mountains sky island. . After pouring over maps, and data I chose Casa Grande, and to be fair it was the more impressive looking peak overall. I took off ahead of Michele from the parking area as she was not following me up this peak (and for good reason). The first mile you follow the Lost Mine trail, and then turn off onto a no longer maintained almost goat trail to the summit. A goat trail it was, it looks like quite a few people head up this peak such that there are multiple goat trails in the absence of a well flagged/cairn’d route to a peak that has a steep approach. Some of the terrain encountered did include a little bit of class 3/4 scrambling (because I like scrambling solid rock instead of fighting with Talus and Scree), and some talus/scree runs that at least have some trees that can be used for hand holds. Once you get up the last gully the trail levels out pretty good and the last 50 or so feet of elevation is a gradual trail. At one point you cover 500 feet of vertical gain over 700-800 feet of horizontal distance. The summit offers a 360 degree viewpoint as far as the eyes can see. Look South towards the Rio Grande, the Sierra del Carmen range and Mexico, glance across the way at Emory Peak which stands close by (and was done later in the week), so plenty of views to be had. Another successful SOTA activation, so we wont go into that, but lets shift into the down route. Looking downhill you can see quite a few options including where some individuals have just bombed straight down the talus fields, which on the map does cut off a LOT of distance back to the parking lot/trail head. I’m not down with that though as rocks hurt and the angle was steep enough that a controlled descent was just not possible. If you can handle that, more power to you. That said as I was trying to contour around, I did wind up on yet another rock band where I was doing a bit of low grade class V climbing but also having to contort and bend to not end up wearing the prickly pear cacti. I almost managed to get cliffed out at one point too, but found a good animal use trail to finally rejoin the “correct” (old/original) trail back to the Lost Mine trail. All in all it took me longer to get down than get up since I had to do a lot of route finding/navigating off the summit. So be warned if you decide to go after this peak.
Day 4: Moving day
Not a lot to really report here, we slow rolled out of Rio Grande Village to Chisos Basin. This is considered “an island in the sky” which I called out above. It was much cooler, but also much more crowded as most people are here to hike some of the trails in the area as well as bag the higher, but easier to reach Emory Peak. There are a plenty of trails to be had here for later days.
Day 5: Emory Peak
Emory Peak
Today’s goal was some Summits on the Air, and the high point of the National Park, and knowing it was a Saturday I wanted to get an early start to keep the crowding on the summit to a minimum while I had an antenna mast up, that and I was starting from the campground, not the Visitor Center area, so that added about 3/4 a mile each way. So on the trail we go with an interesting inversion occuring outside the basin. There was fog/clouds pouring over the Panther Pass area creating a fun misting effect. Fortunately the Emory Peak side of the basin was without the inversion, so views were had all around. I was well ahead of the crowds so far and made it to the trail junction in about 2 hours of walking. This trail junction has a pretty posh setup, there are bear boxes right there, an AED and a nearby privy. Onwards and upwards, the trail stays pretty moderate until the last little bit where the final push for the summit is 2-3 minutes of solid rock scrambling (class IV climbing) onto the top of the summit block. There are two blocks, the taller one is to the right/North when standing between them, or from a visual perspective, the one that contains the radio systems. Speaking of radio systems, one of the antennas was being held up with 5mm paracord..I guess if it works, it works. the USGS marker is close to an edge, but not too crazy. Note that there are sheer drops on the Western side of both summit blocks, so be advised if you have issues with exposure. (actually if you have issues with exposure do not bother with the climb up, but enjoy the saddle as a place to rest, grab lunch etc. It is possible to activate from the saddle, but it will be harder to be out of the way given that some folks will go after both summit blocks. Pretty straight forward SOTA day, 28mhz/10M got me France, Sweden, Germany, Spain and the UK for DX, and the usual suspects from about North America. By the time I wrapped up and started heading down the crowds were really ascending on the summit. It took a good 10 minutes to get off the summit block as I had to wait for a window to sneak down in between groups heading up. Something to be aware of regardless of your intentions for the summit. Pretty much the same story at the trail junction as well, easily 100+ people hanging out, having lunch and resting before the final push up. Note that the Pinnacle’s trail provides access to the South Rim Loop, and many other backcountry campsites, so most people were dropping packs into the bear boxes to snag Emory as part of their outing. Had some enjoyable conversations with individuals on my down walk, including someone sporting the brand new Durston Kakwa 55. This individual was working his way to Florida to put his few remaining possessions in storage and was headed up the AT this spring. He was doing a three day shake down trip to try out the new gear here in Big Bend, and he could not have picked a better place for it..
