High Sierra Topix

Welcome Shaun,

Welcome to HST! Thanks for the official intro!

Nice fish shaun

Hi, my name is Amanda and I'm new to the Sierra, although I've been obsessed for a couple of decades. I've backpacked--albeit inconsistently--in the west for 18 years (e.g., Utah/Nevada desert; Wind River Range; Tetons; Sawtooths (ID); Gros Ventre). I'm planning my first Sierra trip and I'm so overwhelmed! Thank you for maintaining this site!

OK, the second ask has compelled me to formally intro myself.

I'm Alan. I've lived in the Bay Area for the past 7 years. I always played "in the woods" as a kid and have been fishing for as long as I can remember. I'm very at home in the water and love to snorkel or scuba. Since moving to California I've slowly but steadily become obsessed with the Sierras. Are the mountains pulling me away from the ocean? Hmmm, we'll see. I don't hunt, yet, but I do forage and love everything the outdoors has to offer.

I did family car camping trips as a child. It was fun but I can't say I loved it. I did some car camping with the wife when we first moved to CA. Awesome. That eventually progressed into "backpacking" to areas with running water and pit toilets. Hiking in a Coleman propane stove sucks... but waking up to a Pacific beach all to yourself? Definitely more awesome than waking up in a car camping site. Now what really gets us going is backpacking into the Sierras, mostly Desolation Wilderness and Yosemite. Sunrise @ Cloud's Rest... most awesome, until we realized we left the lighter at camp and couldn't make coffee! We still find time for every type of trip, though. There is something to be had in everything.

I would become a mountain man but unfortunately I can't grow a beard to save my life.

Greetings All,

I'm a geezer who only occasionally gets out to the Sierras any more because I live on the "wrong coast" these days. I still get out for a small backpack trip every once in a while, my last was a couple years back to Mattie Lake, Wildcat Point and Cold Mountain, which was an incredible area for my wife and I to have to ourselves for a few days as it is only one relatively short day's pack in from Tuolomne Meadows and a whole lot of beautiful scenery to explore. It helps that the trail into it is not on the map so the multitudes at nearby Glen Aulin are blissfully unaware of it. Now that I have been there twice (the first time we climbed up Cold Mtn. #2 and found a full on trail in a place I had never suspected one to exist) I don't mind if the rest of the world finds out about it as I have more places I want to visit than I am likely to be able to so a third trip there is not in the cards.

I found this site site while planning an upcoming trip to Sadler Peak which I hope to be able to do this summer but even if I don't I always have fun "armchair hiking" and reading about other people's experiences. It seems almost every time I sit down with the maps I find some other amazing hike that has been hiding from me all these years and it goes on "the list." Some of my long time favorites have had to be taken off of the list over the years as my abilities decline, but more are being added all the time so it's all good. I think there's a lot to that saying that one's reach should exceed one's grasp so planning trips I may never take is not a depressing thing to me.

I have never been a "peak bagger" but I am a bit of a "view" bagger I suppose, as that for me is what hiking has mostly been about. Once, when I was young, I went up Inspiration Point in the fog and was not at all inspired and never got over it I suppose, but to each one's own.

Yosemite has always been my favorite hiking area although I have had many other fine hikes in many other spots. But, perhaps because it was where I first learned to love to hike it has always been special to me. The rock calls out to my feet as the vistas do to my eyes, and so long as there is still solitude to be found there I will always return for as long as I am able to.

But until I can do so once again there are always the maps, and the internet too these days.

Enjoy the View. (and be glad I'm not there blocking it)

Hi Amanda,

Welcome to HST!

Hi Alc101ma ad POV,

Thank you for taking the time to post an intro!

Looking forward to reading about everyone's adventures from future trips to the Sierra, and beyond.

Pelican here! I just joined HST on the recommendation of my friend vhsvhs.

I started backpacking about five years ago back East in Massachusetts in the Taconic Mountains/Berkshires. Moved to Oakland about two years ago and took my first trip out to the Sierras. Have been in love with them and with California ever since. I try and get out at least a couple of weekends a month in the summer and try to do two or three 4 - 5 day trips. My partner and I started hiking together and have built a great group of guys here in the East Bay that we taking backpacking with us and who we have introduced to the Sierras.

We've backpacked in Yosemite, SEKI and the Lost Coast. I hope this summer start exploring more of the Sierras, particularly the Sequoia National Park and Emigrant Wilderness. I'm also looking forward to improving my skills so I can start going off trail as well as backpack in the shoulder seasons. I'm also hoping to do the JMT next summer.

When I'm not backpacking, I'm pretty busy as a professor. Attached is a photo I particularly like from my last long trip the Rae Lake Loop.

Hello all,

Steve from Tampa, FL here. Heading to Hetch Hetchy for the 3rd time in July. We will be packing to Beehive, Jack Main, and Vernon on a 5 nighter. Missed my last trip in 2013 due to fires. Usually go Labor Day weekend when the Strawberry Music Festival was at Mather. Brother n law will be leading the way, since he his the most experienced, with many thousands of miles under his belt in the Sierras.

Hi Pelican,

Welcome to HST! Thanks for the intro, and for the photo.


Hi Scuba,

Welcome to HST! Make sure you load up on water before the descending down to Rancheria from Vernon, it is going to be hot and dry. Looking forward to your TR.

My name is Jon. I think I found HST by searching for a particular Sierra Nevada place name back in 2012. My wife and I went over Bishop Pass that summer to find the lovely Dusy Basin. That trip really rekindled my love of the Sierra. The Kids (now 8 & 5) stayed at Grandma & Grandpa's house for that trip. This was our first multi-day foray back into the Sierra back country after the kids arrived and since completing the SC Angeles Chapter's WTC class (http://www.wildernesstravelcourse.org) back in 2006. If you do the math you'll see that our oldest was in-utero for that class including snow camp at Rock Creek Lake! I'm very grateful for any trip into the Sierra. Last summer (2014) I only got two trips in, one of which was with the wife and kids into Little Lakes Valley. This was the kid's first overnight trip into the backcountry. They loved it!

This is such a useful site and I hope to contribute to the resource in the future.