John Muir Trail Journal Day1

I did 211 mile (340 km) John Muir Trail thru-hike in July, 2014, by myself.

JMT hike is memorable and life-time accomplishment.
Every night during JMT, I wrote journal. I will share them.

 

Day1-Happy Isles to Sunrise Creek (a few miles before Sunrise Camp)

It was exciting to finally have started this JMT journey.
It was sunny, typical Sierran weather.

For me, this was the first day of the 16-day trip, the people around the Valley were mostly sightseeing. They were not even dayhikers. They had daypacks or just water bottles. Some of them were totally out of shape. They looked at me like I was crazy because I was carrying a huge 35-pound backpack, which was almost 30% of my weight. Weird.

It was my 4th time hiking in today's area. It was always nice to see the Half Dome, but it was not very new to me.
I also planned excessively aggressive itinerary for the first day. The trailhead was at 4000 feet, and the goal was 9000 feet high. It was too much, so I stopped at about 8000 feet point near Sunrise Creek. I set up my camp in the middle of nowhere and went to bed. I was too tired to eat dinner.

I'm now worried about the next 15 days...

John Muir Trail Journal Day0

I did 211 mile (340 km) John Muir Trail thru-hike in July, 2014, by myself.

JMT hike is memorable and life-time accomplishment.
Every night during JMT, I wrote journal. I will share them.

 

John Muir Trail Journal Day0

Day0 Backpackers' Campground in Yosemite Valley

I will hit the JMT tomorrow.

Finally I left for the JMT trip. It's surreal. 

It was 6 months ago I applied for a permit for this backpacking. Finally this is happening. 

I picked up a permit at the Wilderness center, and pitch a tent at the backpackers' campsite. This campsite allows for backpackers to camp who depart the next day and the next day they finished the trip.
Because this is the first-come first-served site, I decided to take it easy after I secured a spot around noon.

While I was relaxing, a Korean couple came and started looking for a site. Because it was around 1 p.m., many sites were still available, but they seemed to try to get the best site. Finally they decided to pick a site next to mine. Then they started pitching a tent, but they didn't know how to do it. I was surprised. It is pretty rare for people who don't know how to pitch a tent to camp at backpacker's campsite. It is not car camping. They asked the people at the next site over to help them pitch a tent. They told them that it was their first camping. Seriously?

While I was observing a Korean couple, an American lesbian couple (it was obvious) came in. They looked like very professional backpackers. They set up a camp quickly and sat at a bench side by side and started making meal. 

Then another American group came in. They were proudly talking about bears. One person said that he had never seen any single bear in the Sierra. He doesn't believe that bears live in the Sierra. There ARE bears. I have seen many bears in the Sierra. He just didn't have an opportunity to see them. I thought that he should not be proud of it, he should rather be ashamed, but he is American. Oh well.
He was very loud (he is American), so other campers went to his group and asked him not to speak so loudly (It's American). He spoke quietly for a few minutes and got louder (It's American). 

The campsite was interesting.

Cape Cod Day Hiking

I love day hiking as much as backpacking. 

This it the short dayhike in Cape Cod National Seashore in Massachusetts.

Cape Cod offers many beaches, hiking trails, and biking trails. It is a very beautiful area and one of the most popular summer vacation destination for New Englanders. To avoid the crowds,  I went hiking in Cape Cod in December 2017. It was my first time visiting Cape Cod. 

I choose to hike on the great island trail. It is just a couple of miles, out and back day hike. I like to have big day hikes such as 20 miles, but sometimes I like to have short slow day hikes. This time I took a time, stopped occasionally and appreciated the beauty of nature. Great Island area has a little hill and a beach. The trail is along the marsh area. Because it was December, no one was there. It was extremely quiet and I was able to find solitude. 

In the evening the orange sunshine behind the was really pretty. I used to hike coastline of Pacific Ocean, so Atlantic Ocean is new to me. Winter Atlantic Ocean is beautiful but at the same time it is displaying harsh side of mother nature. I sat down for a while to star at warm sunshine. 

Cape Cod has other interesting areas: I will write about them in different entries. Definitely must visit spots in New England.

