It’s known as “America’s Most Beautiful Trail” for good reason: There may be no long backpacking trip that’s more spectacular, step for step, than a thru-hike of the John Muir Trail through California’s High Sierra. From Yosemite Valley to the 14,505-foot summit of Mount Whitney in Sequoia National Park, you walk 211 miles past jagged peaks of golden granite, through a constellation of sparkling mountain lakes and more waterfalls than anyone could name, and over numerous passes from 11,000 to over 13,000 feet.

Haven’t hiked the JMT yet? Check out the photos below. They just might convince you that it’s time to move it to the top of your list.

The John Muir Trail has become one of the most sought-after long-distance hikes among serious backpackers. Late summer is the best time for a JMT thru-hike (as well as backpacking anywhere in the High Sierra, or many other Western mountain ranges, for that matter), for many reasons: The bugs, heat, thunderstorms, and crowds of July and August have largely dissipated, and the high passes are snow-free, while dry weather often lingers well into September, with mild daytime temperatures and pleasantly cool nights.

Hi, I’m Michael Lanza, creator of The Big Outside. Click here to sign up for my FREE email newsletter. Join The Big Outside to get full access to all of my blog’s stories. Click here for my e-books to classic backpacking trips. Click here to learn how I can help you plan your next trip.

And if you hope to make this your year for a JMT thru-hike, the time to start planning, picking dates, and preparing to apply for a wilderness permit is now.

Get a sampler of this classic, incomparable backpacking trip in the photo gallery below. Scroll past the gallery to find links to stories at this blog about the JMT, including my feature story about thru-hiking it in a week with friends, and other stories offering expert tips on how to plan and execute a JMT thru-hike.

I’ve helped many readers plan an unforgettable backpacking trip on the John Muir Trail.
Want my help with yours? Find out more here.

Read read my feature story “Thru-Hiking the John Muir Trail in 7 Days: Amazing Experience, or Certifiably Insane?” about my (admittedly somewhat insane) seven-day JMT thru-hike, which includes more photos, a video, and tips on pulling off your own trek on “America’s Most Beautiful Trail.” Please note that reading that full story, as with most stories about trips at The Big Outside, requires a paid subscription.

See also these stories: “Thru-Hiking the John Muir Trail: What You Need to Know,” “How to Get a John Muir Trail Wilderness Permit,” “10 Great John Muir Trail Section Hikes,” “Thru-Hiking the John Muir Trail: The Ultimate, 10-Day, Ultralight Plan,” and all stories about backpacking the John Muir Trail at The Big Outside.

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One key to finishing and enjoying the 211-mile JMT (221 miles including the descent off Mount Whitney, which is not part of the JMT) is keeping your pack weight as light as possible. See my story “A Practical Guide to Lightweight and Ultralight Backpacking.” If you don’t have a paid subscription to The Big Outside, you can read part of that story for free, or click here to download that full story without having a paid membership.

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After more than three decades of exploring all over Yosemite on numerous backpacking trips, I’ve learned two big lessons about it: First of all, few places inspire the same powerful combination of both awe and adventure. And Yosemite’s backcountry harbors such an abundance of soaring granite peaks, waterfalls, lovely rivers and creeks, and shimmering alpine lakes—plus, over 700,000 acres of designated wilderness and 750 miles of trails—that you can explore America’s third national park literally for decades and not run out of five-star scenery.

Yosemite exceeds expectations in many ways, including this truth: Its reputation for crowds just doesn’t square with the reality of backpacking throughout most of the park. Yes, Yosemite Valley sees insane numbers of tourists, and a few of the park’s trails—like the Mist Trail and Half Dome—are among the most popular in the country.

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But most of the park’s backcountry isn’t crowded. I once interviewed a retired backcountry ranger who’d worked for 37 years in Yosemite, 25 years as wilderness manager, and had hiked every trail in Yosemite “probably about 10 times.” He told me that only about 10 percent of the park’s hundreds of miles of trails—from Happy Isles to Donohue Pass (mostly the John Muir Trail) and the Sierra High Camps loop—accounts for about 80 percent of all trail use. Little Yosemite Valley alone accounts for almost 20 percent. And the average length of backpacking trips is just two nights.

Consequently, he said, “There are areas of the park where you will see very few people.”

