Jordan Summers has had more fun sleeping on rock, snow, and dirt than any one person should be allowed. As a boy in Virginia, he would camp in the woods behind his house. Since then, he’s spent absurd amounts of time in the three major ranges and many minor ones, in forests, canyons, and deserts in every season and weather condition.

Jordan’s children were both veterans of several wilderness hikes by the age of 5. They both became llama-wranglers and guides a few years later, when their dad began leading llama treks in Oregon and the Sierra Nevada. They hiked several of the new edition’s trails with Jordan and continue to explore backcountry trails alongside him.

In 2009, Jordan solo-hiked 1,100 miles of the Pacific Crest Trail (PCT) from the California-Mexico border to Echo Lake Dam. He resumed his northbound journey in 2012 and hiked into Canada that fall. In 2016 and 2017, Jordan hiked the PCT from south of Mount Whitney to the Canada border in order to update the Wilderness Press volumes of Pacific Crest Trail: Northern California and Pacific Crest Trail: Oregon & Washington.

Jordan is an alumnus of the National Outdoor Leadership School’s (NOLS) Outdoor Educator program and Wind River rock climbing.  He is a NOLS/Wilderness Medicine Institute Wilderness First Responder, and a Leave No Trace Trainer. The training and expertise gained help Jordan pursue his passion: “to help hikers of all abilities get out there, have a great time there, leave no trace there, and come home safely from there.”

Jordan and his partner, Karin, live 44 miles west of the PCT in Pioneer, California.