Navigating the transition home after my PCT Thru Hike

I completed my PCT via hike on September 16, 2025. Since I got home, many people ask me what it’s like to come home after almost 6 months on the road and if it has changed me. I wanted to fully document the trip, I needed to examine how I view things about my life and experience now that the epic PCT climb has been in my rearview mirror for 3 months.

the physical world

The first thing I noticed when I got home was how much noise there is in the civilian world. In the “normal” world, we are constantly bombarded by loud trucks, lawnmowers (especially in Florida), airplanes, etc. There is so much peace and quiet on the road that you can hear yourself think: this is something I really miss. The other thing I immediately noticed while walking through the airport on the way home was how invisible you become. I guess it’s like being in the military and coming home after deployment. When you take off your uniform (in my case the backpack), people no longer treat you as special as before. When my fellow hikers and I arrived in town, we were oddities that attracted most people. People opened doors for you, bought you cinnamon rolls or a beer, and generally wanted to talk to you. I admit it’s kind of a mental trip that you get used to, and I think most hikers will notice that that special feeling is lost when you leave the trail.

Another thing that affected me immediately after returning home were the physical changes in my body. Hiking is a relentless effort on the body. By the end of the hike, my average daily mileage was 25 to 30 miles per day through some pretty strenuous climbs and descents through the Washington Cascade Mountains. On the road you are so used to being busy from sunrise to sunset that it becomes normal. When you get home, the relief of routine hits you and you just want to sink into the couch. You become relatively passive. I could feel the pain in my knees as soon as I got off the plane. I’m not sure exactly why the stiffness appears after these long hikes, but the same thing happened when I hiked the Appalachian Trail (AT). Knowing what to expect this time, I immediately started back in the gym with knee strength training and it seems to have helped me tremendously. My goal after the AT hike was to do an Ironman triathlon while I was in such good conditioning. But because of knee pain that lasted for several months, he couldn’t run without pain. I have plans again to try to complete an Ironman next year to take advantage of my PCT conditioning. With strength conditioning in my knees, I can run and I think training will be on track this year to complete the race. I should note that I didn’t have any problems with my knees on the PCT hike, they always felt fine. I credit my pre-hike conditioning with helping me both prevent issues during the hike and throughout my recent recovery. Good lesson for future hikers, especially at an older age like me.

My weight. My goal when I returned home was to try to keep my weight close to my final walk weight. I had lost 25 pounds during my hike and desperately didn’t want to get back to my pre-hike weight. But when you burn more than 5,000 calories a day and maybe replace half of that with food, that just wasn’t going to be in the cards. I’m sorry to say I’m back pretty quickly, not quite yet, but I’m still working on it. I hope this Ironman training helps me a little, but I admit I still have a hiker hunger problem without the «hiker» part of that formula. I need to make some life changes in that department in the future.

Mental and spiritual changes

This transition area is more difficult to describe. A friend of mine said that when she came home, nothing had really changed, it was like nothing had really happened to her. I felt the same, was this experience just a dream? Everything at home was more or less the same as when I left it. It’s as if this crazy, intense experience never happened. But that’s how it was, I know it from all the photographs I had taken. As I looked at my photographs I remembered how I felt when I took each one of them remembering the details of what was happening at that moment. As time goes by, I now have strong emotions when I see those images. I can only describe the feeling as nostalgia, a feeling of homelessness. If someone asked me now if I would like to get back on the road, I would say no. It’s not that I wanted to live that life again, I’m home comfortably and surrounded by friends and family I didn’t have on the road. I guess the reason I have these nostalgic feelings is because it was a very special time where I was able to immerse myself in nature, reconnect with myself in a way I haven’t since I was young, and meet a lot of people with whom I had a profound experience.

The PCT hike was different than my experience on the AT. On the AT it seemed like I was walking with more people and I wasn’t so alone. I met and hiked with many people in the desert section of the PCT. It was a lot of fun, everyone was much younger but they accepted me and treated me the same as everyone else their age. Because they spend so much time together and go through so much together on the trail, the bonds of friendship they develop are deep. I still keep in touch with my desert tram on a regular basis, we can talk to each other about things that our friends and family back home can’t really relate to. Along the way, the routine strips you to the core and those are the people who walk with you, you know. This is a struggle for many people who hike, when they get home they really miss having people around who really understand them and know them inside out. I think it’s a bigger problem for younger people, but I’ve also heard it from people closer to my age. Personally, I didn’t struggle with this as much because I have a lot of close friends and family at home who know me very well and who I can really talk to. And obviously this is the case with my wife, who is my best friend and I also have to return home.

My desert tram

When I arrived at Kennedy Meadows South, I had to say goodbye to my desert tram to return home for a couple of weeks to attend the birth of my granddaughter. When I returned to Kennedy Meadows I had to start over meeting new people. And at this point, people were friendly but seemed more locked into their groups and not as interested in expanding their groups to others. This actually turned out to be a good thing for me, as I think it forced me to spend more time on my thoughts and experiences in a very meaningful way. While I camped with other people and met many people in the future, I spent most of my days hiking alone and often camping alone. Doing this allowed me to reconnect with myself and really listen to what was going on inside my head. It was as if the silence of nature became my therapist. And by the way, this therapist was incredibly beautiful! That’s what I miss most about my walk, the incredible beauty of the land I walked on. I walked through some of the most inspiring natural spaces, sometimes with no one in sight for miles, and was able to immerse myself in them for long days. It was very spiritual to be constantly surrounded by the beauty of nature. I don’t really believe in formal religious beliefs, but I will say that when I was on the trail I think I felt closer to that entity that created the beauty of nature and speaks to my soul. I think that experience is what I will value most about the walk.

One of my favorite sections was Goat Rocks in Washington. This morning I had the entire hike to myself.

People ask me: did the PCT increase change you? I would say the answer is “not really.” I tried to keep my hair long for a while, but I looked crazy with my hair growing in every direction. While the trip didn’t really change me, the experience did change some things within me. It was a very intense experience with ups and downs. I got out of my comfort zone for 6 months and I’m better for it. I feel much more centered and sure of myself. I think because of my age, I’ve probably had an easier transition than a lot of my younger counterparts. Talking to many of them since returning home, some are struggling with life ahead. Many of the people I walked with left a job they didn’t like and now have to return home with uncertainty, something I haven’t had to deal with. And this would be a lesson to future hikers, don’t think that hiking will solve your problems because they will just wait for you. In short, would I like to get back on the road? Not really, but I feel very lucky to have had the opportunity to experience the incredible beauty and magic of the PCT hiking experience. Will I do something like this again? Once you experience a long hike, it stays in your DNA, so yes, I will do more long trail hikes. Maybe not as long as 6 months!

I loved my 2025 PCT hike, but it’s good to be home with my family.

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