Trip reports

Split Mountain is a classic CA Sierra 14er usually climbed via the North Slope (class 3, easy snow, I estimate max of 40 degrees) or Jean’s Couloir (Alpine Ice 2, steep snow). Chesson, Gabe and I climbed it via the former, easier route, summiting on Sunday, May 31st. We drove up to Alabama Hills dispersed camping on Friday night after work. After a lazy Saturday morning brunch, we began the long dirt road drive in. As forewarned by the internet, we made it about four miles from the trailhead before insurmountable ruts and boulders blocked the path of our sedan. Luckily, a good Samaritan in a lifted truck pulled through and generously offered us a ride (“offered” is a stretch… I shamelessly asked for the help). However, forgetting that the night before I had drawn a hiking path on OnX, I incorrectly navigated our ride to a dead end. Apologizing and informing him of the correct route, we began our bushwack to the correct starting point. ...

Let’s talk about this big walk that Michael and I did Prep At some point in late 2025, Michael approached me with an idea. We were both interested in doing an ultra-esque adventure sometime in 2026, once my marathon training died down. He suggested that we backpack across San Diego county. A 156mi, almost JMT-length trip that takes most plebians 7-12 days. Here’s what Michael said when I asked how many days it would take us: ...

With the goal of doing the East Arete of Mt Russell, Ben Schauer and I (Ben Mous) managed to snag two difficult-to-get overnight permits for the Whitney Zone. As the trip approached, the weather forecast continued to get worse. As Schauer had never seen rain in the eastern sierras, and my past experiences with Sierra rain mainly consisted of light drizzle, we decided to head out anyway on a Friday afternoon - hoping the weather wouldn’t be as bad as forecast. The plan was to camp at Horseshoe Meadows Friday night to start acclimatizing, drive to Whitney Portal Saturday, and summit Russell / hike out Sunday. As we drove out we saw rain clouds but experienced no rain. However, the trip started to not go to plan as we drove up the road to Horseshoe Meadows at sunset, as Ben S’s miata started to overheat. We discovered the coolant tank was completely empty; unable to go higher, we turned around. Unfortunately, even coasting down the road caused the engine to overheat. ...

Sometime in November 2024, I developed a non-life threatening medical condition forcing me to be (mostly) horizontal for several months. As part of an effort to stave off the beasts of boredom and apathy, I decided to write… a gear review? This was written as a reference for California folks looking to buy a tent for backpacking specifically, in particular those looking to upgrade… I lay out my decision-making process in pain-staking detail below. Please keep in mind that this calculus is highly regional! I don’t pretend to know what is good for the Bavarian Alps, that would be dumb. Adapt this to your ranges of interest. ...

A quick summary of a journey through the East Sierras by some truly elite mountain men. These guys are just about the most skilled group of hikers you’ll ever meet (who needs ropes lol). The plan was simple: drive up to Whitney portal Saturday morning (6ish hours), hike up to Meysan Lake (5-6mi, 3,000’ gain), put our packs down, summit Mt. Irvine (13,780’), and return to the lake to set up camp and eat dinner by dark before hiking out first thing the next morning. Ok, maybe not so simple. But these guys didn’t really think things through at the beginning. This will be a recurring theme. ...

In early October, in a period of about 30 minutes, Shreyas, Chesson, and I convened and, for better or worse, purchased flights to Oregon. The standing plan was to do a cute and short 24 mile loop trail in the Jefferson Wilderness as a weekend overnight backpack. Little did we know that in a few weeks we would be walking the length of this loop in a single day, a third of it in 3 inches of snow, in a very different location. The trip was about to become much less cute and short. ...

Typically, when you want to do some athletic thing that’s beyond your current means, you want to adhere to a few broad but useful principles: Plan: Deliberate and thoughtful planning, of both the trip and your training, goes a long way to ensure success. Train: Be consistent, and make it goal-specific Recover: Get lots of sleep and keep overall stress levels low Now, knowing all this, it’s a damn shame Phil and I did absolutely none of these things to prepare for Steck-Salathe. To be clear, the reason for this error was the fact that we simply underestimated the route. It’s a common story – and we hope others may learn from our mistakes. This is the story of how we proudly achieved the blazing time of 27 hours car-to-car on a 16-pitch route. ...

Here, we document the epic journey of Payton, Jay, Shreyas, and Chesson (and Gromit!) to an eventual summit of Mt. Russell, a 14er (technically, 14,089’). Basically, it was an all-star crew. By which I mean we had every possible permutation of prepared-ness covered: Altitude acclimated/good cardio Sad lungs Actual climber Payton Jay “Hiker” Chesson Shreyas Shreyas had a bit of a rough time this trip. ...

It’s amazing how alive the valley is at night in the summer. Thousands upon thousands of little critters emerge from every crack and crevice as soon as the sun goes down. The flow of ants and silverfish is endless, only punctuated by the occasional scorpion, toad, spider, rodent, or ring-tailed cat. Up on the western shoulder of El Capitan, the bustle of the valley is another world. Here the insects outnumber the people at least a million to one. ...

For a place not known for its winter, it seemed like the colder months had been rather dark in San Diego. Heartbreak, injured and graduating partners, car troubles, and work-related difficulties had kept the crew in something resembling hibernation pretty much since October. Of course, there were plenty of local outings, but somehow the fire just wasn’t there. But the uneventful and altogether depressing season had an upside: turns out, it made for fertile training ground. ...