Cross-country Skiing at Notchview

On a sunny day in February, we went out for cross-country skiing in the western Massachusetts. Notchview is located in Windsor, MA. This town is almost NY and VT state. From Boston, it is about 2.5 hour drive. Notchview has 25 miles of trails. In winter, most of them are for cross-country skiers and some trails are for snowshoe hikers. Most trails are above 2000 feet and the highest point is 2300 feet. Some trails near the trailhead is mostly green trails, and then blue trials, then farthest trails are black. Green trails are easiest, blue is more difficult, and black one is the most difficult. Green trails are all groomed, most blue trails are groomed, but some not. All black trails are not groomed. 

taking a break

At the trailhead, there is a lodge. There, one needs to pay for the daily use. It is $18/day/person. I thought that it was a rip-off. If you become a member, it will be $10. Member fees is for $50 for single , or $70 for family. We were already there, and not really interested in becoming a member, so we decided to pay $18/person.

Black trail

First small fun was there were two goats at the lodge. They were really cute. It reminded me of goats during my Tour du Mont Blanc trip (journal is here at https://himebackpacker.blogspot.com/2019/01/tour-du-mont-blanc-day6.html). The goat was really interested in my basket of poles. She munched it a lot. Cute!

Judges Hill is the highest point

Then we started with groomed green trails. Green trails are mostly flat. It was piece a cake. Then next was blue trail with groomed. Then next we went to an ungroomed black trail. It was steep to ski up. It was only 300 feet, but it was tough for me. After we got to the highest point, it was now downhill. We chose a blue ungroomed one instead of black one, because I am not good at steep down hill. Despite of blue, it was difficult to go down on ungroomed trail. Besides, trails were tilted and very narrow. However, I got brave and agressive and went straight down, even though I fell many times. Mr.N suggested to zigzag by turning a ski 180 degrees, but I decided to ski down, because I think I can't get improved without falling. 

Mr.N said again, "You can go zigzag."

I said, "NO!" 

I was determined to try and error.

 

Because this is near Green Mountains in VT, I saw some mountain views from higher point, which was nice. 

After difficult ungroomed section, groomed section became much easier. After skiing, we ate sandwiches that is brought from home, at table area in the lodge. 

Next time I can try more black trails!!ヽ( ･∀･)ﾉ┌┛←emoji of determined

Nothchview website http://www.thetrustees.org/places-to-visit/berkshires/notchview.html

Mount Cardigan Hiking

One day in spring after a long winter, I went hiking in Mount Cardigan in New Hampshire. It is possible to hike, cross-country skiing, and snowshoeing in New Hampshire in winter, but spring is an exciting season. Somehow human beings like to see fresh green in the spring and cute colorful spring flowers. I am not an exception. I can appreciate green much more in spring. On this hike I also had opportunities to see wild flowers. Their colors are prominent in the snow melted New Hampshire.

First, I saw trillium. The color is really pretty and hard to describe with my poor vocabulary. It is not vivid red but not blood red either. I could see clearly vessels in each petal.

Then next is glacier lilies!! Wow. I didn't know that they can be found in New England. Surprising. Yellow is a happy color. They look humble and pretty. 

Then next was another trillium. This one is white and the petals are more spiky. It is interesting. 

 

 

 

 

 

Then I saw another white flowers with green leaves, but I don't know the name (please let me know if you know the name). No name but still beautiful. I saw many flower burst out suddenly and got excited. I can't stop hiking.

Lastly, from the top I saw nice green hills. Spring has come and every weekend, the mountains will be greener and greener. I saw windmills in the distance. I saw them a lot in Livermore, California. The windmills reminded me of Livermore where I needed to pass on the way to Yosemite. So for me seeing windmills would be exciting icons before and after trips. I didn't know windmills in NH. 

There is a small lake at the trailhead and I saw tadpoles and newts in the same lake. Wow. They are cute and enjoying swimming with spring sun. On this hike I was able to see all kinds of wildlife! Fun.

San Bruno Mountain State Park Day Hiking

You can enjoy a variety of views at San Bruno State Park!

