This post originally appeared on The Trek, which you can read here.

If you want to see more from my 2025 PCT thru hike, make sure to check out my Instagram (@annamckinney22) and TikTok (@magicinthemountains) for daily vlogs!

*these posts are coming straight from trail, I apologize in advance for typos!*

Day 93: July 9, 2025

Location: NorCal
Start: Middle Fork Feather River – 1251.4
End: Bucks Lake Road (Quincy) – 1269.6
Miles: 18.2
Ascent: 4416 | Descent: 1898
Sleep: Building

Finally in town! We had to hike a ways before getting into town, but we knew if we got up early we could get it done around lunch time. We set off around 5:30am to get the 6ish mile climb out of the way before it got too hot. The ascent ended up not being that bad because it was partially shaded and we passed by a couple of streams we could get cold water from.

The hardest part of the day came when we neared the top and began walking through more burned area. It was hot and exposed and made for miserable hiking, plus we had to navigate around countless blowdowns.

When we finally got to the ridge we were able to cruise for the rest of the day. We stopped for water one last time before pushing on to the road. When we’re getting into town I feel the most motivated to hike hard, but that also kind of makes me not enjoy hiking as much because I’m so focused on the next part of the day. I just want to get there already, and every step I have to take feels like I can’t get there fast enough.

We arrived at the road and were greeted by a section hiker and her husband. She was getting on trail and they were doing some last minute fine tuning of her bag. It didn’t seem like the husband would be leaving anytime soon, so we stuck out our thumbs and started trying to hitch. Shortly into this endeavor Vegas hiked up and joined our efforts. A mini van passed us and then turned around and pulled up beside us. It was a mom and her young kids and she said she only had room for 1, so we told Vegas to go ahead and we’d see him in town. He was reluctant since we got there first, but we both couldn’t have ridden along anyway.

We kept trying to hitch for several minutes, but there was little traffic and the few cars that passed drove by quickly. Another hiker came down the trail, and the husband of the section hiker bid his wife goodbye. He said he was heading down towards Quincy and offered to give the 3 of us a ride.

It was about a 25 minute drive, but we past the time by chatting about the trail and getting to know the other hiker who tagged along, Savage. The driver dropped us off at the Grocery Outlet in town so that we could go ahead and check one chore off our to do list. Truffles and I have been loving the Grocery Outlets because they’re so cheap and have so much randomly good stuff. We hadn’t eaten lunch and that made resupplying hard since we were hungry, but it felt good to be making progress as soon as we arrived in Quincy.

After checking out we went outside of the store and posted up by the cart return in the shade in order to organize our haul. We got everything situated and moved on to the next order of business: food. We saw a Mexican restaurant across the street and thought that would suffice. We were pleased to arrive during happy hour and treated ourselves to drinks on top of our well deserved meals.

When we were finished eating, we walked over to the bus stop to get a ride back into downtown. We were only a couple of miles away from the town square, but there wasn’t a chance we’d walk that. A busy four lane road made for a bad place to hitch, so we decided to wait for the bus. We lucked out in learning the city buses are operating without fares in the summertime, so we got a free ride down to the post office.

We arrived just in time to mail home our bear cans before the post office closed. Good riddance to that bulky thing! My pack has never felt lighter. At this point it was around 5pm and I started trying to get in touch with Bob, the trail angel who agreed to host us in Quincy. Bob gave us his address and we made the short walk over to his house just off the main road.

Bob greeted us in his porch and gave us a tour of his home. He’s in his 80s and has lived in Quincy for over 50 years. He hosts hikers to do work for stays, meaning he gives hikers a place to sleep and feeds them in exchange for work. To sweeten the deal (and attract more hikers), he also offers to pay hikers $20 an hour for the work they do. We were so glad it worked out for us to stay with him and have the opportunity to actually make money on the trail instead of just spending it.

We had gotten into town on a Wednesday, which meant that it was community supper day at the Methodist church. Bob invited us to tag along and after a quick shower we were on our way.

Every other week a different organization around Quincy feeds the community at the Methodist church. This week the local bank was preparing taco salads, and we got to eat our fill! The fellowship hall of the church was full of people, mostly older folks who seemed very happy to be socializing. When we were stuff, Bob drove us all back to his house. We sat out on the porch chit chatting for a while before Bob brought out dessert: vanilla ice cream with homemade apricot topping. What lovely way to close out the day. We are grateful to be sleeping in a bed tonight, this is our first bed since Mammoth back at mile 900!

Day 94: July 10, 2025

Location: NorCal
Start: Bucks Lake Road (Quincy) – 1269.6
End: Quincy – 1269.6
Miles: 0.0
Sleep: Building

Our working zero in Quincey! Bob wanted to get an early start to avoid the heat so we were up at 4am. We had a quick breakfast of yogurt and granola with some local blueberries before hopping in Bob’s Prius to drive to his “ranch” in Gennessee. It was about an hour drive through the Dixie Fire burn scar but we got to see various sections of the Feather River and some really pretty cattle fields.

We arrived at the ranch around 6am and were introduced to Bob’s helper (who I forgot his name). The helper was a retired Forest Service worker and worked for Bob clearing trees. Apparently Bob’s goal is to get rid of the majority of pine trees on his property in order to restore the oak forest. Bob gave us a quick tour of his ranch house before setting us to our tasks.

My job would be to weed and fertilize the fruit garden. The garden was large and even housed a greenhouse with a variety of fruits and vegetables. It was easy enough work and the morning passed quickly.

