PCT Bound

It's been a hectic few days since we got back from Scotland. I would suggest that house buying and selling and long backpacking trips are not activities that should be combined if you want a stress-free life. Mick suggests that I may have been a bit stressed over the weekend, but then we did have a completely unexpected spanner thrown into the works.

After a smooth journey, we've made it as far as Heathrow so far, so the time for stress is over. All we have to do now is to reach our gate on time and sit on a plane for 11 hours. Then, later in the week there's a bit of a walk to do.

Checking in at the airport, you wouldn't have thought that we were off for a lightweight backpacking trip. One big holdall, one medium sized holdall, and two backpacks comprised our luggage. The ploy worked though - by putting everything in holdalls to be checked in, we can just about squeeze the near-empty Osprey Exoses (which are a bit longer than the allowed max length) diagonally into the 'allowed cabin bagage size' measurer. I didn't want the Exoses to go in the hold. That frame doesn't look like it's up to rough handling or having suitcases thrown on top of it.

Whilst the holdalls looked huge, not quite everything needs to be squeezed into our packs. There are a few re-supply items in there. The bulkiest is the seven packets of oatcakes. The rest of the food for the trip has been or will be sourced in the states (we've a big package of dehydrated ingredients from Harmony House Foods waiting for us in LA, which will be used to bag up 50 meals), but I couldn't find that oatcakes are available in the US, and couldn't contemplate a backpacking trip without them! (Hmm, we've just realised that our remaining sandwiches for lunch are still in the bag that's been checked in too - oops!)

Even with all of the resupply stuff out of the way, our packs are still heavier than I would have liked. Six and three quarter kilos in my case, which doesn't sound bad until you consider the addition of part of the tent (we've got a new TarpTent waiting in LA for us), food for 6 days, and enough water to get us to the next water-source, all of which will add up to more weight than I've carried before. I'll just have to concentrate on the fact that it will get lighter as we walk (at least until we resupply!).

More to follow, assuming that I manage to get my Blackberry active on a US SIM...

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