 

1. San Francisco Bay

2. San Francisco city in the distance

3. Pacific Ocean

4. San Francisco Airport and Airplane

5. Bay Bridge

6. Green Hills

7. Racoon Family

8. Mt. Tamalpais in the distance

 

From the list above, you can guess where this park is. It is really nice area. Probably this is one of only a couple of parks that allow you to see such a variety of view. All of the listed views are very iconic for San Francisco Bay Area.

In the picture above, you can see SF city and the Bay Bridge easily. When I climb the hill at this park, I would think that I really live in the Bay Area. I would appreciate the opportunity. Hiking always gives me time to appreciate not only nature but also situation where I am.  Working in science at a good institution, having body to be able to hike, run, walk, and having eyes to see the beauty of this world. On busy weekdays, there is not much time to reflect and think where I am. For that, go outside and hike is important. 

 

Racoon family is not always found here, but is you are lucky yes. I usually see racoon at night while camping, but this time I saw family during daytime. The mother seems to be protecting kids behind her (the picture in the left).

Another thing about this park is that you can see this park from San Francisco Airport (SFO). Of course, if you can see SFO from this park, you can see this park from SFO. The point is that you can see this park even if you are just in transit at SFO. A couple of months ago, I was layover at SFO for several hours. From big window this park came into my eyes and brought back my memories of this hike. It was really nice feeling.

Briones Regional Park Day Hiking

Briones Regional Park is in the East Bay of San Francisco Bay Area in California. East Bay has many hiking parks. When hills are green, it is very pretty. 

The picture below was taken in Briones Regional Park. It is very typical and nice scenery in East Bay. Rolling hills with some green trees, undulating hills, then Mount Tamalpais. Mount Tamalpais is located in East Bay and it has an iconic shape and it can be found from everywhere. Its nickname, Mt.Tam is handsome from any angles. I consider that is one of the great mountains' feature. 

A lot of parks are used as ranch, so you see many cows in these parks (left picture). It is kind of fun. 

Sometimes cows are on the trail. Usually they run away when hikers get close. Once in a while, they don't move at all and need to carefully pass them.

Livestock is nice to see, but wildlife is always very special. On this hike, I saw a coyote! He looks healthy cute. I was so excited. Seeing wildlife is not very often, therefore it is precious and exciting.

Acadia National Park Camping in Winter

On my previous entry (https://himebackpacker.blogspot.com/2019/02/acadia-national-park-camping-in-summer.html), I wrote about camping in Acadia National Park in summer. Now it is about winter camping. In February, I went camping in Acadia National Park.

Saturday I did cross-country skiing along the Eagle Lake. Trails along the lake was groomed. The lake is completely frozen. It was totally different scenery from summer. It was differently pretty. Despite the cold, there were some people cross-country skiing and snowshoeing. It was nice to be outside on a sunny beautiful day in white view. The loop was 5.6 miles. Because it rained Friday, the snow condition was not great. However, it was still worth being out there.

After enjoying skiing, I went to Blackwood campground. In winter, this campground is still open. Furthermore, it is FREE! You just need to go to the park visitor center and get a permit for free, and leave it on the dashboard of car. It is a car campground in summer, but you need to walk half a mile (0.6 km) in winter. You park a car near the road, then you need to walk to a campsite, because the gate near the road is closed.  The right picture is the tent. Looks cold? Yest it is.  I thought that nobody would camp in this cold. Surprisingly, there are three parties camping there. There are 300+ campsites in Blackwood, so 297 was still empty, though. 

I had pasta cooked with Jetboil for dinner, and had a cup of decaf coffee. It is allowed to have campfire in the fire pit if you bring logs. Since I love fire, I brought some logs and planned to have a campfire. However, I saw the fire pit and thought, "Ahhhhh!" The fire pit is buried in the snow. This made me extremely hard to make fire. It took a while, but I finally had fire. I was happy by finally having fire.

It was cold at night. The low temperature was -8C (for Americans: -8C is 17F). Even though I was in a down sleeping bag with four layers, it was still cold in the tent. However, it was not bad as I expected. I had base layer, fleece, down jacket, and shell.  Probably the key was my new fleece. It is very warm. It is from mont-bell. Mont-bell jackets are so functional and great. Highly recommended. 

In the morning, I had a cup of coffee and again made fire. It took very long, because water was frozen in the tent, as you can see in the right picture. Furthermore, the fuel canister was so cold, the fire from canister was very small. That also contributed to the long boiling time.

