For a lot of us who hike the trails, timing is usually determined by having an opening in our lives. Either it’s the end of something (school, military service, career, or marriage) or the middle (new job coming, heading toward grad school, between years for students, etc.) you reach a point where you are ready for a major change in your life and you decide that now is as good a time as any. Those who are completely satisfied with their lives as is usually end up hiking for a short while and then go back to the good life they left. They miss their friends, family and comforts.
After the first hike, for those of us who get seriously hooked on long distance hiking, it becomes a question of which trail and when, not if.
First AT hike - I had a job I liked, but had no time to travel. I felt like I was in a rut and wanted more than just going to work and going home. I dreamed of wandering the world, but had very very little money. I had started backpacking and loved it so I decided to see whether I had the fortitude to do a thruhike, since I couldn’t afford to travel around the world. I was pleasantly surprised to find that I loved the life. Yes, it was really hard, but it was happiness.
Second hike - started a new job. Quickly discovered I hated it. I knew I wanted to go back someday to see whether the AT was really as much fun as I remembered. I decided that if I waited, I would waste a year being miserable, whereas if I quit now (March 1st, 1992) I could do another long hike and start over when I returned.
Third hike - by this point I was seriously hooked on long distance hiking. I wanted to go do the PCT, but my husband wasn’t all that interested in that trail. One day, at an outdoor store, I saw him gazing at a CDT poster with what I interpreted as a look of longing. I said, “You know, we could do that one next.” He responded, “Okay, let’s do it.” So as soon as we had enough money saved up and the timing was right for him to quit his job (4 years later) we left. We had to wait an extra year because of responsibilities at work, so we saved enough to do the CDT and PCT back to back. Happiness.
There are a lot of considerations in deciding to leave your life to do something as radical as a long distance hike. A few people have homes and jobs to go back to; I never did. It is easier if there is less disruption in your life, if you have someone back home to act as support, but there is also more of a pull back to that life that can make it hard to finish your hike. There are other risks. There is always the risk that it will be difficult to find work when you return, or that you won’t want to do the same kind of work after your hike. There is the risk of damaging relationships with your spouse or children. There is the risk of doing some sort of permanent injury to yourself while hiking. There is the risk of change - you can’t necessarily control how you will change. There is definitely financial risk of one sort or another. (But some of us have figured out that life is risky and security an illusion, so we are willing to take these risks when the rewards are so great.)
At some point, the need to know, the desire to experience the life, the hope for a real challenge, will be stronger than your fears of the risks involved. Unless you have the ‘fire in the belly’, wait a while. Thruhiking is hard. It is much harder when you aren’t completely committed to doing it.
Spirit Walker
It was hard to do, but quite empowering. Frankly after that hiking the AT was, in a sense, easy.