Wander into the park’s vast backcountry and you will find some of the very best scenery in Yosemite—along with a surprising degree of solitude.

This article describes the 10 best backpacking trips in Yosemite, from the core between Yosemite Valley and Tuolumne Meadows—including Half Dome—to the John Muir Trail, the Clark Range and southeast corner, and the vast wilderness of northern Yosemite. These trips range in length from roughly 30 miles to nearly 90 miles, and from beginner friendly to serious adventures in the park’s wildest corners.

I’ve backpacked all of these trips—and others across Yosemite—over more than three decades of getting to know this park very well, including the 10 years I spent as a field editor with Backpacker magazine and even longer running this blog.

Each trip described below has a link to a story about it that provides more detail (reading those stories in full, including key trip-planning details, requires a paid subscription), and some descriptions have a link to one of my three Yosemite e-books, which provide much more detail on how to plan and prepare for that trip.

See my expert e-books to three great backpacking trips in Yosemite—including “The Best First Backpacking Trip in Yosemite”—and my Custom Trip Planning page to learn how I can help you plan any of these classic adventures, variations of them, another Yosemite trip, or any trip you read about at The Big Outside.

Please tell me what you think of the trips described below, share your questions, or suggest your own favorite backpacking trip in Yosemite in the comments section at the bottom of this story. I try to respond to all comments.

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Understanding Yosemite’s Wilderness Permit System

In Yosemite, wilderness permit reservations are issued based on daily trailhead quotas on the number of people, which vary between trailheads, with special rules for backpacking the John Muir Trail. For trips from late April through late October, 60 percent of trailhead quotas can be reserved through a rolling lottery at recreation.gov/permits/445859 that begins on the Sunday up to 24 weeks in advance of the date you want to start hiking and runs for a week, with the lottery for each specific window of dates closing at 11:59 p.m. the following Saturday.

Planning a backpacking trip? See “Backpacking Yosemite: What You Need to Know”
and “How to Plan a Backpacking Trip—12 Expert Tips.”

The remaining 40 percent of permits are made available at recreation.gov/permits/445859 at 7 a.m. Pacific Time seven days in advance of a trip start date.

Popular trailheads—including Happy Isles in Yosemite Valley and most of the trailheads in the Tuolumne Meadows area—fill very quickly. There are lower-demand trailheads in the park where you can more likely reserve a permit less than 24 weeks in advance.

See “How to Get a Yosemite or High Sierra Wilderness Permit” and my “10 Tips For Getting a Hard-to-Get National Park Backcountry Permit.”

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Yosemite’s Best Backpacking Trips

Little Yosemite Valley and Half Dome

Let’s acknowledge this up front: Any list of Yosemite’s best backpacking trips must include this route from the park’s most popular trailhead to its most popular backcountry camp and the summit so famous and popular that the park requires a permit for hiking the cable route up it whether while backpacking or on a dayhike.

Many thousands of people attempt the strenuous hike up Half Dome, about 16 miles round-trip with almost 5,000 feet of elevation gain and loss from the Happy Isles Trailhead in Yosemite Valley, in one big day. Backpacking it as an overnighter with a camp in Little Yosemite Valley spreads out the effort over two days—a more reasonable objective for many hikers.

Having the camp also makes it easier to reach the 8,800-foot crown of Half Dome ahead of the wave of more than 200 dayhikers permitted to hike Half Dome each day, enjoying something closer to solitude for the incomparable view of Yosemite Valley and 360-degree panorama of a big swath of the park’s mountains.

From Happy Isles, ascend the Mist Trail past 317-foot Vernal Fall and 594-foot Nevada Fall to reach Little Yosemite Valley. Dayhike Half Dome from your camp, and then descend the northernmost leg of the John Muir Trail back to Happy Isles—or skip Half Dome and turn this into an easy overnight of under 10 miles total, ideal for beginner backpackers or families with young kids. And understand: This is the hardest wilderness permit to get in Yosemite.

Read more about this hike in my blog post “Where to Backpack First Time in Yosemite,” and find much more detailed information on how to plan this trip, including variations of this route and insider tips in getting a permit for it, in my e-book “The Best First Backpacking Trip in Yosemite.”

I can help you plan any trip you read about at my blog—and I know the tricks for getting a Yosemite wilderness permit. Click here to learn more.

