Go to the conquest of the American West on foot from Mexico to Canada, on the PCT you like?

Julien left alone, because it's not really easy to find someone to go for a walk for 5 to 6 months and walk more than 4,000 kilometers in the great American West. At the same time, he was also drawn to loneliness and he wanted to immerse himself in it. He wanted to withdraw a little from the modern world and go to meet it. Loneliness acts on him a bit like therapy. She sweeps her life away, brings back memories, leads her to make choices, to live new experiences. Loneliness puts him in front of who he really is. He can no longer run away. There is no wi-fi, phone, TV or noise to escape. It is not always easy to face yourself, to listen to yourself and to know clearly what you want and where you want to go.

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Despite this loneliness, Julien still made some great encounters. The first was done at the end of the Sierra crossing, after walking for a month in the snow. Exhausted by this first ordeal, he was greeted by a person at her home for 4 days. It happened on July 4th. She gave him a tour of the city, she took him to see a fireworks display on the lake. He even had delicious barbecues and monstrous breakfasts every morning. He also spent a month with a group of hikers in the Sierra, in particular to ensure the safety of crossings of strong rivers. At times, it is true that there could be complicated technical passages where he risked getting carried away and where he especially should not fall. Despite the perceptible danger, he always had the certainty that everything would be fine. He never really felt in danger, except maybe the one time he crossed paths with a bear and a wolf. We dread these meetings a lot, but on the other hand we hope so too! Of course, to avoid attacks, as we can be told in survival guides, he always put his food outside, never in the tent. The food was in cans specially designed so that bears in particular would not open them. He was in a wild environment that demanded a lot of humility and simplicity.

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Julien was able to adapt quickly to these difficult living conditions, because he has been a follower of minimalism for many years. To follow him on social networks, I know that he doesn't really like this term which has become fashionable and suddenly too generic. According to him, it refers to a minimal notion. It's true, we keep seeing articles like "100 items maximum to own" appear in the press. Why restrict yourself to a totally random number of objects? For an experience we would understand, but for a lifetime, we can doubt it. Julien would be more attached to the concept of essentialism, which brings us back to the idea of having only the essential. However, he was not always attracted to the idea of living only with the essentials. Before in his previous life, he had a lot of things. It happened to him like everyone else to have compulsively bought books to fill his large library, already full of unread books or to have fallen for a huge corner sofa that filled the space of a good apartment. too small to contain it. But today possession no longer defines it. The experience of living only with the essentials blew up all the layers that encumbered his happiness. He considers our life to be like a bag, it has a limited capacity for beliefs and values that allows us to keep moving, to move forward, but in case of too much, it can just as easily slow us down or make us back down. . He thinks that you can enjoy things without owning them. Of course, he still has beautiful chosen objects, such as his smartphone for example. Despite everything, he likes the idea that if he loses it, all he has to do is press a button to find another identical one. It is no longer attached to the object but to its function. In short, he behaves like a landlord. Profiting without owning is its order of progress. Today, few objects seem essential to him. With her house on her back, the bag also became the symbol of her new life. The lightness makes it more free to go on the paths.

In his backpack, he managed to keep only the essentials. He doesn't have the goal of having the most beautiful material, the coolest bag, the most stylish pants. He doesn't want to get into this identification game. He just wants the equipment that will allow him to go to the end of the 4,200 kilometers.  He spent weeks discovering the ultralight technical equipment market, meeting long-distance walking specialists, chatting with adventurers. At first, he left with 19 kg on his back (water and food included). There has been a huge evolution between the heavy burden of his departure and that of his arrival. He could really see that there was a lot of things, which he did not need although he believed them essential when preparing for his adventure. He has made a lot of compromises when it comes to personal comfort, but the most important thing is to stay comfortable while walking. He thinks that true freedom is also in lightness . However, the material really depends on each person, their approach and their needs. To find out, it is by launching into the experiment that we can really know the right formula to apply. It is not easy to anticipate all these things especially as everyone evolves differently during these months of wandering. Even if Julien spent a lot of time on internet forums looking for the right equipment, he believes that today, it is better to start with what you have and adapt your equipment as you go. after only 2 months, he had to change his tent. He started with a 60 liter bag and ended with a 38 liter bag. In the United States, they use a lot of materials in Dyneema, a very light and strong fiber, thanks to which their new tent weighed less than 500 g! On a trail like the PCT, it is always possible to order equipment and receive it in the nearest towns. In the end, he kept only the bare minimum in his backpack. When you walk for 5 months, every gram counts. He just brought something to sleep on: a foam mat and a sleeping bag, even if he most often slept under the stars When it was not possible he used his tent. He took very few clothes (a down jacket, a rain membrane, a long-sleeved t-shirt, thermal tights). He had no underpants and wore the same shorts for 5 months. Like other equipment, he had his toiletries, a portable battery plugged into a solar panel to recharge his smartphone, some utensils (headlamp, cords, etc.), his bag of food with a small jar to eat. He decided not to use a stove, for more lightness. He ate cold, often raw foods,  for which he just needed water. He stopped when he was hungry, he had no schedule. He often had granola bars that he ate all day. He didn't take a lot of breaks, he didn't feel like spending an afternoon somewhere, he needed to walk until the end of the day, usually around 7 or 8 p.m. He determined his stages according to the food he could carry, that is to say on average  4 to 5 days of food reserves. The maximum was 10 days of couscous and bars to last as long as possible in the Sierra Mountains. The only times he left the route was to join a road to hitchhike and get supplies. Sometimes he would take a shower, then come back to where he left off. Every day he was looking for the next refreshment points, sometimes on the trail, most of the time off the trail. It is difficult in these conditions to predict or anticipate anything. He went through the stages one after the other. He actually knew very little about what was going to happen. Also, he realized that he always ate the same thing and that it suited him very well. It was easy!