Day 6: Time to start moving on
However we had time for one last hike on the Window View Trail which is accessed directly from the campground, so we were like a 30 second walk to that TH. This is a pretty short trail that goes to a very cool feature. The trail ends at the top of a waterfall. note that the rock is pretty polished, so even when the creek is dry test your footing as you approach the edge. It is a pretty short trail, but note you descend down to the waterfall, the return is a climb of about 500-600 feet of elevation gain that’s pretty much sun exposed. So if it is summer, carry copius amounts of water and consume it. We made it back to the campground around noon, so with that we decided to head on out of town to cut our drive time to Guadalupe down.
Final Thoughts
Big Bend was pretty damn impressive. I would totally return there, especially with the backpack and check out the South Rim loop, (note that from Feb thru April that trail is closed because of Falcon nesting). It would be fun to put together a 5-6 day loop, during the new moon to really get that star gazing in. I will note, that while this area is good for stargazing and I had some great dark sky nights I still find the skies in Nevada to be darker and clearer. If Big Bend is on your list and you have the time, doing a 7-10 day trip is very possible spending 3-4 nights in each of the three campgrounds. While we never made it to the Cottonwood campground, what I can say is that Chisos vs Rio Grande Village offered two completely different experiences and moving between them was super easy.
A few remaining shots of some sunsets, and random wild life.
Javalina/Piccary
Up Next: Guadalupe Mountains National Park, and the Texas State high point.
Time for a new chapter in life, so saying goodbye to Tahoe and seeing what the world has to offer us as I venture down a new career that will keep me walking in the mountains and allow us to travel!
Okay so this post is a bit of a one off that long term may not be a one off, although if you follow me on Instagram and saw how I rebranded there some of this will make sense. Note that I may eventualy rebrand this blog as well. Also this write up is being finished six months after I had intended to post/publish so this is a 6 month old draft that has both reflections and steady state of my where we were mentally in April 2022, as well as “wow that did not go as planned but OMG we had so much fun and the path is constantly fluid”.
What started this life altering event?
The story goes like so: It was Presidents day weekend (Feb) in 2022 and after seeing the house behind us sell for a ton, as well as the house across the street sell for more than it should have plus having a hunch that some big global things were about to hit (this was a couple of weeks before Russia invaded Ukraine) and an overall nagging feeling that the housing market was not sustainable for another year the wife and I decided to pay our financial guy a visit and to gauge how much we really needed to sell the house for to just walk away from the tech industry and take a little time to just figure things out as well as do some travelling. Thanks to the pandemic and folks looking to leave the cities and head to the rural areas we had watched our home value just sky rocket a lot over the past 18 months.
So with a number that kind of surprised us (lower than expected) and the desire to dip our toe in by asking for something that split the two houses I had mentioned above we ended up selling our house in 3 days for well over asking. Truth be told we were the last house in the area that was going up for sale that had a boat dock, and the guy that bought it had missed out on the house across the street; he did everything he could to not miss out on our house. This all happened so fast we had not had much of a chance to really start a plan other then establish new state residency in Nevada for tax purposes and start thinking about about some of the places we would like to visit. So what allowed us to be able to go from living the typical American lifestyle of humble but respectable house, good job, involved in the community blah blah blah? Well the main thing was both our children were now adults and were starting thier own lives and while our house was big enough (about 2000sq feet) for the 4 of us it was just to big for empty nesting. I had been constant in my mantra that i did want to be out of tech and working towards a job in the outdoor industry by the time I had reached 50, so now made the perfect time to take advantage of the situation and well “move on”. Things were just lining up perfectly, so what if we did not have a plan?
