Pacific Crest Trail

Dustin and Angela Ballard hiked the Pacific Crest Trail as a test of their relationship. The blisters are real. The love is tested. The trail, as always, is the thing that matters most — 2,650 miles of proving that two people can walk through something enormous and come out the other side together.

Gail Storey's memoir of hiking the PCT with her husband — a journey she undertook not out of love for hiking but out of love for the man doing it. Funny, honest about misery, and ultimately a book about what marriage looks like at 7,000 feet.

Cindy Ross's account of hiking the Pacific Crest Trail in the early 1980s — before the trail was famous, before Strayed, before anyone had written a bestseller about it. An honest, unpolished account of walking a long way.

A photographic account of a PCT thru-hike — the landscapes rendered in large-format images that capture the scale of walking from Mexico to Canada.

Lest you think Cheryl Strayed holds some sort of monopoly on waxing poetic about the Pacific Crest Trail, this anthology will disavow you of that notion. A mix of historical interludes, short stories by esteemed nature writers like Mary Austin and Barry Lopez, and journal-esque musings from regular ol’ hikerfolk, this collection proves that while a trail can be defined as a simple dirt path between Points A and B, its truer meaning can be found within the people who choose to walk its length.

An anthology of writing about the northern half of the PCT — the essays, fiction, and natural history tied to the trail's Oregon and Washington sections.

It took Heather “Anish” Anderson 60 days, 17 hours, and 12 minutes to set a speed record on the 2,650-mile Pacific Crest Trail in 2013, but the physical and emotional reckoning that followed lasted quite a bit longer. Her chronicle of that incredible feat and its fallout offers a glimpse into not only what it takes to earn a Fastest Known Time on one of the world’s most famous trails, but also what it can take out of you in the process.

A PCT thru-hike told without the usual transformation narrative. The trail is beautiful and boring and painful and transcendent, and Quinn writes about all of it with the honesty of someone who doesn't need the hike to have a moral.

While there’s no telling how many long-distance hiking dreams have sprung from its wake, Strayed’s memoir detailing the heartbreaking circumstances that inspired her now-famous ramble along the Pacific Crest Trail (and a Hollywood movie, to boot) is less a love letter to the backcountry than it is an ode to a more internal sort of adventure. Turns out you really can find yourself out there, if you’re willing to trade some sweat equity for the revelation.