Eric Willhite's Background

I had my own unofficial travel service at the age of 10. At the time, I waned to own every brochure to every hotel, sight and city on earth. It was not long before the mailman came to the door and asked my parents to purchase a larger mailbox. It was a fun hobby and I loved dreaming of going to all those places but I always had reservations and doubts. It was not until a trip to Argentina to climb the highest mountain in South America that I realized that traveling wherever I wanted was really possible. If my friend and I could land in Santiago, Chile and find our way into the high mountains of Argentina without knowing the language or having any real skills, then I could go anywhere. After the climb, we toured around Buenos Ares for a week with some friends from New Zealand that we had made on the mountain.
     Several years later, I was married planning on a trip where we would sell our first house and use the profit to go on a 3 month Europe trip. This plan worked and in 2001 we traveled around 24 countries sightseeing from morning to the late hours of night over 3 months. We returned broke but eventually bought another home....a real piece of garbage. We fixed it up and sold it using the profits to travel to the Middle East for a month visiting the sites in Egypt, Israel and Jordan. Other trips came along and the travel tradition was in place with the family. When our first child came along we did not let that stop us; we planned a month vacation in Southeast Asia. Traveling in China with a one year old boy....that is an experience.
     My outdoor experiences started before I can remember. I know I was camping often from age five and about every month since then. When I became a Boy Scout, I was introduced to backpacking and wilderness areas. I was immediately drawn to the peaks that I was hiking around, always wanting to go up, not around them. By age 15, I was hiking and backpacking solo in the Cascade and Olympic mountains of Washington. I also moved onto peak bagging around age 16, climbing Rainier when I was 17. After a 2 year service where I had no access to peaks, I quickly returned to the mountains climbing Mt. McKinley at the age of 22. Currently, I have climbed 1,300 mountains with 300 or more prominence. Half of those are in Washington, with a large majority of the rest in the Western United States. I have traveled in every state, hiking thousands of miles of trails. I will finish all the 50 state highpoints in 2024 by hiking the entire Appalachian Trail 2,200 miles to finish the AT and my state highpoint goal on the summit of Mt. Katahdin, on my 50th birthday.
     I worked at REI for 7 years giving advice and knowledge about how to get out, where to go, as well as product info. I have a Bachelor of Science degree from the University of Washington in Forest Resources. I spent several years as a Forester designing Timber Sales in Washington working in the forest. This was followed by managing State land use, rights of way, leasing and land sales. This was followed by starting a real estate company with my wife. Currently I do miscellaneous projects for the company as well as get my kids to all their many activities.
     I am currently trying to complete a goal to find and visit every fire lookout site that ever existed in Washington State. This has taken over a decade and I am currently around 635 sites visited of the 766 sites. The project has literally taken me to every spot in Washington that has trees.

My Background