Okay so pretty quickly we decided that downsizing was in order and we did our best to give away, sell or just throw away as much as possible and we did pretty good with that. I donated all my Search and Rescue stuff (that was still usable) to the local SAR team I had been a volunteer for over the past 9 years. The end result of our efforts was we were able to put the last remains of what we deemed neccesary (clothes, and some stuff for the kitchen) into a 10×10 with enough room left over our Son and my mother-in-law could also move some stuff in (honestly we maybe take up like 15-20% of the storage facility) and could probably downsize to a 5×5.
Saying goodbye to one of the best homes we’ve lived in.
We were gone from Tahoe by the end of March <sniff> <sniff>
Other than what I noted about “get a job doing something where I could be outside all the time”, the plan was come up with a 3-4 month travel plan and regroup later this year. So on April 30th I was “retired” from the technology industry. I deleted my LinkedIn account the very next day.
New Beginnings (a short stay in Reno): (these next few paragraphs are definitely mixing old and new). I have spent many years volunteering, and some side hustling involving Search and Rescue, or other wilderness education and leadership endeavors. It has always been my goal to find a way to do that as a profession, or even semi-profession; so anywhere we end up will have to offer some kind of guiding, teaching beginning backcountry travel or even some outdoor therapy. We are hibernating for the spring in the Reno area so maybe I’ll finally get a few of those North Lake peaks I’ve been ignoring, but after that we are hitting the road. We plan to spend some time down under with some friends, so hopefully I’ll be picking up one of the ZL associations, and spend a couple of weeks in Australia so I’ll get some more VK action too. Later in the year we will be headed to the UK and EU, I’ll be doing the West Highland Way (SOTA edition) in September and the wife has agreed (or well she decided for us) to do a little jaunt in the Lakes District called the Peaks to Pubs in August (if that’s what it takes to get her to do some walking with me so be it :D).
I do kind of want to reflect though on my time in Tahoe. I would like to throw out that reality is I lived my best life in Tahoe. I learned how to take care of my broken body in ways that living in an area that was not a mountain athlete focussed area would not have been possible (so I say to myself). I’ve always been a hiker and backpacker, and thanks to SOTA I did more hiking then anywhere else we ever lived; because of a trip in 2014 to Kilimanjaro and the back injury in 2013 I also learned the value of very regular working out and using someone to help me achieve very specific goals to keep me moving mostly pain free. Also just the amount of giving back I was able to do as a 9 year volunteer for the local SAR team. I spent the last 5 years in a leadership position within SAR, the teaching/volunteering for the local college teaching backpacking etc. I was definitely enjoying that whole aspect of my life. So yah, “best life we could live, why leave?” For starters we just no longer really enjoy (or our bodies do not) the snow any more. Despite that the winter of 21/22 was pretty mild, my body hurt a bit more than in years past, including those heavier snow years. Not that I am a weather wimp, but I do love hiking in green landscapes and sunshine :D. Tahoe had become routine, and I hate routine. My exploring was requiring further and further drives into NV/OR/UT just to get to new launching points, so it was time for a new base station. Those are just a few of the drivers to why it is time for us to leave this mountain town and try and find a new one. I am hoping we can find something that is less touristy, a bit cheaper but still offers access to water and mountains and exploration!
I will still be doing plenty of SOTA, but I will probably be operating with different variations of my callsign over the years to come.
(Jump ahead to May)
June had already been planned out. We were going to do a little travelling back east, and then I had some volunteering the last two weeks with a youth outdoor therapy group in the Truckee area (Gateway Mountain Center/GMC). A couple of weeks after my last day in the tech industry I get a phone call from GMC to confirm my volunteering, but the person on the phone was all apologetic about not getting back to me sooner because they had been franticaly trying to hire their full time guides for the summer months. “Oh really, you dont say? Well what are you looking for ?” The individual went through the list and so I replied with “Well my situation has changed some and I could actually take on a larger role with GMC”. (meanwhile in the other room I could hear an exasperated WTF sigh). After a couple of phone calls over the next couple of days what would have been a two week volunteering session turned into a five week stint as a guide.
