Longing for a Long Trail

In 1998, my journey began at the Mexican border, where I set out on a 2,650-mile hike along the Pacific Crest Trail. Five incredible months later, I had reached 180 miles south of the Canadian border. However, as late September approached, the weather in the northern Washington mountains turned wet and snowy.

On October fifth, I encountered a day filled with misadventures. I found myself lost in a trailess white landscape. Descending a hillside covered with a combination of fresh snow atop slippery wet grass, I fell into a toboggan-like descent that only halted when my leg became entangled in tree roots. Thankfully, I emerged uninjured, but I spent hours climbing out and retracing my steps to the last recognizable location on my map. As late evening settled in, I was exhausted and ready to camp. Placing my backpack down, I reached for my tent, which had been fastened to the exterior of my pack due to its dampness. To my dismay, I discovered it was no longer there, most likely lost during my tumble downhill.

Under a makeshift lean-to made from my ground tarp, I spent the night watching snowflakes fall, and the full moon break through the clouds. The yipping bark of coyotes pierced the silence, and I knew that was as far north as I would get. Life took me in different directions upon my return home, and twenty-five years have amazingly passed, filled with different full and meaningful adventures. Yet, that long trail always lingered on the periphery of my thoughts, and it would lead me back.

It’s now the end of July 2023, and I’ve been walking since early morning and have done so for several days, with two weeks ahead to complete my Mexico to Canada hike. Returning to the trail has me filled with an intense sense of gratitude. The physical movement and grand landscapes are igniting ongoing sparks of familiarity. I remember how to walk, drink from creeks, sit in the dirt, talk to bears, and observe the world with far fewer voices requesting my attention. Something dormant reawakens, and it’s profoundly exhilarating and intoxicating.

My mind wanders through vivid images of a trail winding through the forest, following waterways, and traversing high mountain passes, extending thousands of miles into the distance. My thoughts continue to spiral out, but a sudden chirp from a passing insect playfully brings me back to the present with its dust, brilliant sun, and ever-changing sky. The trail seems to have a current, like standing in the shallows of a river, tugging me forward. I long to be carried away by it.

Reflecting on my past and present trail experiences, the word “longing” surfaces first. This longing isn’t an insistent yearning demanding an immediate response. Instead, it’s a warm energy of possibility and momentum. A steady spin of a prayer wheel, humming a song of long trails, distant lands, unimagined vistas, and joyous simplicity. And in the years between my cross-country start and finish, I now know it was kept alive by the subtle power of longing.

As I continued down the trail, I stumbled upon a young thru-hiker peacefully napping in the dirt, partially covered by a ground tarp. His clothing was approaching threadbare, and his skin sun-blasted with a layer of trail grime. It was a scene I could not imagine how to replicate anywhere else in life. A perfect, picturesque moment of freedom. Continuing on the day would get hard, but moving through the cathedrals of nature is an easy antidote. I can feel the prayer wheel humming louder with an increased tempo, and I know that even after days, weeks, or years, it will continue to offer prayers that I might return.

Or I can say to myself as if I were
A wanderer being asked where he had been
Among the hills: “There is a range of mountains
Once I loved until I could not breathe.”
By Thomas Ferril