“A trail of the masses.” Now that’s a loaded term. And the Pacific Crest Trail–isn’t the Appalachian Trail (AT) America’s ‘trail of the masses’? Yes, the AT is. However that doesn’t mean the Pacific Crest Trail (PCT) can’t be one also. The good news is that it rapidly is. Of course part of it has to do with the phenomenal success of Cheryl Strayed’s PCT memoir, Wild–From...

President Obama has purchased the Pacific Crest Trail memoir, Wild, by Cheryl Strayed. Unsurprisingly, Miss Strayed was wowed by the news. I think President Obama has really searched his soul in the way that writers do, Miss Strayed wrote. He has really had a lot of people who loved him well, who had a lot of teachers. But he is really a self-made man. So much of Wild is about how we must ultimately make ourselves. Bill Walker is the author of...

President Obama has purchased the bestselling hiking adventure book, Wild–From Lost to Found on the Pacific Crest Trail, by Cheryl Strayed. This is the story of a lone woman (Cheryl Strayed) recovering from the death of her mother, divorce, and drug abuse, setting off alone on the 2,663 mile Pacific Crest Trail from Mexico to Canada. “He had an unusual background around lots of supporting, loving people,” Miss Strayed...

“I’m in a wheelchair in a nursing home with no chance of ever getting out. It is my days on the Appalachian Trail I remember most fondly.” Those are the words of former Appalachian Trail thru-hiker, Colin Fletcher. Yet I suspect he is speaking for many of us. This fact of life is brought home to me when I look at the number of my Facebook friends that so many people–including, very much, myself–have met through...

http://www.digitalspy.com/movies/news/a525038/wild-reese-witherspoon-shares-first-photo-as-cheryl-strayed.html Reese Witherspoon has released the first photo (see link above) of her playing Cheryl Strayed in the upcoming Hollywood movie, ‘Wild’. The long-distance hiking community eagerly awaits this film. Already Cheryl Strayed’s book has had a tangible effect as the number of hikers who applied for thru-hiking permits on the...

The Summer issue of the Pacific Crest Trail Communicator had some eye-opening statistics. In 1997 the Pacific Crest Trail Association (governing body of the PCT) issued 16 thru-hiking permits. This year, however, by April 15th it had issued 1,211 to thru-hikers and thru-riders (equestrians) for the 2013 hiking season. The trail could now fairly be said to be wildly popular. And there is no reason to think this trend won’t continue. No, the...