PCT Resupply

You can only carry so much. If you’re doing a thru-hike of the PCT you’re likely going to rely on resupply packages for everything from food to toothpaste. Planning your resupply on the PCT is one of the most difficult parts about a PCT thru-hike.

Everyone does it differently: On one end of the spectrum, there are hikers that literally spend close to a year planning out every mile of their hike: they have the life of their gear planned out the last mile and their food intake planned out to the last calorie. On the opposite end of the spectrum, there’re hikers that will head to REI, buy a pack, load it full of dehydrated meals and hike into the closest town every few days to buy more food and supplies when they run out. Both of these methods have serious flaws, this page will tell you why. 

Most PCT hikers will use a variety of methods to resupply on the trail during their hike. Before reading too much about it, know this: there is no universal strategy that works for every thru-hiker. No matter how much planning and reading you do (or how little), you will finish your thru-hike wishing you had done part of it differently.  

On this page, we’ve put together a lot of information about resupplying in general as well as a lot of specific information about resupplying on the PCT. We’ll also include some links to some other helpful sites.

On the map above you’ll find about 100 possible locations to mail resupply shipments. Trying to figure out which ones are best for you can be a daunting task. In reality, most of these resupply points are not equally used by PCT hikers. Based on factors such as distance from the trail, availability of items to purchase and distance from past/future resupply locations many resupply points get used much more heavily than others.

To help you figure out which resupply points will work best or you, we dedicated a page of our website that gives you all the information you need to know about the 30 Most Popular PCT Resupply Points. We made the list using a lot of input from experienced PCT hikers and using the data from our resupply service that packs and ships resupply boxes to hikers.

We know that planning and successfully executing a resupply strategy for a PCT hike is incredibly difficult for thru-hikers and section-hikers alike. We created a web application that has a goal of making it a little bit easier for you. Anyone preparing for a hike along the PCT can use our application for free as a way to plan and visualize their resupply strategy. Trail Supply Co. exists primarily as a resource for long-distance hikers and we are continually making improvements to the application with the goal of making the ultimate way to plan your resupply strategy.

We also have a paid resupply service that will pack and ship your boxes for you. From your account, you have the ability to customize each of your boxes and we will pack them to your exact specifications. Tell us exactly what you want in each box, when and where you want them delivered and we handle the rest.

A bounce box is a popular component of many thru-hikers resupply strategies. A bounce box is a box of items that you keep re-shipping to yourself to locations further down the trail. Bounce boxes often contain things that you will need at some parts of the trail but not all parts. Common things to have in these boxes are things that might not be readily available in each resupply town such as maps, clothes, chargers, seasonal gear, first aid or toiletries.

Sometimes if hikers are in a town where there are lots of food/gear options they like they’ll buy enough for their next stretch and then buy more to put in a bounce box to their next resupply point. Not all trail towns are created equally and some have much better and affordable options that others. Of course, you will have to pay USPS priority mail postage to get the boxes there.

There is some confusion about how much bounce boxes cost. Technically, the post office will allow you to forward (“bounce”) an unopened priority mail package 2 times without paying for additional postage. If you open your package to retrieve/deposit items into your resupply boxes then you have to pick the package up from the post office and cannot bounce it for free. Every time you pickup a package you have to repay postage. Also, if you don’t ship your package using priority mail, then you cannot bounce an unopened package for free.

All of Trail Supply Co.’s resupply shipments, unless we’re required to use a different carrier, ship using USPS Priority Mail. It’s common for our customers to change their itineraries for a variety of reasons and contact us to bounce their boxes for them. If the box is eligible, we contact the post office and do this for free on behalf of the customer. Have questions about that? Contact Us for more information.

The long-distance hiking community is fairly divided on what the best way to resupply on a hike is. Just know that the decision doesn’t have to be as binary as choosing resupply packages or choosing to buy food. Doing a combination of these strategies is what seems to work best for the majority of hikers. 

One of the reasons that there isn’t a universal resupply strategy that works for everyone is that hikers all have different considerations that play into what works best for them. In general, we don’t really recommend you planning on living 100% off of what you ship yourself in resupply boxes. There are many places along the there trail where you can buy items. However, some hikers with serious dietary restrictions do rely on mailed resupply exclusively. 

It’s also pretty uncommon to resupply solely off of buying as you go. There’s a lot of people out there that are very vocal about this being the best option, but even hikers that rely on buy as you go more heavily generally end up shipping themselves a few packages along the way. It’s extremely common for hikers more heavily rely on resupply as you reach Northern California, Oregon, and Washington. 

Additionally, if this is your first long-distance hike then start getting comfortable with the fact that your plan is going to be wrong and that things won’t go according to plan. You’re going to read a lot about what other people recommend and what works for them. You’re going to learn a lot about yourself during this first experience which will inform what you do the next time. Don’t over analyze it. Do some research, take a guess, screw up and you’ll know better next time.