Why I Chose the Trail

There are countless miles of beautiful trail in Washington, too much for a young eastern-born backpacker to believe. Living in Seattle and waiting for the snow to melt in the North Cascades to start my PCT SOBO hike, I came up with an idea. And just like that, on a whim, I decided to to hike the Wonderland Trail. My window was 5-6 days.

Preparations

I missed the permit window so I had to hope I could get a walk up permit which could only be obtained the day of or one day before I began hike. Honestly there was not that much planning to do.

• Read a little about the trail and current weather conditions

• Downloaded the Guthook's Wonderland Trail app

• Prepared 3 resupply packages

• Prepared a few different itineraries so I was flexible at the permit desk

• Packed my microspikes

Thats about it.

How it Went

Wow. My first reaction is, that was really hard. The elevation change on the Wonderland Trail is terrifying. You are either going up or down an arm of the mountain, and they can be merciless. This sucker is steep.

My second reaction, wow, this thing is gorgeous. Nearly every moment is beautiful. I can understand why this trail is a destination for so many. Constantly basking in the shadow of Mt. Rainier means a hiker is enamored by the view at almost any moment.

Originally my dad was supposed to join me for the trail and we were going to take 6 days. We started together but he began developing some knee problems on day two and got off trail at the beginning of day 3 with about 33 miles done. That left me to conquer the last 60 miles solo. I decided to put in some work and knocked out two 30 mile days to wrap up the trail in a total of 4 days. With some time still left for his vacation, my dad and I headed out to the San Juan Islands north of Seattle.

I highly recommend the Wonderland Trail for anyone interesting in a highly challenging and truly beautiful hike.

Gear

My gear list for the Wonderland Trail was similar to the lists for my other hikes in the season.