Yes.\u00a0 That was absolutely nerve-racking!\u00a0 As expected, about a thousand thru-hiker wannabes rushed the PCTA website all at the same time.\u00a0 The mosh pit grounded the website to a near halt.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The way the process works, now that I have seen it, is that when you first select your date, they give you exactly thirteen minutes to complete all the pages of the application. I would fill out the form and click next and it would take nearly a minute before the next page would appear. I would frantically fill out the form and then sit there watching a flashing “Processing…” message.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The final page before hitting the submit button required me to enter my credit card if I wanted to make a donation and to purchase a permit to climb Mount Whitney. I had one minute to do it. I typed as fast as I could, but I wasn’t fast enough. When I hit the submit button, my application timed out and I had to start over. I did that right away only to find that 32 of 35 slots of April 6th were taken!<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The second time I skipped making a donation.\u00a0 I have already given before, so hopefully it will not make a difference in my application approval.\u00a0 I clicked the submit button.\u00a0 Processing…<\/p>\n\n\n\n
My phone beeps. I received a new e-mail from the PCTA with a confirmation notice that my application has been successfully submitted. Now I wait for the formal approval which should be in about three weeks. As I gave myself a window of April 6th to September 15th, I do not expect for it to be declined. The first major step of this hike has been successfully completed. Now I pack for a three-day, two-night section hike of the Ice Age Trail to celebrate. It is supposed to be cold and rainy. It is ideal conditions for a shakedown of my gear.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u00a0My heart can now stop beating so fast.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Yes.\u00a0 That was absolutely nerve-racking!\u00a0 As expected, about a thousand thru-hiker wannabes rushed the PCTA website all at the same time.\u00a0 The mosh pit grounded the website to a near halt. The way the process works, now that I have seen it, is that when you first select your date, they give you exactly thirteen … Continue reading I Start April 6th!<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1952","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-pct2018"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/jphikes.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1952","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/jphikes.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/jphikes.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jphikes.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jphikes.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1952"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/jphikes.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1952\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2940,"href":"https:\/\/jphikes.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1952\/revisions\/2940"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/jphikes.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1952"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jphikes.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1952"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jphikes.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1952"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}