Born and raised in Maine I was destined to enjoy the outdoors. There’s really not much more to do in the state than to be outside. In the summers, I spent it camping and hiking. One of the greatest parts about Tahoe is how much hiking there is. Even though I’m 3,000 miles away from home I still feel at peace, a sense of ‘home’ while I’m in the outdoors. Hiking gives me a reason to be outside and appreciate the world for what it is. Being able to let go of the phone and the internet, the work and the stress, being on the trail allows you to be at peace and enjoy the little things.

The Tahoe Rim Trail is 165 miles long. It’s a loop that covers the Tahoe Basin around the lake. Ranging from 6,240 feet to 10,338 feet. One of my top bucket list items while living in Tahoe is completing the entire Tahoe Rim Trail. Many people have done the entire trail in one sitting, traveling many miles a day and camping at night. My goal is to complete it in sections, some small, some big. The longest backpacking trip I’ve ever done was a 60 mile section of the John Muir Trail from Mammoth Lakes to Yosemite Valley. Four days, five nights of hiking and camping in the middle of the woods, there’s not much more that feels more freeing than that.

People travel all over the world to complete the Tahoe Rim Trail and I’m fortunate enough that it is literally in my back yard. So far, I have completed only very few miles of the trail: Brockway Summit in the North and Echo Lake to the South. I’m not going to put a time frame on my goal and am excited to complete the trail piece by piece.