Point-to-Point hiking, what it is and how to structure

I say “point-to-point hiking” and “thru-hiking” interchangeably. Simplistically, these are hikes where you start at one point and end at another rather than backtracking (which is called an “out-and-back”). If you search “thru-hiking”, you’ll find a variety of interpretations. Some say it’s a “thru-hike” only if 1) you cover a substantial distance and thus you need to spend weeks/months on the trail, if 2) you backpack (carry all your food/equipment), and if 3) you hike the entire trail in one-go rather than sections at a time. Physical and mental toughness are often associated with “thru-hikers” and some popular US trails come to mind:

• Pacific Crest Trail: ~2.6k miles to/from California to Washington
• Appalachian Trail: ~2.2k miles to/from Georgia to Maine
• Continental Divide Trail: ~3.1k miles to/from New Mexico to Montana

Not to worry, this isn’t the type of hiking I’m writing about as there’s already plenty of online content for that. To be inclusive, I’m referring to any type of hike that ends at a different point regardless of day-hiking or overnight backpacking. Which means this can be for all levels of hikers, but it requires advance planning unless you intend to hitchhike which I don’t recommend.

Car on both ends
This is the simplest way to structure a point-to-point. You’ll need at least 2 people and 2 cars (obviously), ample time before/after the hike to drop off a car at the end and ride the other to the start, and verification that you can park the cars at those spots for a longer duration. I can’t emphasize the last point enough as the last thing you’ll want to see after a hike is a parking ticket or a boot on your car tire.

Real example: over a decade ago we backpacked 3 days on the Skyline to the Sea trail, south of the California Bay Area that started at the crest of the Santa Cruz mountains and ended at the Pacific – sadly this trail is now closed indefinitely due to wildfires. There were 6 of us, hence we had a 6-person SUV that we stashed at the end and kept the rest of our cars at the start. We could’ve swapped and parked the SUV at the start. But with limited parking at the endpoint, we preferred to keep a single car there. The drive back and forth took close to 2 hours, so we factored that into our start and end times.

Leverage a shuttle, taxi/ride-share, or a train(!) at one end
Park your car at the end and find a way to get to the start (or vice versa). Don’t assume you’ll have cell reception and accessible taxi/ride-shares! If you’re not sure, call nearby hotels/retail to verify. Certain parks may have shuttles to leverage for one-way routes. A handful of popular US National Parks have some to help with parking challenges (i.e. Yosemite, Glacier, Zion, Grand Canyon, Rocky Mountain). Cuyahoga Valley National Park in Ohio has a scenic train that runs through! Pay attention to the shuttle/train schedule. Unfortunately when we overnight thru-hiked in Cuyahoga, the train was only going the opposite direction that day so we had to catch an Uber back to our car instead. I highly recommend staying in Brandywine Inn which is right in the middle of the park.

Real examples:

• Shuttle: Glacier famous Highline trail is ~12 miles of stunning alpine including glaciers and the occasional wildlife (hello marmots!). Park your car at Logan Pass and take a shuttle at the end back to your car. Don’t forget to add the ~1 mile steep detour up to Grinnell Glacier Overlook for breathtaking views of the glacier. You’ll now need a timed entry permit to enter this part of the park in the summer so plan ahead!
• Taxi/Ride-Share: On our 1 year wedding anniversary, we hiked ~30 miles over a few days on the Trans Canada Trail (TCT) in Vancouver Island while staying in a single AirBnB. The entire time we leveraged the help of the local taxi to drop us off to the start and/or end points.
• Train: The Inca Trail is a 2 or 4 day hike where we camped along the way, ended in the famous Machu Picchu, and rode the Peru Rail train all the way back to Cusco, Peru. The 4-day hike is the classic tour and we honestly loved seeing the quieter and well-preserved Incan ruins along the way more than the actual crowded Machu Picchu itself – “the journey is the destination”. I recommend Alpaca Expeditions for a guided trek.

Hike directly to/from your accommodation 
Backpacking falls in this type since you’re hiking to where you’re setting up camp for the night. However, you don’t always need to camp to do this! Hotel-based point-to-point hiking (or referred to as “hut-to-hut”) is tricky as you’ll need to find a route where lodging accommodations are on/nearby the trail and close enough together where you cover that distance in a day. You can carry all your overnight stuff on you or hire transport for your stuff to be at the lodging when you arrive – this includes hiring drivers or porters. When it’s possible, it’s a thrilling adventure! 

Real examples: Our trek to Annapurna Base Camp in Nepal was a quintessential hut-to-hut where we hiked into and stayed overnight in teahouses in tiny remote villages scattered across the Himalayas. Another memorable trek was in Mongolia many years back where we mixed hiking, camel riding, and horseback riding to cover the distance to get to our next destination and stayed overnight in tents, yurts, and hotels. And more recently our hike last year on the Lycian Way in Türkiye is another example I wrote extensively about in a previous blog where a car transported our luggage to our next hotel.

Hut-to-hut is possibly the most niche but there are well established trails around the world where you can do this: Camino de Santiago (Spain), Tour de Mont Blanc (France, Italy, Switzerland), and Milford Track (New Zealand) just to name a few. The Dolomites in northern Italy is one I will be excited to share about later this summer.

If point-to-point style piques your interest, there are some routes in the US I’ve structured and tested where you can lead this yourself. Keep checking back for more itineraries!