Yosemite Valley to Half Dome, Clouds Rest, and Sunrise

Planning your first backpacking trip in Yosemite and want to hit all the famous highlights—on a route that’s also beginner-friendly? Take this 37.2-mile hike from Happy Isles Trailhead in Yosemite Valley.

Essentially an extended version of the above hike, this route from the Happy Isles Trailhead loops through the core of the park, including the Mist Trail past Vernal and Nevada Falls, the cable route up Half Dome, the spectacular summit of Clouds Rest, a section of the John Muir Trail, and a view of the Cathedral Range from your campsite at Sunrise. 

Probably the most popular backpacking trip in Yosemite of more than one or two nights—ranked behind its shorter variation to Little Yosemite Valley and Half Dome (above)—it usually includes at least one night at Little Yosemite Valley. Expect a lot of competition for this permit and plan alternative routes in case you don’t get it.

Read more about this hike in my blog post “Where to Backpack First Time in Yosemite,” and find much more detailed information on how to plan this trip, including variations of this route and insider tips in getting a permit for it, in my e-book “The Best First Backpacking Trip in Yosemite.”

See also my tips on hiking Half Dome.

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Tuolumne Meadows to Tenaya Lake

The roughly 30-mile traverse from the Rafferty Creek Trailhead at the eastern end of Tuolumne Meadows to the Sunrise Lakes Trailhead at Tenaya Lake features not only those two amazing spots, but the panorama of mountains from Vogelsang Pass, the beautiful canyon of the Merced River, the view of the Cathedral Range from Sunrise, and relatively quiet sections of trail.

This hike passes three of the park’s High Sierra Camps—Vogelsang, Merced Lake, and Sunrise—where you can stay in tent cabins and have all meals prepared for you, or stay in DIY backpacker campgrounds. This route is popular because it’s relatively accessible, scenic, and offers the convenience of using the free shuttle buses that operate between trailheads throughout the Tuolumne area.

This is described as an alternative route in my e-book “The Best First Backpacking Trip in Yosemite,” which provides a wealth of information on how to prepare for and take a backpacking trip in Yosemite.

Planning your next big adventure? See “America’s Top 10 Best Backpacking Trips”
and “Tent Flap With a View: 25 Favorite Backcountry Campsites.”

The High Sierra Camps Loop

One of the park’s most popular and scenic multi-day hikes, this roughly 47-mile loop from Tuolumne Meadows offers a signature Yosemite experience on a highlights tour around the Cathedral Range to the five High Sierra Camps: Glen Aulin, May Lake, Sunrise, Merced Lake, and Vogelsang.

You’ll enjoy views of granite domes and Cathedral Peak’s distinctive sharp profile; overlooks of the magnificent Grand Canyon of the Tuolumne River and several waterfalls, including 594-foot Nevada Fall from a perch near its brink; gorgeous May Lake, Tenaya Lake, and Merced Lake; wildflower-choked meadows and crystalline creeks—and a surprisingly amount of solitude on sections of the loop, considering its easy access from several points.

There are ways to shorten the loop or lengthen it, options for side hikes to more lakes, waterfalls, and summits—including two of the best in Yosemite, Mount Hoffmann and Clouds Rest—and create alternate routes or start and finish from various trailheads, all of which can help you obtain a highly coveted wilderness permit. It’s also a beginner-friendly hike feasible for families and new backpackers, with amenities like toilets in all the backpacker campgrounds adjacent to the High Sierra camps (and the option of booking tent cabins in a High Sierra camp for every night and carrying only a daypack).

See photos and more about this area of the park in my stories “Where to Backpack First Time in Yosemite” and “Best of Yosemite: Backpacking South of Tuolumne Meadows,” and find more detailed information on planning variations of this route in my e-book “The Best First Backpacking Trip in Yosemite.”

See some of Yosemite’s best scenery on “The 12 Best Dayhikes in Yosemite.”

Tuolumne Meadows to Yosemite Valley

Something of a classic ultra-dayhike or trail run—because it’s so darn beautiful but also predominantly downhill going in this direction—the approximately 19-mile traverse from the Cathedral Lakes Trailhead in Tuolumne to the Happy Isles Trailhead in Yosemite Valley follows an easy section of the John Muir Trail below the distinctive spire of Cathedral Peak; offers a choice between camping by or visiting the Cathedral Lakes or overlooking the meadows of Sunrise and the Cathedral Range; plus a chance to hike the cable route up Half Dome; and a second camp at Little Yosemite Valley before descending to the Valley via either the Mist Trail or JMT to the Valley.

