Читать книгу The Pacific Crest Trail. Hiking the PCT from Mexico to Canada онлайн

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Other reasons to take a zero day might include the fact that you’re reached a lovely place in the wilderness that you can’t bear to leave in a hurry. Perhaps the comforts of town – hotel beds, showers and laundry – are too tempting. Or perhaps you want to take a zero day for no other reason than everyone else is doing the same.

There are plenty of reasons to avoid zero days. They can be very expensive: someone calculated that the average hiker spent $100 at Vermillion Valley Resort in the Sierra Nevada. Most people who quit the trail do so after a zero day, particularly at Warner Springs in Southern California, just 110 miles from the start. But the most important consideration is that every unscheduled zero day you take means that you have to hike an extra hour or more each day for the next week to make up the lost time.

Before you set off think carefully about your zero day policy. It is best to produce a schedule with very few zero days but one that is fairly easy to achieve. You can then earn your zero days by getting ahead of schedule and enjoy them with a clear conscience.