The hike from Echo Lake to Lake Aloha is a beautiful Type 2 Fun hike along the Tahoe Rim Trail/Pacific Crest Trail in the Sierra Nevada Mountain Range. We backpacked into Desolation Wilderness and were there for two nights.
The hike at Salt Point State Park takes you through forests, over meadows, and by the seaside. The area is diverse while green and lush in parts while exposed and dry in others. Along the way you will hike amongst redwood trees, Douglas fir, and madrone among other trees.
The hike to Dewey Point from the McGurk Meadow Trail in Yosemite National Park is a hike to a fantastic view of El Capitan with Half Dome in the distance and the majestic tops of the Sierra Nevada Mountain Range in the background. While many people do this hike as a day hike, we decided to backpack in and spend the night at Dewey Point.
We backpacked out to Buck Island Lake over the summer which is in the El Dorado National Forest near Loon Lake but just short of going into Desolation Wilderness. The lake itself was beautiful where we and other backpackers were. But behold, the other side of the lake where the Jeepers are left the experience something to be desired.
This summary is going to be a little unusual, as I’m going to combine a hiking and a backpacking summary into one post in that we did both in the same location.
The hike to Upper Ritchey Canyon at Bothe-Napa Valley State Park is challenging, but along the way you can see a forest that is in recovery from a fire that burned through parts of it in 2020.
The Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone is an incredible sight to see and hike along in Yellowstone National Park. From different vantage points, you can marvel at Lower Yellowstone Falls. The forest along the hike was tranquil and mediative, and once we left the crowds, we probably saw a little more than a dozen people.
Mirror Lake in Yosemite National Park is a beautiful hike that is pretty easy and hikes through forests and next to big granite rocks. Upper and Lower Mirror Lake live up to their name where the reflections in the water of the landscape around them can be gorgeous.
There are several places you can start the hike from, and we jumped on the Yosemite Valley Loop Trail off of Ahwahnee Drive about .34 miles short of the Ahwahnee Hotel. The Mirror Lake hike itself is about a 2.4 mile loop, but we wanted to make a longer hike out of it, so we ended up hiking 7.2 miles.
The hike from Yosemite Valley up to Vernal Falls and then over to Nevada Falls is incredible, and one of many of many spectacular attractions of Yosemite National Park. But even hiking through the beauty of the forests, it does take work to make it to the top of either waterfall.
This is a very pleasant trail in the Napa Foothills where you eventually end up looking over Lake Hennessey from Conn Peak, especially in the springtime when the hills and trees are all green and the wildflowers are popping.
The Steep Ravine Trail at Mount Tamalpais State Park is a beautiful trail to hike, and I’ve written about it previously. I combined this trail with the Matt Davis Trail to make a loop on the west side of Mount Tamalpais.
If the weather is right, the views from the Coast Trail on Mount Tamalpais of the Pacific Ocean can be striking. During the right time of the year, the hills are beautifully green with a beautiful blue ocean background to the west, or sweeping green hills as you look north and south.