Okay so lets touch on the “exasperated sigh”. Michele did not speak to me for a couple of days and I obviously knew why. Two weeks into retirement and I am already changing the rules. (two good rules for a successful marraige, communicate and never goto bed mad. I broke both; time for damage control). To be fair I was worried that waiting 1-2 years would have an impact on getting that first job in a new industry, and I was adamant about never working behind a computer ever again so to me it was more about getting a foot in for the sake of the long game and not risking losing the contacts I had developed at the college over the past few years. During the next couple of night wanders/dog walks I racked my brain to come up with the right things to say and a possible solution. After the second night and about a 3 hour walk I had it. In 2020 Michele was supposed to take her mom to Paris for a week, do the Disney thing and some fun touristy stuff, blah blah, but yah 2020 we do not need to revisit that :P. What I came up with was after our June East Coast trips were done, head to San Diego and Michele would reconfigure for a few months of time in Europe, take her mom for however long she can stay (I also planted the seed with my mo-in-law to kinda help things along) and I would catch up <somewhere> when the summer guiding was done. Within a few days the new plan was put into motion, plane tickets were bought and we were starting about to head off into our June travels. Note that during our time in Reno we also consumed a TON of videos on “how to behave like someone who was not quite “F.I.R.E”, but living that way. We also watched a bunch of expat videos, best countries to retire in videos, just whatever as we were not sure if we were going to Expatriate, stay in the US, or just travel. We also came across this very interesting service called Trusted Housesitters which we were planning to use as a way of finding stays in out of the way places and to help cut some costs on lodging. I had this wild hair about living out of our Audi AllRoad for the duration as I saw it as a fun experiment in further minimalisation. So my “reconfigure” was taking just what I needed for guiding and living in a medium sized wagon. It was a lot of fun at the end of the day!
My first night back to the area I drove up Monitor pass and camped at the gate on the dirt road to Leviathan peak (near Topaz on hwy 89). It had been a couple of months since i had experienced quiet and this area was QUIET! It was soo nice to be back to one of my favorite zones to go hide! So not a lot for me to hit on with my job other then to say I had a ton of fun, and finally felt some real emotion again. This was in fact the work I want to do and I do jive with a lot of the mindset of the organization. I did a pretty good job endearing myself to the founder and ended up taking on a lot of responsibility other than just guiding. Given that we were based out of Donner Summit I spent a combination of nights between sleeping at Rainbow Bridge as well as playing “Jack Torrance” at the lodge GMC bases their operations out of. It was nice being in this position and it allowed me to help in ways beyond just being a guide, but yah I guided a lot and had some very interesting experiences with the youth and chaperones I was working with, but well this is not the point of this post other than to say going down this road was a very worthy left hand turn to the road we had originally pulled on to a couple of months earlier.
On the road and a new path started: Fast forward to August; after guiding was done for the summer I spent a little time with Jeremiah down in San Diego and reconfigured for Summer and Fall travel abroad in Europe with the inclusion of some backpacking gear as I was doing a few jaunts while Michele would fly back for a softball tournament in late September. Michele was working the trusted housesitters thing well having done Bruges and Amsterdam on top of her travels and sits in Northern France. I caught up to her in Brixton England. Remember how I noted the house sitting thing *should* allow us to visit some places that might turn out interesting, but also be out of the way? Brixton is both the birthplace of David Bowie and was the cite of a riot in 1981 that was commemorated in the Eddie Grant song “Electric Avenue”. Brixton’s history and cultural influence was very Caribbean in nature, however the past couple of decades of gentrification was starting to have it’s impact. So the point of this next bit is not to highlight every little house area we hit, but to illustrate the need for flexibility and fluidity especially in view of our desire to just “travel” with no real plan overall. Okay I lie, we did have a couple of specific locations planned out. We knew we were going to do a house sit near Cognac France the first 3 weeks of October, and I was doing the West Highland Way the last two weeks of September, but for the most part it was a “lets hit the last few places in England on our list and just wing it”. We did rent a car for about 10 days but we mostly slow travelled via the trains. In the first six weeks we were together we visited James May’s pub in Swallowcliffe, Diddly Squat farm shop (we actually went here twice), went back to Wells yet again, visited Port Isaac for the whole Doc Martin thing, and did other house sits in Looe (Cornwall), Lindfield and Monmouthshire. We did have to sprinkle in a couple of AirBnBs here and there as well. One in Pembrokeshire Wales that allowed us to head to the coast daily for some fun coastal walking!
