Hiker covers entire Pacific Crest Trail

Nichole Olsen spent her summer hiking the Pacific Crest Trail from Mexico to Canada. She traveled some 2,650 miles on foot, walking as few as 15 miles a day and as many as 30. Most days she hiked 22-28 miles.

Her big adventure started on May 3 and ended September 24. In that time, Olsen only took seven days off.

"My intention of going on the trail was to be by myself," Olsen said. "Can I be alone? Am I capable of pushing myself and being by myself and making it?"

Olsen is a Wahkiakum High School alum and the daughter of Andy and Jackie Lea of Cathlamet. She lives in the Bay Area in California and does contract work, organizing houses, homes and events.

She began her adventure by a monument marking the southern terminus of the trail on the California-Mexico border and learned quickly that you never actually had to be alone, unless you wanted to be.

"There was one day in Oregon where there were no southbound or northbound hikers," Olsen said. "That was the only day I didn't see anybody, unless you count the couple people that I saw when I got off the trail."

"On the other hand, when you get to places like Yosemite you can't get away from people," she laughed.

Olsen, who has always enjoyed the outdoors, had some experience hiking and backpacking. She had traveled the world and was looking for a new and different challenge.

"I might as well do it now," she thought at the time. "I'm not getting any younger. I do contract work I can leave at any time. If I leave, I will still have a job I can go back to."

Hikers walking at similar paces soon found themselves surrounded by other hikers, and the experience they shared made them instant friends. It was during one of these periods of sharing time on the path that Olsen got her trail name.

Everyone gets a trail name. Olsen became Tent Talker for her consistent behavior after each day's hike.

Almost without fail, she would set up her tent in a spot with her fellow through hikers and immediately crawl inside. She had all her conversations from there.

"I did it the whole trail," Olsen said. "I'd get to new places with new people and I would just be inside my tent. It was cozy in there, I could sort through my stuff, put on comfy clothes and lie down.

"I like to be social, but sometimes it's just easier to go in the tent and relax. Especially after you've been hiking all day. It's physical and mental and I didn't want to socialize necessarily."

Even when she didn't feel like socializing, she was part of the through hiker's community. When she felt low, she would talk to someone and find out they were feeling the same. If you needed something, someone had it. If you got hurt, someone was there.

The weather was good this year, but Olsen still got caught in snow, hail and extreme heat.

"I guess the heat in other years has been excruciating," Olsen said of the desert. "There were times I had to stop every mile and try and find shade. Sometimes we would sit under a tree and wait out the heat."

"There was some bad rain," she added. "In Yosemite we had hail the size of gumballs at one point. That hurt. Then there were times you would experience lightning and thunder right in front of you. What do you do?"

Olsen described her last four days near the Washington-Canadian border as nice but cold. One morning as she took down her tent, the fly held it's shape, even after the pole had been removed.

But the nights were almost always cold, even in the desert.

"I think there were only two or three times that I actually slept outside my sleeping bag the entire trip," Olsen said.

In the desert she was passed by a woman who was doing 35 mile days.

"Everybody was pushing to do these huge mile days," Olsen said. "That woman got 150 miles from the end of the trail and blew out her knee. She couldn't finish."

"It's horrible to get that far and not make it," Olsen added.

While in Oregon, Olsen struggled with exhaustion, with wanting the trek to be over. She found out she wasn't alone. She felt the same way again near Snoqulamie.

"I was so close," she said. "I couldn't not finish. I had to do it for myself. I don't think my friends would have been disappointed in me, because I had gotten so far."

Despite the weariness with the daily hike and the trail, she went on.

"When I started, I decided the only reason I wouldn't finish is if I got injured or there was a family emergency," Olsen said.

It was about a mile from the end of the trail, marked by another monument, that she encountered her first moose. There were two.

"I'd been told that the only animal on the trail I should be afraid of are moose," Olsen said. "I was told they will attack for no reason."

She stood one mile from the monument for a long time, peeking around the corner to see if the moose were still there. She had something to eat and peeked around the corner again.

Everytime she peeked, one moose would look up. When she started crawling up the side of a hill to hide behind a tree, the moose left.

She waited and wondered if there were more and thought about the fact that there was just one more mile.

Olsen saw a couple bears, but didn't worry about them very much. She didn't see any mountain lions but saw a print one day in the desert. She saw lots of deer, a few elk and marmots.

She's a big fan of marmots.

"They are probably the cutest thing I've ever seen," Olsen laughed.

"Some people asked why I didn't carry a gun," Olsen said. "I had a knife but I sent it back because it was heavy."

The biggest nuisance were the mice.

"Sometimes you have mice running up and down your tent at night," she shuddered. "That was horrible."

There were some tricky places along the trail to worry about as well.

"I fell down a few times," Olsen said. "In the Sierras you run into some loose rock. Once you start going, once you get that slip, your pack is so heavy you just hit. I did that a few times in the snow and had some pretty big bruises up the sides of my hips. I almost should have broken my leg at one point. My pack held me up off the ground. If it wasn't for that, I'm sure that this leg would have been broken."

She can laugh at the memory now, a vision of one leg pointed in one awkward direction, the other pointed the other way, her arms stuck in her pack, Olsen unable to move.

"You have to crawl over big logs or crawl under logs," Olsen said. "There was one hillside that had been washed out. My options were a steep muddy hill or mulchy stuff on the other side. I went down as far as I could and sat on my butt and slid down the rest of the way."

"There wasn't another option," she said. "I wasn't going to turn back around and hike out. Though there are some parts that I'm surprised I got through because it scared me to death."

"I guess I didn't really think about all those things before I left," she said finally. "If I had known, I still would have gone."

For all the people that walk the trail, there are many more that wish they would do it themselves. Olsen ran into the curious and the caring, all along the trail, and off, when she would go into towns to resupply.

"There is some really amazing trail magic out there," she said. "The people in the neighboring towns know we are PCT hikers, so there will be trail angels that will stop and wait and pick up people, take them to town and bring them back. Sometimes they'll leave coolers of beer or sodas out by the trail. Some might leave snack foods, or set up tents and make food for you."

One day a man who appeared to be dressed in red or orange came running down the trail towards her. As he got closer she realized he was only wearing his trail runners.

"He is a trail angel and apparently a nudist as well," Olsen laughed. "We stood there and talked for a few minutes and told me that he had cookies and bananas back at his trailer if she wanted to stop by and pick them up."

"I heard there were root beer floats somewhere nearby," Olsen said to him.

"Oh, that was me," he replied, naked. "I ran out.

In Stehekin, a box of Wheat Thins cost $6. In another town, restaurant owners would pick you up, take you to their restaurant and then bring you back.

"If it wasn't for you guys," the owner said, "we wouldn't survive."

Olsen filled several boxes with necessities before she left, and gave instructions to her mom on where and when to send the care packages.

After one leg, she called her mom and told her to take all the Snickers Bars out of the care package.

"I'm off Snickers Bars," she laughed.

She lost 15 pounds during the first 30 days of her trek and lost 40 altogether.

"It's a great weight loss plan," Olsen joked. "I guess I couldn't recommend it, it's not fun."

A week off of the trail and not long after deciding she never wanted to do a through hike again, she is considering a through hike in New Zealand with friends in a couple years.

Meanwhile, she's still hiking in her dreams. Step after step after step. It has become her own internal rhythm.