Father And Daughter Plan Walk Of A Lifetime Together

Joy Turner’s friends don’t understand.

Why would this 14-year-old Coeur d’Alene girl want to hike 2,700 miles with, of all people, her father?

“It’s my life,” she says, as if no further explanation is needed. Then she catches her dad’s eye and laughs. “I think I’ll find out a lot more about him than I want to know.”

On April 20, Bob and Joy Turner will step out of Mexico and head north for five months. They’ll hike through California’s deserts and mountains, Oregon’s rains and Washington’s forests until they reach Manning Provincial Park in Canada at the end of September.

Joy will miss two months at Lake City High. Bob will forego months of paychecks. They expect blisters, bland food and exhaustion. But neither one’s desire has wavered.

“This has been a dream for 20 years,” Bob says. “Everything’s fallen into place. Plus, now is Joy’s window of opportunity.”

Joy’s legs are so skinny that her jeans hang on her like drapery. They don’t look like they could make 20 miles, but they’ve already covered 1,500. She logged her first backpacking mile at age 7.

“It took us three hours,” Bob says.

Bob is a die-hard outdoorsman. He first traveled part of the Pacific Crest Trail in 1978 as head of Whitworth College’s outdoors program. He vowed to return, but kids and jobs kept him too busy to hike through most of the 1980s.

In 1989, he decided Joy and her brother, Isaac, were old enough to hit the trail with him and his wife, Chris. He was right.

“We’ve been blessed with two wonderful children,” he says. “They like to do the things we like to do.”

By 1990, the Turners were ready to conquer the east side of Mount Rainier - a 35-mile trek. A year later, they covered the 93-mile Wonderland Trail around Mount Rainier in 12 days and Joy groused that they hadn’t attained the magical “100.”

By ‘94, the annual summer trip had stretched to 465 miles in 40 days. Joy was 12 and scaled her first peak that year, Oregon’s Middle Sister.

Joy shared Bob’s passion for hiking, his endurance, even his stoicism. She and Isaac learned about flora and fauna. Bob taught them to read the layers in the rocks.

When Joy heard about the 2,660-mile Pacific Crest Trail at a long-distance hikers’ conference 18 months ago, she pitched the trip to Bob. He wasn’t sure she was ready.

“It was my smile that convinced him,” she says.

Joy wanted to take off the following April, but logistics demanded more planning time. Bob needed time off from his teaching job in the Coeur d’Alene School District. The family had to figure out how to survive without his paycheck. Joy needed permission to leave school for two months.

“That was the most time-consuming and frustrating,” Bob says.

His sabbatical was approved. A second mortgage solved money worries. But school officials played hardball; Joy’s missed classes would endanger her graduation. Bob finally decided to teach her himself on the trail and enroll her in correspondence courses.

The trip itinerary was easy. The Pacific Crest’s dirt and rock trail is well-marked and never slopes more than 15 percent.

Planning the menu was more difficult. Bob doesn’t mind losing weight, but he doesn’t want Joy to lose any. They want quick, light and tasty meals and will depend on spices to perk up dried noodles, rice, potatoes, stuffing, soups and soy meats.

“Sometimes, I crave peanut butter and jelly sandwiches to the point it’s weird,” Joy says.

Bob will carry about 40 pounds and Joy 25 pounds including food and water. Chris will mail reinforcements of food, T-shirts, underwear, socks and insect repellant to resorts and stores near the route. Hiking to those places will add about 40 miles to the trip.

They know the routine. They’ve done it in shorter increments plenty of times. Hit the trail about 7 a.m. eating PopTarts or granola bars. Hike until 1 or 2 p.m. Cup o’Noodles for lunch. Read or write in journals for an hour. Hike until 6 p.m., then set up camp. They need to average 18 miles a day.

“I enjoy the evenings. You let the day close in on you,” Bob says. “By dark, you’re asleep.”

He and Joy realize the trip will hold surprises. Not everyone on the trail will be friendly. Weather might play tricks. They could tire of each other.

But they’re not worried.

“Dad and I have always gotten along well,” Joy says. “We see things a lot of people don’t get to see, and all we have to do is walk.”

, DataTimes ILLUSTRATION: Color Photo