You can go read the write up on the West Highland way later on, and I should do a write up on the week between sending Michele back to the states and me doing some hiking in the Lake District and in Wales but for the sake of time on to France.
France was a lot of fun, we explored Fontveraud Abbey, Cognac and a lot of the area around the house we were at. The Tawny owls were amazing as I had owls every night when I would go and wander. It was very nice being out that far in the country. I was really enjoying being on the road and just seeing what the various locations would open up for us. I managed to sneak in some SOTA in the Pyrenees. I did have to cut my part of this sit a week short however. Back in late August I secured a spot at a week long interview/field training with a Youth program in North Georgia. This program was quite a bit different than GMC and ultimately at the end of the week I opted not to take the job. I was just not ready to “come in” off the road, however it was totally worth it to end the travels after 3 months (for me) to at least find that out. We are finishing up a house sit in the Washington DC area, and are headed back to the West Coast for Nov/Dec. I did pick up a couple of weeks at GMC in Nov/Dec but we also want to sit down and review a few things and build a plan around Australia/New Zealand in March/April/May (their Autumn).
Key Takeaways and things learned: Fluidity matters. Oddly enough after bouncing from a couple of house sits in France, Belgium and Amsterdam in July while I was working Michele really took to this notion of “do we really even need a home base?”. To the point that during her Sept visit to the states she ended up buying us a used Ford Transit Van for travelling and living in. It does look like I will keep working for GMC over the next couple of summers. We have tossed a few ideas around maybe doing a tour of all the National Parks, and sprinkle in some campground host volunteer/work here and there. The Van does open up a lot of options for when we want to be in the States. The problem with this kind of freedom is for everything you want to do you really do need to pace yourself which leads me to my next thought.
While I love the notion of just winging it, it does help to have some type of plan, or at least a few destinations in mind. It is very easy to get around in Europe and just walk. I love to walk and I love to explore and well the radio thing helps too :D, there are pathways everywhere, and just so much history. For every location we stayed in there was no shortages of nearby hikes that had a story. I even added the GR10 to my wish list of long walks I would like to do. I also committed to a friend of mine who really wants to do the Portugeuse Compestella next fall.
It seems impossible to find small houses for a couple, it seems society has deemed it that if you are an empty nester you need to be moving into one of those over 55 condominium villages. Most of the neighborhoods we looked at on realtor.com seem to mostly have 3000+ sq foot super mansions, no thanks, not our lifestyle..too much to clean, and too much to heat/cool.
So for now as noted, we are going to play in the van and build a plan for our Spring travels to the Southern Hemisphere as well as the fall travel back to Europe. Central/South America and Africa are also down the road too. We are thoroughly enjoying this minimalist mindset and this whole “home is just whereever you happen to be at that moment in time”.
Teaching and mentoring is my bag, facilitating is okay however when it does come to executing the therapy program that is being written by a therapist/psychiatrist for a specific individual I tend to lose interest. I love the idea of teaching backpacking skills so I will try and dip my toe in that world as well. It might be fun to find someone who can hire me to do that internationally. Guiding the JMT, WHW or TRT could be pretty fun!
We always seem to end up in England so we agreed to take a 3-4 year break from winding up there. 😀 I love the Lake district for sure, but after my little jaunt in the Pyrenees and the time I have spent in the Alps and other trips I do have planned, it’s just time to stop going back to the old familiar and see what all these other mountains in the world do have to offer. I want to see if those mountains talke to me the same way the Sierra Nevada does.
For now I am going to say 73 and there will be more coming later on down the road.
Backcountry Saunters 
