It was a grueling but significantly symbolic journey that drew two nonprofit professionals to walk a combined 1,300 miles in 17 days in April when they trekked on foot from Seattle to Los Angeles.
Ken Craft, founder and CEO of Hope the Mission, and Rowan Vansleve, its president, put a spotlight on homelessness when they walked from Seattle to Los Angeles, raising funds and awareness for their cause.
The length of the journey symbolized the extensive trip back from homelessness which is arduous and often involves recovery from addictions, struggles to find employment, and reaching out to families they haven’t spoken to — sometimes for years.
“Rebuilding up a life is a long walk, but the long walk is worth it,” Craft said.
The trip required that each man cover roughly 40 miles per day during their rotating 12-hour shifts in which one man walked while the other man drove their RV.
“I think I had the easier one to wake up for,” Vansleve said, taking the shift from 2pm through 2am. “I would just get out there and my job was to somehow, someway, walk, run, crawl, whatever I could do, the 40-plus miles, and then I’d meet Ken and we’d tag off. We just did this all the way back,” Vansleve said.
The pair left Seattle on April 9, ultimately earning more than $200,000 via donations. Despite damp weather, dark and spooky nights, and Craft breaking a bone in his foot, they saw it through as a means of inspiring, raising funds and simply bringing attention to the cause they care passionately about.
“One of the hardest things in the work we do is keeping the attention on this crisis,” Vansleve said. “A number of years ago, I was talking to Ken, and I said, ‘What if we did something crazy?’ We started talking about different ways we could shine a spotlight on (homelessness) and also raise the money needed.”
On a whim, the two men ran in the 2019 L.A. Marathon, raising $40,000. Over the next few years they embarked on a range of fun and frantic challenges including running five marathons back to back, trekking 250 miles from Death Valley to the Hope the Mission headquarters in North Hills, and, after jumping off the Stratosphere Tower in Las Vegas, making a 350-mile run back to L.A.
Ken Craft, left, founder and CEO, and Rowan Vansleve, president of Hope the Mission on May 4, 2025. (Photo by Jarret Liotta) People hold signs in support of Ken Craft, Founder and Chief Executive Officer Hope The Mission, and Rowan Vansleve, President Hope The Mission, before the pair begin their bike ride to Washington, D.C. at Hope The Mission’s administrative offices in North Hills, CA., Tuesday, March 12, 2024. The pair will bike the approximately 3,500 miles to the U.S. Capital to raise funds and bring awareness to the homelessness crises in Los Angeles and across the country. (Photo by Hans Gutknecht, Los Angeles Daily News/SCNG) Ken Craft, Founder and Chief Executive Officer Hope The Mission, gives a tour after a ribbon cutting ceremony at Hope The Mission The Sierra’s, a new transitional housing facility in Lancaster, CA., on Friday, March 1, 2024. Two motels on Sierra Highway have been made into housing for unhoused families, with plans to convert several more. (Photo by Hans Gutknecht, Los Angeles Daily News/SCNG) Rowan Vansleve, President Hope The Mission, hugs his daughter Sidney before starting his ride to Washington D.C. at Hope The Mission’s administrative offices in North Hills, CA., Tuesday, March 12, 2024. Vansleve and Ken Craft, Founder and Chief Executive Officer Hope The Mission, will bike the approximately 3,500 miles to the U.S. Capital to raise funds and bring awareness to the homelessness crises in Los Angeles and across the country. (Photo by Hans Gutknecht, Los Angeles Daily News/SCNG) People hold signs in support of Ken Craft, Founder and Chief Executive Officer Hope The Mission, and Rowan Vansleve, President Hope The Mission, before the pair begin their bike ride to Washington, D.C. at Hope The Mission’s administrative offices in North Hills, CA., Tuesday, March 12, 2024. The pair will bike the approximately 3,500 miles to the U.S. Capital to raise funds and bring awareness to the homelessness crises in Los Angeles and across the country. (Photo by Hans Gutknecht, Los Angeles Daily News/SCNG) Guests rise for Hope the Mission’s founder and CEO Ken