Tioga Peak, CA: A Little Hike for a Big Summit
Choosing the location of hikes is the start of my adventure. Zooming around on Google Earth, searching for maps, trying to predict weather… rarely do I ever just decide to hike down a random trail, I like to have a vision for my hike. Also, its a good idea so I don’t get lost and or in over my head. Happy hiking moods turn sour pretty quickly when I can’t…
The Trees Have Eyes – a (Spooky?) hike to Parker Lake, Ansel Adams Wilderness
I think most people have thought of the woods as a “Scary” place at least once in their life. Im not talking about real scary here either, like hypothermia or altitude sickness, but the irrational sort of scary. For example as a little kid my brothers pretty much convinced me that axe murders and Freddy Krueger hid in the woods surrounding our home. Also, I think around the same time I…
Backpacking Molybdenite Creek: eastern sierra fall colors you don’t have to share
Fall colors – they happen every year but they don’t get any less magical. Colors in California can’t ever compare to my favorite displays in Michigan (I’m looking at you Brockway Mountain), but those yellow and orange aspen littering the hillsides are really growing on me. Actually it’s a sort of poetic how the summer season is greeted sunny poppies and then adjourned with the fiery aspen, full circle. Right now…
Gambling on Walk-In Campsites – Rock Creek Lake Campground
Whenever I plan a last minute adventure I feel a little like a someone at a horse race – stacking the odds versus the payoffs, and ultimately taking a slightly informed leap of faith. Walk-in campgrounds and first come first serve permits are saviors for last minute planners, and an agony. Why is the “Earliest arrival date for on-line reservation is three days from now”? And do you really expect me to “Please…
A MicroAdventure Hiking Mono Pass, John Muir Wilderness
This morning I was reading an article about #MicroAdventures – which simply put are mini adventures that allow one to escape the 9-5. The video, the hashtag, and the blog of the man who wrote the book on #MicroAdventures make it seem very exciting, fun, and well… sexy. It is like a one night stand with a beautiful place & who knows if you will ever see it again. I immediately…
Backpacking Ediza, Iceberg, and Rosalie Lake in Ansel Adams Wilderness
Another #ThrowbackThursday blog post here, this one documenting a backpacking trip I did with a few of our friends (Tom, Johanna, Pete, and of course Curtis) back in 2011. It was a two night backpack into the Ansel Adams wilderness, my first time traveling in from the Agnew Meadows Trailhead. This was the last trip with my tiny little “first” backpack, a pack that could only fit a bear canister…
Saddlebag Lake Hiking – to Greenstone & Hummingbird Lakes
October, it has gone by so quickly! & Between a trip to Michigan and the government shutdown I have not spent much time in the Sierra. Actually, Curtis and I were supposed to go backpacking with our friends, Jen & Ryan, over the Columbus day weekend – but without being able to get a wilderness permit we had to call off that plan. Not the type of people to let…
Day Hiking the Duck Pass Trail, Mammoth Lakes
It is fire season in California, which means two things: (1) Curtis leaves me behind to work looking at fire damaged soils, down near this time near San Bernardino, and (2) There is smoke everywhere, including the Mammoth Lakes Basin on the east side of the Sierra from a fire on the Sierra National Forest. But even if the vistas are a little obscured smoke should not, and will not, ruin a…
Backpacking Buckeye Creek, Hoover Wilderness
A couple of firsts this 4th of July weekend – My first backpacking trip of 2013 and Curtis & I’s first backpacking trip in the Hoover Wilderness! I choose this trip out of Exploring Eastern Sierra Canyons: Sonora Pass to Pine Creek, which I recently found and bought a copy of in the Groveland Museum (which I was surprised to see has the best selection of regional hiking books and…
Hello! I am a 30-something outdoors-lady, backpacker, and resident of Groveland, California - 
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