Truffles had a much harder morning. His first task was to break up concrete with a pick axe. Once that was finished he then had to load boulders into a tractor bucket for Bob to haul off. Truffles said it was back breaking work and he got frustrated my Bob’s micromanaging.

Around 11:30am Bob decided it was getting too hot and wanted to head back to town. We loaded up the car and were on our way. When we arrived back at the house Bob made us sandwiches for lunch and announced he was going to take a nap. We decided to do the same and spent most of the evening lounging in our bedroom.

In the afternoon we roused ourselves to go out on the town and get out of the house. We walked over to the toy store that doubled as the local ice cream parlor. Inside we ran into Delicate Flower and Leah. We chatted for a bit before getting our free PCT hiker ice cream. Getting a free ice cream cone was awesome! I expected it to be small since it was free, but they loaded us down with 2 large scoops of whatever flavors we wanted. It was such a treat!

We ate our ice cream while wondering around the toy store before heading down to the local brewery for drinks and dinner. Quintopia Brewing Company had a decent selection of beer and I absolutely loved their Hazy IPA. We enjoyed our first round in the brewery’s loft and then went downstairs to order food. As we were waiting for our food the taproom filled up, apparently we were there in trivia night. The place was packed and there were hardly any seats left inside or outside.

Thankfully we found a couple of seats and were able to eat our food while listening to trivia. We hung out for a while at the brewery before walking back to Bob’s house. Bob was home when we arrived and we all sat out on the porch together for a bit before calling it a night.

Day 95: July 11, 2025

Location: NorCal
Start: Quincy – 1269.6
End: Chips Creek Trail – 1290.7
Miles: 21.1
Ascent: 2703 | Descent: 5754
Sleep: Cowboy

Today was a very full very tiring day. We got to “sleep in” at Bob’s until around 6am and we had a light breakfast with Bob. He made French press coffee and we each got a cup to pair with our yogurt and granola. Our task today would be yard work at his house mostly clearing away the remnants of some tree work he had done. He needed to borrow his friend’s trailer to hall away debris, so he and Truffles went to pick up the trailer while I did the dishes and started packing up our things.

Bob’s yard was dirt with no grass in sight. There was saw dust from the tree work, and he wanted us to take it up. Turns out it’s really hard to take up the saw dust without also taking up the dirt, and it didn’t really seem like we were accomplishing all that much. Regardless, we ended up with a trailer load of debris which we covered and then hauled off to the dump. We unloaded the trailer and then drove to Bob’s friends house to drop the trailer off. On the way back to the house we stopped at a coffee shop for pastries.

Once back at Bob’s house we had lunch before packing up to leave. Bob had agreed to take us back to the trailhead and we were eager to be on our way. The more time we spent with Bob the more we understood that he was a trail angel, just someone hiring hikers to work. We got paid for our labor and had a place to stay and were fed, but it definitely wasn’t the warm and fuzzy experience that’s typically associated with trail angels.

We made it up to Buck’s Summit around 1pm and started hiking. It was hot and exposed and honestly the worst time of day to be hiking. It was in the 90s and it felt miserable to be going uphill in the sun.

Thankfully after a few miles we rounded out on top of the hill and we were able to cruise over the mellow trail. We had planned to only do about 10 miles but got to the water source for our dry campsite around 4pm and decided to push further. If we could camp down by the river that would set us up to tackle the notoriously awful climb out of Beldon in the morning. The trail basically made a giant V from the ridge down to the river at Beldon and then back up again. Both the ascent and descent were supposed to be steep and strenuous, and if we didn’t have to do them both on the same day that would be great.

As we began the descent we were treated to prettt views down into the valley. Far below us we could see the river and it seemed so far away that it was hard to believe we’d be down there this evening. The views quickly became obstructed by haze and it felt like we were in a hot and muggy cloud.

As we neared the bottom of the climb, we began to hear music. Belden isn’t a town but there is a small “resort” down on the river. It was a weekend so we figured there was just a show taking place. The closer we got, though, we began to see tents set up all along the river. We weren’t sure what to expect when we finally made it to the bottom and walked across the train tracks into Belden.

The tents we had be seeing on the descent were large car camping tents. There were people all over the road and as we kept walking we passed signed for a festival. Apparently there was a large burning man style music festival taking place at the resort and we just happened to be there smack dab in the middle of it.

We had planned to camp down by the river, but it became clear that we would t get any peace even if we were able to find a spot. We decided to keep hiking and hope to find a place outside of the festivities. We were tired and hungry and being in the middle of the crowds and revelry made me want to hide in a closet.

We wadded through the festival goers and eventually came out at the bridge spanning the river. On the other side of the road is where the trail begins to climb steeply, and we prepared ourselves for more climbing. At this point it was already almost 8:30 so we knew we would likely be night hiking. On FarOut it didn’t look promising for a campsite, but we tired to stay optimistic and pressed on.

We climbed for several miles and eventually crossed a stream where we collected water. We weren’t sure if we’d be camping by water, so we got enough to dry camp. We kept climbing and had to turn our headlamps on as it grew dark.

Finally we arrived at the junction for the Chips Creek trail. Supposedly there were campsites down the way, so we veered off the PCT to check them out. At this point it was full dark and we weren’t sure what to expect. To our horror and frustration there were already 10+ tents set up with seemingly no room for us. The fact that we were trying to find space in the dark just made it all the more difficult, but we finally found a sloped spot just big enough for us to cowboy camp.

We tried to be as quiet as possible since it was nearly 10pm at this point and hurriedly ate snacks for dinner and tried to fall asleep. This was easily one of the longest and most mentally exhausting days on train yet, and we’re supposed to have a horrendous climb in the morning. Moral is low.