california

The Trinity Alps are a great wilderness area located in Northern California between the Sierra and the Cascades. There are generally no trail quotas and also no advanced reservations available. Permits are required, but you pick them up on site, before hiking. We had a week available in...

Since my birthday falls in early August, I usually manage to get out on the trail to celebrate. This year, my youngest daughter was in town, which gave us even more impetus to see some wonderful places over the course of a few days. We spent one night at our cabin above Sonora. The next day we...

Not to be confused with Roper’s classic Sierra High Route, the shorter SoSHR explores challenging terrain parallel to the John Muir Trail from Bishop Pass to an exit south of Mt Whitney This stretch of the Sierra Crest is the highest and most inaccessibly rugged of the range. 13 of California’s...

This past week, I did a 3-day on/off-trail loop in the High Sierra. I had wanted to return to Bear Lakes Basin, and check out a few places I had not yet visited. It was stormy in the afternoons, so I cut a few of my hiking days shorter than usual. Mileage: ~39 miles Elevation gain: ~9900'...

I wanted to do a Sierra trip out of Mammoth Lakes for the summer of 2023. I was hoping to time the trip such that there would be lots of wild flowers in the high country, patches of snow still receding and mostly dry passes for cross country travel. The record snow fall in California, combined...

We're back home from spending a week in Death Valley: camping, hiking, and enjoying the desert. We did a series of great hikes: Little Bridge Canyon, Willow Creek Canyon, Kaleidoscope Canyon, Corkscrew Canyon, and an attempt at Grapevine Springs. That one was inspired by our trip to Ash Meadows...

I don't have much of a back story for this trip. I try to make it out to the Sierra at least once a year, and the historic snow pack forced me to rethink my summer plans. I'd blocked off a week in October to squeeze in my last big hike of the year, and wasn't sure if I'd head to Colorado, Utah...

7/28 - 8/6/22 (10 nights) Taboose Pass (Inyo NF) I had grand plans for a big loop out of Taboose Pass. A little bit on the JMT and a bunch of cross-country passes over 11 nights. I had lots of time and flexibility, so I could just see how things went. Outline of my plans: Taboose -> Upper...

August 19-21, 2022 The trip started out on a Friday morning when I left my home in Las Vegas around 6:00 AM. The shortest route from my house to the Big Pine trailhead is through Death Valley National Park, but due to recent floods, which closed the highway trough the Park, I had to take a...

This was initially supposed to be a trip to the high country in Yosemite, which I feel has been fighting me for a few years now. The one trip I made there successfully was in September of 2020, starting from Sunrise Lakes, and for 5 of the 6 days the wildfire smoke was heavy and the views...

I added a couple extra days after Yosemite to check out Point Reyes National Seashore. Point Reyes had been on the "need to see" list since @Tim Valentine's report https://backcountrypost.com/threads/point-reyes-national-seashore-december-2021.10080/ Thanks Tim for the inspiration The couple...

Way too many photos in general, this time lots of flowers (of course) and lots of waterfalls, and almost certainly too many of Half Dome and a couple bear photos. I just copied from my blog so you get it all :) Yosemite National Park 6/10 - 6/20/22 (10 nights) Camera: Sony a7ii and Sony...

Hi all, Just returned from about 4 weeks of southern NV, AZ and CA travel: Gold Butte, Lake Mead, Havasu National Wildlife Refuge, Havasu and Mt Nutt Wildernesses, Mojave NP, Ash Meadows National Wildlife Refuge and DVNP. I've been reluctant to do full on TRs of late. As I see certain...

Hello everyone. It's been a good minute since I've posted anything here so with my return and some free time in the winter I'm going to post some of my (bigger) trips of the year. This was an 8 day backpacking trip in California's Sierra Nevada mountains. This trip was excellent and I was...

After being laid up all summer with back problems I figured it would be a great idea to put in a 48 miler from Onion Valley to Whitney. Seemed like a good idea but having only been backpacking 3 times in the last 9 months mistakes were made. First, I was so worried about not having enough I way...

This one is not on our maps, but we learned about it from an excellent post on High Sierra Topix by BigTubs. And since we had a couple of days free, and we could get a campsite in Hodgdon Meadow, we decided to give it a try. On Thursday we left home for Napa, and the timing was right for...

Days: 128 - 153 Miles: 1679.2 - 2151.9 (-48 miles due to active fire) Zero Days: 5 How can I possibly summarize day 128 into a digestible blurb that will not have people wishing I would just stop talking? I probably can't... This is the day that I would FINALLY cross into Oregon. Yeah, I took...

Days: 112 - 127 Miles: 1376.1 - 1679.2 Zero Days: 1 There is a lot of fear mongering on trail, but for the most part, I could ignore it. This next stretch got to me though. Heat wave coming Totally exposed I ran into a girl who got airlifted off No water for 40 miles? (that is what they said)...

Days: 91 - 111 Miles: 1044.1 - 1376.1 Zero Days: 2 Northern CA had sooooooooooooooooooo many flowers. I tried to only pick my favorites to show, but there are MORE. Northern CA was my 2nd favorite part of the PCT, but nearly tied with 1st, which is Washington. Usually when I saw these flowers...

Days: 69 - 90 Miles: 789.1 - 1044.1 Zero Days: 3 Our last stretch, even with extra food, it quickly became evident that I would have to ration. At this point, I had always rolled into town with a day or 2 of extra food, but no longer. Even with my low appetite and struggling to eat, I was...