 

 

 

Then we checked out Jordan Pond.  I really liked Jordan Pond in summer, so I wanted to see what it looks like in winter. The next picture is Jordan Pond in winter. For comparison the below of it is the summer one. How different and how pretty! The whole pond is ice skate rink! I walked on the lake.

 On the way back, I checked the Maine's famous rocky coast line. I love ocean, because I am from island. This Atlantic Ocean is very different form Pacific Ocean. The coast is really rocky. I walked on the rocks and enjoyed the nice blue water. Most lakes are frozen, so it was nice to see liquid H2O. 

Now I did winter camping in Maine in February. 

Mr.N said, "You upped your game in winter activities."

Acadia National Park Camping in Summer

2018 Memorial weekend in May, I went camping in Acadia National Park in Maine.

There are many beautiful lakes and pretty ocean views there. 

Jordon Pond

I didn't know that Maine is a pretty state. First of all, I didn't know the state of Maine for the first five years of stay in the U.S. Maine is northeastern state in the U.S. Actually northern part is most north, and most eastern in the U.S. The first time I recognized the state of Maine was when I saw Acadia National Park in Maine in the book of American National Park. Pictures look pretty, so Acadia National Park had been on my bucket list for a while. Finally I am in the driving distance there, so I visited!

Acadia National Park is mainly on Mount Desert Island and with a lot of small islands nearby. Therefore it has many rocky coastline. Due to this kind of location, this park has pretty and peaceful scenery with water: lake and ocean.  However, not only water scenery, but also the park has mountains. So you can hike up to mountains and look over the lakes and ocean. Indeed I climbed up Cadillac mountain. This place is "the first sunrise" in the U.S. I did hike up Cadillac mountain, but people actually can drive up there. From the top, you can see Atlantic ocean and numerous small island on the ocean. It is peaceful. 

Moving from California, so much water filling views are new to me. California has more dry (yet still beautiful) view and even desert. In New England, so much water in the nature, which is beautiful.

At the top Cadillac Mountain

Not only Cadillac mountain, there are many short trails. One of them, some portions are steep and need to climb a ladder (at least ladder is there, so not too difficult). Some portions, you need to walk on the metal thing (on the right picture). It is fun these little adventures. 

 

I camped 2 nights at Blackwoods campgrounds.  Despite the huge campground (+300 sites), it is quiet and nice. Compared to California, camping fee is higher in New England in general, however, it is worth visiting Acadia. 

 

Hawai’i Big Island Trip Day13-18 Part2

We swam with dolphins 5 times. This is amazing and unforgettable experience.

 

Hawaiian spinner dolphins are nocturnal. They travel deep in the see at night to feed. In the daytime, Hawaiian spinner come to bay to rest. Spinner dolphins live all over the world in the warm area, but ones only in Hawai’i and northern Brazil come to shallow water area to rest. When they are resting, half or the brain is sleeping and the other is awake.

A pod of dolphins

We camped on the beach in the local park, and every morning around 8:30 a.m., a pod of dolphins came to the bay. The sign says that it is not allowed to share the location on social media: so it is a secret place. As soon as they come, we jumped in the ocean and saw dolphins. Usually a school of dolphins consists of 10-20. In the group, 3-5 dolphins really synchronize to swim and come to the surface to breath. They repeat going under then going up to surface to breath. Sometimes they jump in the air. They twist their bodies. Usually dolphins stay in for the entire morning in the same bay and circling around. I was able to observe them for several hours each day just by floating on the surface. Also, it is the right thing to do: not to disturb their biological behaviors by chasing with diving.

Sunshine on the dolphins

They are not scared of human if you just float, and by doing that, they come really close to you to breath on the surface. Looking at three dolphins just in front of me in a beautifully synchronizing movement is extremely exciting. They are so close and looks like enjoying swimming near me. Dolphins are social animals and I could tell that they communicate each other. One of the days, the dolphins are very playful and I saw they were swimming together by chasing each other and jumping a lot. That was a sunny day after a couples of day of cloudy days, so they might be happy. On that day dolphins are shiny on reflect of sun. It was beautiful. I am so grateful that I was able to have such joyful, exciting, and precious dolphin experience. Dolphins are definitely the highlight of this Big Island trip.

