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Blog - backpacking

Southwest Yosemite Backpack, June 27-29, 2008

June 14, 2010 No Comments

I did a drive down from Seattle to LA from May 30 – June 1. It was pretty pleasant, but really rather a lot of time in the car. However, I had a good travelling companion, and the scenery was mostly good, so , yay.


meadow-walk
Definitely pretty, when you can see it. At the time, I was too busy shoving off mosquitoes!

But then, and more to the point, I did a two-night backpack in southwestern Yosemite National Park, dropping south from Bridalveil Campground and doing 30 miles in 3 hiking days (1 afternoon, 1 full day, 1 morning), with about 2300′ of total elevation change, though a bit more up and down on the route itself. My issue of Sierra North (8th ed?) refers to this as the Buena Vista Crest, and I think the current ed refers to it as Royal Arch Lake (ed. – Sierra North has the similar area as Royal Arch, Falcon Guide Hiking Yosemite lists the route we did as Buena Vista Crest). Dave, Gretchen, Erin, and Amittai came along for this sucker. We spent the night before at Summerdale Campground, just south of the park, which I only managed to snag because of a weirdness with it only being listed via direct search on the reservations page. I win, I guess!

We then went north, picked up our permit at Wawona, and then drove up to Glacier Point Road and Bridalveil Campground, where we parked, and began our trip.

Backpacking! (and one pic from the Seattle drive)

San Gorgonio, April 2007

November 13, 2007 No Comments

So this trip was pretty cool. This was probably the hardest bit of hiking I’ve done to date, and I would have been way more proud of the fact if people weren’t doing it as a dayhike and kicking our asses both up *and* down the mountain. Well, my ass. Joe could have done it.

Anyway! We did an overnight backpack on April 28-29, 2007 of Mt San Gorgonio, the tallest mountain in Southern California, with the summit at 11,502′. The trip was a one nighter. The first day was just short of 6 miles, and about 3k’ of gain. The next day was 11-12 miles, with 2k’ gain, and all 5.4k’ of loss. Ouch. This is hike #54 in San Bernardino Mountain Trails, the current edition by David Money Harris (I kid you not. real name. hotshot engineering faculty at Harvey Mudd, too).


gnarled
I always see a gnarly face in there

Anyway!

off we go!

Mineral King

January 16, 2007 No Comments

In late July of 2006 , I went with Ryan, Danny, Erin and Joe for an overnight backpack in Sequoia National Park’s Mineral King Valley. We started there, headed south over Farewell Gap, thus crossing into Sequoia National Forest, and arduously headed on to Bullfrog Lakes, where we spent the night. The two day total was 17 mi RT, with 3400′ of gain over both days (600′ of drop, so 2800′ climbing the first day). The starting elevation was 8000′, pretty much right on the money, and the elevation at the lakes was 10,700. Pretty out there. Also, marmots! Read more after the pictures.


marmot-scurries

pretty-field

a digression on the hike itself…with more pictures!

Hetch-Hetchy Reservoir, Yosemite NP – June 2006

November 20, 2006 No Comments

On June 23-25, 2006 I was in the Hetch-Hetchy region of Yosemite NP. John Muir called this valley originally a partner to Yosemite Valley, often called one of the most beautiful places around. Hetch-Hetchy, however, was flooded behind O’Shaughnessy Dam as of 1923, in order to generate electricity and give drinking water to San Francisco. “Muir was pretty pissed”. Anyway, the reservoir makes a pretty nice lake, although I would easily believe it was better before.

Anyway, I was up there with Joe, Gretchen, Dan, Kate, Elisa and Jen. On the latter two days of that trip, we did an overnight out and back trip to Rancheria Creek, 13 mi’ RT, and maybe 600 feet of gain, but mostly flat. We’d been intending to go on to Tiltill Valley, but the heat defeated us.

scale

The actuality of the trip, in and of itself:

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