Mike Brawley Exploring the World!

Back home from the trail

Hi everyone, Sarah and I are both back home from the trail. Sarah came off trail at VVR and I pushed on to later come home to be with my new wife. It is hard adjusting to the normal life from trail life but the transition moves fast. Amazingly we both became very busy with looking for jobs and business development for Backup Planet.

We are both setteling into things and everything is coming together. Sarah starts her new job in September. I have had good luck looking for jobs, there seams to be a lot of jobs out there (more then I thought there would be). I have applied for 3 jobs and already have 2 interviews.  I have two other prospect jobs ontop of the 3 I applied for that I have a good chance of working for(I know both owners).

Off for the Pacific Crest Trail

My Wife an I are off to hike the Pacific Crest Trail. We will be gone for 6 Months and hope to finish up by October.

Check our progress out at www.mspct.com

Food Preperation has begun!

Sarah and I have made our first Costco run for food. We picked up a lot but most we need to wait as it only has a 6 month shelf life. So those things we are waiting to purchase closer to our date of departure. We made a trip to the hardware store and picked up a bunch of plastic totes to organize all of our food and gear as we get closer and closer to our departure date. You could never imagine how complicated it is to plan 6 months of food for 2 people when everything has too be able to be kept at room temperature and cooked in 5 minutes or less..... Lots and lots of planning to do.. Not to mention it has to be light enough to carry a weeks worth at a time!!!

Trip Planning

Well its official! I can post that Sarah and I are leaving for the PCT April 19th!  Both our bosses know and all of our family know now.  Soon we will be off on the longest hike in our lives! 2,658 Miles, 180 days, 3 states, 300,000 vertical feet.  All for one goal, to hike from Mexico to Canada on a dirt trail! Below is a map of the PCT trail! We will be starting at the Mexico border near Campo California.

Last Minute Training

Well I postponed my Wonderland Trail trip to this Thursday as the weather window looks better.  Yesturday I hiked Annette Lake trail as a last minute easy hike.  Thursday my plan is to wake up at 5 and be at Longmire by 7:30am. From there its time to throw the pack on and head north to hike clockwise.  I don't amagine there will be too much traffic on the Wonderland Trail this late in the year.  I really need to move fast and make sure I am up by 5am every day to get moving and put in some miles.  96 miles, 22,000 feet and hoping to finish in under 86 hours.   We will see.

Training

So I figured I would start training if I wanted to do the Wonderland trail in 4 days. I really wanted to go hiking or Mt Biking but I didn't want to fight the traffic and drive for an hour to do so. I broke down and went for a run. I'm no runner but I managed to not get a side cramp so I went out to the Northgate mall and back. I managed to do 3.5 miles in 31 minutes.