Hawai’i Big Island Trip Day13-18 part1

sunset at beach campground

The last five days of the trip, we camped at local park. The picture above is from camping site. The guide book says that there are no campers on weekdays and local people on weekends. Due to holiday season, there were many local people were camping. Actually there were ONLY local people there. Only a little far from Kona, there were few travelers.

Star fuits

One camper next to us lives there and he gave us fruits and vegetables from his yard. One of them was star fruits which I had never had. It was juicy and delicious.

Eggplants from farmer's makert in miso soup

 

 

We also brought fruits and vegetables from Hilo farmers markets. We got tomatos, avocados, mangoes, bananas, eggplants, papayas. They were REALLY tasty. We put vegetables in camping food, such as miso soup or Japanese curry.

Hilo Farmers market is really popular for both local and tourists. Really fresh and good vegetables, fruits are available. Not only that, some bento, and cooked goods are available. I bought home-made taro chips. They are delicious. Not like commercial chips, no salt added, so I was able to taste the original taro. 

 

Another important thing in Hawai'i is cats. 

As you may know, there are many, actually tremendous amounts of feral cats on all of Hawaiian islands.

Except for backpacking campsites, every campgrounds where car can access had feral cats. Most of the feral cats on Big Island are very cautious and they don’t get close to human beings. They are really adopted in the wild.

tabby at the campground

Only one cat was friendly. She was with us for the last five days of camping. The campsite was usually occupied with only local people. There were three cats at the campground, but only one, black and white, was friendly and two others, tabby and black, were really shy and never got very close to humans. I was able to take pictures of tabby, but the black one was always far away from human.

 

 The friendly black and white was always at our tent vestibule. She was there all night. Also in the daytime the vestibule seemed good place for her to hide. One reason was as a shade, but more important reason was to hide from children. Some kids chased the cat and she seemed to want to hide from them.

She even played with me using some plants. It was like a tamed cat.

Cats are not native in Hawai’i. They were introduced from Europeans. Cats were important to catch rats on ships.

Now feral cats are considered to impact Hawaiian native animals, such as birds. This problem has been controversial how to deal with that. Indeed it is a tough thing to deal with for cat + animal lovers.

 

Hawai’i Big Island Trip Day12

I saw the real rain forest at Kalōpā Native Forest State Park.

wild guava

East side of Big Island has a lot of rain. It makes great rain forest. Kalōpā Native Forest State Park is a great place to see it. There is ōhiʻa lehua forest. I had never seen ōhiʻa before. ōhiʻa are native Hawaiian trees found in the wet area. This is extremely peaceful forest. No sounds on the most portion, but you hear some area has nice sounds from bell crickets. There are many ferns below trees. I found some guava and ate it. It was juicy and tasty.

Because the east side has a lot of rains and beaches on the east coast are not very suitable for snorkeling, people usually focus on the west side. Also if you don’t camp, it can be very expensive to stay for a long time. We saved money by camping during the whole trip and explored east side when it was sunny.

Near Hilo, we camped on the yard of hostel. It is common in Europe to camp in the yard of huts or hostels. I am glad that such kind of camping in Hawai’i. By camping there, we had an access to outdoor hot shower, couches near the yard, and even outlets to charge camping gears, such as head lamps or solar chargers. These 2 nights in Hilo was the only opportunity to take a hot shower during the3-week trip. Usually my trips are no shower at all, so it was a glamping there.

Hawai’i Big Island Trip Day9-11

Day9-11, we snorkeled everyday at Kahalu’u, Kiholo, and Puako.

During this trip, we snorkeled 11 times. It was amazing to see the sea world. There are hundreds and thousands of species of fish in the sea. Some are colorful like yellow, orange, blue, green. A lot of fish have patterns, such as poka dots or stripes. Some fish look like they are smiling. Some swim as large school. Sometimes only one unique fish is there.

 

On the other hand, there are many fish who are really similar color to rocks. The camouflage is working well.

Some are playing together, some are peacefully swimming, some are eating with big focus.

The fish world never bores me.

