State Route 1 runs along the Pacific Coast for most of California’s length, winding steeply and sharply along some of the world’s most spectacular shores. But about forty miles north of Mendocino, the highway takes an abrupt turn east and joins Highway 101 further inland. The highway leaves the coast because that part of California is so rugged that the highway’s planners simply couldn’t build a road there. Known as the Lost Coast, the area boasts some of the most incredible coastline in the world, with steep cliffs and hills dropping straight into the ocean.
About thirty miles south of Lake Tahoe and thirty miles north of Yosemite, the Carson Iceberg Wilderness is a little known gem in California’s high country. Just beyond Bear Valley on Highway 4, the wilderness is past the point at which the road is maintained in winter, making access impossible after the first heavy snows of winter. I led an introductory backpacking trip to Carson Iceberg just before the beginning of the winter season.
Fourteen thousand, one hundred and sixty-two foot Mount Shasta is a dormant volcano that rises in solitary drama in the far north of California. A few years ago, I attempted the climb with my father. We were turned back by low snow, poor conditions, and severe dehydration. Over Memorial Day weekend I tried again with a group of friends from school.
At 9,983′, Pyramid Peak is the highest point in California’s Desolation Wilderness. Since it is only about a three hour drive from the San Francisco Bay Area, Desolation Wilderness is the most heavily-used wilderness area in the United States. Thus exploring Desolation during the winter months has a number of advantages—not only do the snow-covered peaks make for spectacular vistas, but most of the visitors that swarm the area during the summer are kept away by colder temperatures and feet of snow.
One of the most popular winter activities in Yosemite National Park is skiing or snowshoeing Glacier Point Road. The road is closed to cars in winter beyond the Badger Pass Ski Resort, but most of the road is groomed, making the 10.3 mile road a relatively easy ski route. The reward is a spectacular view of Yosemite Valley.
The winter retreat for the Stanford Outdoor Education Program instructors was a back country skiing trip off of Highway 88 near Kirkwood Mountain Resort. We left campus early on a beautiful Saturday morning. Despite a flat tire in Jackson, we managed to make it to Tragedy Springs Road, of which only the first hundred feet or so had been plowed. We parked in the plowed area and distributed group gear and food. Then we strapped on our skis and went on our way.
I flew into Lima in the early hours of December 14. A desert city on the Peru’s western coast, Lima is known for its depressing weather, and sure enough it greeted us with oppressive clouds and fog. A taxi took Kate and me to a hostel in Lima’s Miraflores district, one of the nicer tourist districts in the city. I didn’t really know what to expect, having never been to South America, but Miraflores was definitely not anything like what I would have anticipated. Within a five-minute walk of our hostel were a TGI Friday’s, a Chili’s, a McDonald’s, a Starbucks, and a Domino’s pizza. We spent the rest of our first day trying to fight jet lag while exploring the area around our hostel. We ate dinner at a nice Italian restaurant a few blocks from the hostel—apparently Italian food is a hot trend in Peru.
The next day we were joined by Kate’s friend Divya and her boyfriend Daniel. Daniel, a native Colombian, spoke fluent Spanish and proved to be invaluable in helping us travel throughout Peru. The four of us walked around Miraflores, and we ate lunch at an upscale Peruvian restaurant where Kate and Divya tried ceviche, a quintessential Peruvian dish. We strolled west to the cliffs above the beach, where we were heckled by paragliding companies. Then we walked down to the beach, where we were heckled by several people offering surfing lessons. Declining, we gravitated towards Larco Mar, a new mall built into the cliffs above the Miraflores beach that wouldn’t look out of place in San Diego. It was a surreal experience to stand in an Aeropostale store in Peru, with pop remixes of Christmas carols (in English) playing outside on the mall’s soundsystem and The Killers blasting on the store’s speakers.
In late October of 2008, I led an attempt to climb Sequoia National Park’s 11,188-foot Mount Silliman as part of the Outdoor Education Program. We left Stanford on Friday evening and arrived at Lodgepole campsite a little after midnight. Mount Silliman is in the same area as a peak I climbed last spring, Alta Peak; it lies a few miles to the northwest. We went to sleep almost as soon as we arrived.
Saturday morning dawned beautiful and sunny. We had a pancake breakfast and then drove through the campsite to the trailhead (the trail for Silliman lies in the eastern part of Lodgepole campground). For the first two miles, we followed a trail up to the north of the campsite. At about the 2 mile mark (where the trail meets Silliman Creek), we turned east, following a use trail that paralleled the stream. The trail wound its way to a meadow below a striking 10,000 foot peak. We took a break in the meadow and did a navigation workshop with maps and compasses.
