A Family Adventure on the John Muir Trail
By Nathalie Vriend
“I see his eyes and ears just above the downed tree,” our 8-year old son Tim shouted. Ben, our 6-year old son, commented, “He wants to play peek-a-boo!”. The bear looked at us directly, determined no food could be found in our campsite, and turned and wandered off again. We were on day 19 of our John Muir Trail adventure and we had just encountered a brown bear in its natural environment!
The John Muir Trail is a 210-mile (340 km) long trek through the rugged Sierra Nevada Mountains in California. Most popular is to hike southbound, by beginning in touristic Yosemite Valley (1230 m) and finishing on the top of Mt. Whitney, the highest point of the lower 48 US states, at an elevation of 4421m. Along the way, the backcountry trail snakes through three national parks (Yosemite, Kings Canyon and Sequoia), two wildernesses and two national forests, conquers 10 different passes and only crosses a road once at Tuolumne Meadows. A true wilderness experience, which should not be undertaken lightly or ill-prepared!
In the high season, about 1000 people are trying daily to obtain one of the 35 coveted wilderness permits by entering a lottery run by the National Park Service. The John Muir Trail had been on our bucket list for the past years but in our mind we thought it would not be possible to hike such a long trail with young children. We are an active family and have been hut-hiking in the Austrian Alps in the previous three years. With a month-long sabbatical coming up, we decided in February 2019 to throw our name in the “JMT hat”. To our surprise, we received “the Golden Ticket” with a start-date of 31st July 2019. Mark and I were still slightly unsure, but Tim and Ben convinced us enthusiastically to go on this adventure together.
Spring and early summer were filled with upgrading our camping outfit with lightweight items and doing “training hikes” in the UK. With a lot of anticipation and excitement, and carefully packed backpacks, we boarded our flight to the US on the first day of the summer school holiday, to embark on a family vacation of a lifetime.
Most people tackle the 210-mile long trek in 2-3 weeks but, as we were hiking with young children, we decided to take a leisurely 28 days. The children were so much faster than anticipated and we were continuously ahead of schedule! As a result, we had 4 full rest days and 23 full days of hiking where we would average 10 miles a day. Mind you, some of these days had more than a kilometre of elevation of climbing and descending!
Although the path is clear and mostly well-marked, there were several natural obstacles. On some days, our trail-runners would get wet several times after fording ankle-high streams, although on other occasions we could balance across on some fallen logs. After a bad winter, there were still lingering patches of snow at higher elevations that we had to traverse, once even with microspikes. As the JMT is graded for horses, we never encountered steep scrambling sections, apart from the last climb before Mather Pass where the original trail was completely snow-covered. Some of the climbs were steep and relentless, but the children set the pace at the front with Mark, while I would suffer in the back. We slept all nights under the stars in a 2- and a 3-person light-weight tents. Most of the time we would be camping in solitude, along a xstream, or with a beautiful view to a pristine lake with snow-covered mountains. Most mornings, our alarm would be set for 5.45am, when dawn was breaking and temperatures would be at 5° C. This early start allowed us to start hiking in the shade around 7.15 – 7.30am, such that we could make a few miles before our first break in the sunshine around 10am. We would usually take another break around 1.30pm, and finish the day around 4 – 5pm. Fully loaded with a fresh resupply, our packs ranged between 12 (Ben) and 47 pounds (Mark), with the children each carrying their own water, sleeping bag, mat and sleep clothes, cold-weather and rain clothes. Our oldest, Tim, also carried one of our tents in his backpack.
There are strict backcountry rules along the JMT; all food and scented items (toothpaste, toiletries) must be stored in a rigid bear canister, toilet paper must be carried out (not buried!) and one should “leave-no-trace”, only footsteps. As we cannot carry food for a month for four people in only two bear canisters, we had five points along the way where we sent a food supply. The first three, in the northern half of the JMT, were wilderness lodges. For the last 100 miles however, there are no signs of civilization. At two remote access points on the trail, we decided to hire a horse pack train coming from a trailhead across a high pass, who would bring our food resupplies.
However, we were informed on our satellite device that the first pack train was stuck on the pass due to an old snowfield which the horses could not cross Mark therefore had to trek up Bishop Pass with two empty bear canisters, and make bonus miles on his birthday, while Tim, Ben and I enjoyed a leisurely extra day in camp.
The next morning was the morning when Mr. Bear visited us. Tim and Ben insisted I should photograph the bear: otherwise their friends would not believe them! During our entire hike, we encountered this single bear, a few coyotes, many deer, countless chipmunks and squirrels and several big birds, possibly eagles.
On August 27th, we set foot on top of Mt. Whitney at 4421m. As we had been hiking between 2500 and 4000 meters for the past month, we were well acclimatised and did not suffer from any altitude sickness. The last two miles were challenging due to the terrain, but it was a great feeling of accomplishment to finally reach the end of our JMT journey! Unfortunately, the trailhead was another 10 miles away, so we had to wait until the next day before we could taste “real, nondehydrated food” for the first time in two weeks.
Tim and Ben, thank you for taking your parents with you on this fantastic family adventure, we loved every minute of it!
At the finish on Mount Whitney Photos Nathalie Vriend
Eaten alive by JMT monster
Approach to Muir Pass
Top of Pinchot Pass
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