Craft as they celebrate Hope the Mission’s new North Hills regional kitchen on Thursday, Feb. 8, 2024. Hope the Mission makes three meals a day for 2600 people sheltered in their homes and shelters. (Photo by Sarah Reingewirtz, Los Angeles Daily News/SCNG) Rowan Vansleve, President Hope The Mission, left, and Ken Craft, Founder and Chief Executive Officer Hope The Mission, begin their bike ride to Washington, D.C. at Hope The Mission’s administrative offices in North Hills, CA., Tuesday, March 12, 2024. The pair will bike the approximately 3,500 miles to the U.S. Capital to raise funds and bring awareness to the homelessness crises in Los Angeles and across the country. (Photo by Hans Gutknecht, Los Angeles Daily News/SCNG) Ken Craft, Founder and Chief Executive Officer Hope The Mission, begins his bike ride with Rowan Vansleve, President Hope The Mission, to Washington, D.C. at Hope The Mission administrative offices in North Hills, CA., Tuesday, March 12, 2024. The pair will bike the approximately 3,500 miles to the U.S. Capital to raise funds and bring awareness to the homelessness crises in Los Angeles and across the country. (Photo by Hans Gutknecht, Los Angeles Daily News/SCNG) Hope the Mission’s founder and CEO Ken Craft gives a set of knives to Jon Poole, who has been donating chicken to Hope the Mission, formally Hope of the Valley, since Craft’s early days feeding the unhoused, during a celebration of Hope the Mission’s new North Hills regional kitchen on Thursday, Feb. 8, 2024. Hope the Mission makes three meals a day for 2600 people sheltered in their homes and shelters. (Photo by Sarah Reingewirtz, Los Angeles Daily News/SCNG) Show Caption1 of 9Ken Craft, left, founder and CEO, and Rowan Vansleve, president of Hope the Mission on May 4, 2025. (Photo by Jarret Liotta) Expand“Last year we rode bicycles from Santa Monica all the way to Washington, D.C., because we believe it is a national crisis and it requires national attention,” Vansleve said. “And we were able to raise $480,000 doing that.”
He called the walk from Seattle to L.A. the hardest, but done with good reason. “We wanted to talk about how coming home from addiction and incarceration, poverty and homelessness, is a really long journey, and that you need to understand how relentless, how traumatizing, how isolating, how lonely, and how that journey requires so much courage,” Vansleve said.
The journey grew harder after Craft broke a bone in his foot. “I got a stress fracture in my metatarsal,” Craft said. “My foot was killing me (but) I just kept taking more Tylenol and Advil and just numbed the pain to get through it, but I ended up walking from Bakersfield to L.A. on a broken foot.”
Craft said his injury “plays into the metaphor that sometimes this walk will break you, and sometimes being broken is good. There’s things that need to be broken, and other times there’s something that needs to be broken and healed.”
Despite success in serving its mission by operating 25 shelters throughout Southern California, and providing support services to help individuals and families transition away from homelessness, both men are nervous about what lays ahead following changes in Washington, D.C.
“The reports that we’re hearing right now are about a 40% cut to rental assistance,” Vansleve said, through the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) housing vouchers, including Section 8. “These cuts are going to mean more people on the street. These cuts are going to mean it’s harder for someone to get out of a shelter and off government assistance.”
He and Craft remain hopeful.
“Last year homelessness increased 18% across the country,” Craft said. “In L.A. it went down 2%, so we’re doing something right. My concern is we don’t want to go backwards,” he said.
In May, Hope the Mission spent an afternoon in Los Angeles engaged in yet another stunt. Their unofficial record-breaking event helped feed those in need thanks to 500 volunteers who devoted 10 hours to making 250,000 meatballs.
“That was only possible because the people of Los Angeles are the most generous and the most committed,” Vansleve said. “And they’ll keep turning up, so I have an incredible amount of hope at the moment and an incredible amount of fear.”
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