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Located about 35 miles west of LA, Escondido Falls is the tallest Waterfall in the Santa Monica Mountains. From smooth paths to rock climbing, the trail offers a little bit of everything for everyone.
The map of the area is wrong. The trail on the map continues due west from the pass, then descends a steep embankment down to Boulder Creek. In reality, the trail turns south and follows a sharp ridgeline gradually to the water. This way down to the creek was stunning. When I reached that ridge, I stopped and stood there in total awe of the valley unfolding before me.
The Culver City Stairs offers an intense climb up 282 uneven stair steps leading to the Baldwin Hills Overlook with amazing views of LA and some quirky sculptures along the way.
There are far too many food options for the field for me to mention all of them here, but needless to say, I’m a big fan of oat meal and quinoa. For lunch, I’ll typically just snack along the trail instead of actually stopping. Granola, almonds, peanuts, cashews, even chocolate.
The initial part of the hike involved tramping through a meadow, then climbing up through a mossy forest. Although we did this hike in late March, conditions were still pretty wintry, with snow lying in uneven patches on the ground. Small, interlocking streams wove like ribbons down the mountainside.
Located about 35 miles northeast of New Orleans the Honey Island Swamp is over 20 miles of preserved swampland filled to the brim with abundant wildlife and swamp tours to get you there to see it all. From alligators to bald eagles, the Honey Swamp is a wildlife sanctuary to see.
As river crossings go it was fairly safe, but the cold made it rough. Just to our south, we could see the glacier that fed the lake at the head of the river. This water had been ice not too long before. That crossing was at mile twelve of the day. Thirteen more to go and we would be done.
In the summer of 2015, my boyfriend and I went off adventuring into the White Mountains of the Eastern Sierras. This was only a month after I had back surgery and we had dreams of conquering Mt Whitney along with White Mountain Peak in these few weeks in the wilderness of central California. Trekking up a few fourteeners was a lofty goal but to be perfectly honest, just being able to walk and hike again after years of crippling sciatica pain was in itself an unbelievably amazing gift. Over our few weeks in the eastern sierras, we did some fantastic hikes, had some crazy outdoor shenanigans and a great summer in the Eastern Sierras! One of the highlights of our trip though was exploring the White Mountains. If you enjoy off-roading, camping or hiking, then White Mountain Peak is a place you really must check out that is completely off the beaten path. Oh, and did I mention there are fuzzy mischevious yellow-bellied marmots? Marmots may be absolutely adorable but they are the troublemakers of the eastern sierras as we learned first hand!
Officially, Denali National Park claims to have no trails in the wilderness. There are official, marked trails in some places, notably the park entrance and Eielson, but when asked, Rangers will never mention other trails. But there is a trail beside the Savage. It begins about half a mile south of the camp, when an unmissable bluff rises on the west side of the river. It’s a flat, smooth game trail which continues up to the point where the river enters the mountains.
Our second hike of the day of course had to be Lembert Dome! This bald, protruding rock had been staring at us ever since we arrived in the park.