Six family members stand close together on a dirt ridge, smiling toward the camera, wearing backpacks and holding trekking poles. — All six Strawbridges on a ridge between South Lake Tahoe and Sonora Pass.Photographs by Dustin Prickett / Sunglow Photography

Pretty Good at Walking is what happened between the borders: two parents, four kids, one long walk, and how you talk a child through something hard, one 0.3-mile promise at a time.

The story

The whole family, the whole way.

In 2018, Vince and Monica Strawbridge stepped off from the Canadian border with their four children and walked the Pacific Crest Trail south, every mile of it, to the wall at Mexico. They went on to finish all three of America's great long trails. This book is the first walk: the fights, the jokes, the blisters, the bargains a father makes with a child who wants to quit, and the ones he makes with himself.

It's a book by a father who lets you catch him being a bad parent.

A hand holds a clear bottle beneath a green leaf wedged between rocks, with water visible at its tip. — A Henry-engineered water delivery system, a leaf wedged between rocks.Photographs by Dustin Prickett / Sunglow Photography

“Anywhere in the world without you, or right here with you — I’d rather be here.”
— from Pretty Good at Walking

“It is all worth it.”
— Monica, in Pretty Good at Walking

“ten days of walking is not the same as the tenth day of walking”
— from Pretty Good at Walking

“Don’t try to involve me in this.”
— from Pretty Good at Walking

“If I were here alone… it would only ever be me.”
— from Pretty Good at Walking

Father and child lie cheek to cheek beneath pine branches, both smiling; a blue bottle and metal cup sit beside them. — Vince and Georgie under a quilt beneath a pine tree.Photographs by Dustin Prickett / Sunglow Photography

A barefoot child stands with hands on hips in green clothes, wearing a green patterned sleeping bag as a hood and cape. The bag’s gray lining is exposed. The hood covers the child’s face, with orange-lens sunglasses sitting on it. — Aiden on Halloween 2018 in the nondescript costume: a sleeping bag and sunglasses.

The receipts

This walk is on camera.

142days on trail2,650miles on foot

You don't have to take any of this on faith. The family walked the Pacific Crest Trail south in 2018 with all four kids, filming as they went, and that hike has its own playlist — a hundred videos of the walk this book is about. The kids in the book are the kids on camera.

Watch the 2018 walk: the PCT playlist, 100 videos →

Or read one day of it, the way the camera had it →

Wooden trail sign: Canada 2,600 miles, Washington 2,100, Oregon 1,650 and Kennedy Meadows 650 point left; Mexico 52 points right. — At 6:15 in the morning on November 18, 2018, Mexico was 52 miles away.

Six people pose around the monument, one child seated on its tallest post; a small striped flag and piled backpacks are visible. — All six Strawbridges at the southern terminus near Campo, California, November 20, 2018.

For the trail crowd

Yes, it's a real thru-hike.

Southbound PCT, border to border, with children. Then the CDT. Then the AT. By 2021 they were the largest family to complete hiking's Triple Crown. Think Cheaper by the Dozen on a trail; think A Walk in the Woods if Bryson had brought four kids and meant it. Call it the anti-Wild: nobody out there is alone.

“We hurt and we cry, but we always make it up that last hill.”
— from Pretty Good at Walking

In the press

Outside Online The Trek Pacific Crest Trail Association

Outside Online profiled the family's Triple Crown bid (“The Six-Person Family Gunning for Thru-Hiking’s Triple Crown”); The Trek covered the completion; the PCTA featured the book.

Readers

Written about the 2024 edition. Three were posted on Goodreads and Audible. One came by letter.

MeghannGoodreads

“A journal entry memoir of a family of six that hikes the PCT, and I have never felt so lazy or more inspired in my life.”

BobGoodreads

“…just wait till you meet June - seriously, you’re gonna fall in love with that kid.”

An Audible listener

“So epic but ordinary in the best way. The ordinary means of grace at work on an epic journey.”

SteveLetter to VinceA neighbor in Lakeland

“This book is an instruction manual… showing parents how to take the important steps of loving their kids!”

Kindle Paperback Audiobook

Reading it together?

The book-club kit

Ten discussion questions, a leader's note, and content notes — printable, free. Built for the group that will argue about Muir Pass all night.

Get the book-club kit →

Stay on the trail

Letters from the family

The trail isn't done with us yet. Vince writes Strawbridge Treks: the story behind the book, footage worth your time, and where the family walks next.

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