A couple of years ago I first tried snorkeling on Kauai island. That time I didn’t float well, so always salty water came into my snorkel. This time I used a swim vest, so it was much easier. Somehow I don’t float well in the ocean, although I don’t have a problem in pool.

Petroglyph Trail

We also hiked on the petroglyph trail. Ancient Hawaiian traveled to the specific point to produce the petroglyph. They didn’t have even shoes and went there by walking on the lava, which is hot in the day time with sun. Most of the petroglyph are humans and towards the mountains. Who? Why? No answers exist to any questions, but it is fascinating.

Another exciting thing on Big Island is Kona coffee. It was super tasty. I had more than 10 cups of Kona coffee during this trip. I wish it was more available in the mainland US.

Hawai'i Big Island Trip Day6-8

From day6-8, we did 2 nights-3 day backpacking in Volcanoes National Park. At first we planned to go backpacking in Waipio and Waimanu valleys where in the rainy side of island. However, it was raining very hard and the ranger at the trailhead said that the river was impassible. So we went to national park and asked the ranger if there were available backpacking permits. Luckily there were. In fact the ranger said that nobody was camping at Halape, which was our destination. The day we would be hiking out was the day when the government might shut down. At that point we (and even the ranger) didn’t think that the shutdown would happen. However, it did happen (and still going on when I am writing this in Jan 16th 2019!), so it was great we changed the plan: Halape is one of highlights of the trip.

From the trailhead to the campsite, mostly the trail is on lava along the ocean. I had never seen such combination. Both lava and ocean is the source of nature. I felt happy that I was able to hike in such a dramatic view.

On the way to Halape, we saw two rangers checking the trail.

Mr.N asked, “Do you want to see permits?”

The ranger answered, “No. Enjoy the hike!”

Wow. Hawaii’s rangers are so friendly and relaxed. If it was in California, probably rangers check permits. I was checked JMT permits twice during the backpacking.

The beach at Halape is really beautiful. Because nobody was on the beach, it was very quiet and peaceful. We camped on the beach under coconut trees. We saw beautiful sunset in the evening, full moon at night, bright sunshine in the day. Every moment was pretty.

Lava and Ocean

Near the beach there was a pool. It was connected to the ocean, but no waves and calm. It was shallow. The ranger told it was okay to go swimming there if you go to ocean first and clean up your body. The reason is there are many unique creature there and sunscreen should not be exposed in the pool. I went to ocean and then swam in the pool. The fish there was amazing. I saw many interesting sea creature I didn’t see any other snorkeling points on Big Island. Mr.N didn’t bring snorkeling set or goggle, and he didn’t like to open eyes in the water. I brought goggle, so I swam many times in the pool. I was so excited. It was a wonderful swim there.

Hawai’i Big Island Trip Day4 and 5

Huge Crater

This day we explored the center of Volcanoes National Park. First at the visitor center, we saw a short movie about 2018 eruption. This 2018 lower Puna eruption completely changed the landscape of Puna area, including the national park. Now no red lava is coming out, because all of it went outside during the Puna eruption. Also the size of Kilauea Iki Crater, which is the most famous crater located near the visitor center, is much bigger now. Crater is much larger than I had imagine and I felt the massive power of underground earth. It is one of the vigorous events to change the landscape of nature and make the nature beautiful. We also saw many steam vents. The eruption is calmed down, but still many activities are going on. It was nice to see earth’s energy.

A few days later the park was closed again for the government shutdown. So it was really lucky I could visit there.

Honokane Nui

This day we camped at Kiholo Bay state park. Camping there was allowed only Friday, Saturday, and Sunday nights. Probably because not many campers on weekends and that is the strategy to kick hippies out. The campsite is just on the beach. So it is nice to see sunset at the campsite. Sunset happens everywhere everyday, but sun setting over the ocean is especially pretty and never be boring.

The next day we hiked to Polulu Valley to Honokane Nui. Polulu Valley is very pretty with rapturous blue ocean. Because there many hikers here, we went to the next hill, Honokane Nui. This is very quiet and nice view point to sit down and chill. It is funny that nobody hikes more than 3 miles in Hawai’i. So you can get to the really peaceful area by hiking only a few miles. We had quality time by staring at lush green hills and beautiful ocean.