Take the less-direct but thrilling detour from Sunrise to the 9,926-foot summit of Clouds Rest, one of the very best mountaintops in all of Yosemite (and far less busy than Half Dome), adding more than three miles and over a thousand feet of uphill and downhill. You will also have to choose between descending the more direct but steeper Mist Trail pass Nevada and Vernal Falls or the slightly longer and still scenic John Muir Trail, which bypasses the waterfalls.

This traverse requires a lengthy shuttle, but you can make the logistics much shorter and easier by finishing at the Sunrise Lakes Trailhead beside Tenaya Lake instead. And you could still hike Clouds Rest from the backcountry camp at Sunrise.

This hike crosses the popular area of the park described in my blog post “Where to Backpack First Time in Yosemite.” See also my e-book “The Best First Backpacking Trip in Yosemite.”

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Yosemite Valley’s North Rim to Ten Lakes Basin

The 45-mile near-loop from Tioga Road may best illustrate the opportunities Yosemite offers to enjoy some of the park’s marquis scenery without running into conga lines of backpackers or dayhikers. The route scampers along one rim of Yosemite Valley—including one of the best Valley overlooks—and explores a lakes basin at 9,000 feet before finishing at one of the park’s prettiest lakes.

A friend and I spent our first evening in the backcountry alone atop a dome, soaking in a horizon that spanned from Half Dome to El Capitan and beyond; our second night beside a beautiful creek after a day of seeing few other people; and our third evening overlooking a lake, while hiking for hours at a time each day in solitude. And yet, almost incomprehensively, this area doesn’t see nearly the same demand for a coveted wilderness permit as Yosemite’s most popular trailheads. You could say this hike is hiding in plain sight.

I wrote about this trip in my feature story “Yosemite’s Best-Kept Secret Backpacking Trip,” which includes my tips on planning it yourself.

If you want to thru-hike the JMT, see “How to Get a John Muir Trail Wilderness Permit”
and “Thru-Hiking the John Muir Trail: What You Need to Know.”

See “Backpacking Yosemite: What You Need to Know,” “How to Get a Yosemite or High Sierra Wilderness Permit,” and all stories about backpacking in Yosemite National Park at The Big Outside.

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Yosemite and Sequoia-Kings Canyon national parks loom large on the radar screens of most backpackers. But savvy Sierra aficionados know that the two major wilderness areas that sprawl over nearly 900,000 acres along more than 100 miles of the High Sierra between those parks, the John Muir and Ansel Adams wildernesses, harbor just as rich a cache of soaring, jagged peaks and shimmering alpine lakes—not to mention sections of the John Muir Trail and Pacific Crest Trail that enable almost endless possibilities for multi-day hikes, short and long. And while competition is stiff for permits to backpack in the John Muir and Ansel Adams wildernesses, those permits are not nearly as hard to draw as permits for the most popular trips in Yosemite or Sequoia-Kings Canyon or to thru-hike the John Muir Trail.

Having backpacked many hundreds of miles throughout the High Sierra on numerous trips over more than three decades, including the 10 years I spent as Northwest Editor of Backpacker magazine and even longer running this blog, I have seen much of the abundant gorgeous backcountry in those mountains—and concluded that, while Yosemite and Sequoia-Kings Canyon certainly do belong on every backpacker’s tick list, you should add the John Muir and Ansel Adams wildernesses as well.

Hi, I’m Michael Lanza, creator of The Big Outside. Click here to sign up for my FREE email newsletter. Join The Big Outside to get full access to all of my blog’s stories. Click here for my e-books to classic backpacking trips. Click here to learn how I can help you plan your next trip.

On my most-recent hike of nine days and almost 130 miles through the Adams, Muir, and a corner of Kings Canyon National Park in August 2022 (the lead photo at the top of this story was taken on that trip), two companions and I walked some premier sections of the John Muir Trail, explored high, off-trail terrain, and hiked through and camped by alpine lakes below skyscraping granite peaks and spires.

That trip illustrated how the extensive trail network throughout the High Sierra’s national parks and forests enable myriad options for multi-day hikes of virtually any distance—and the Ansel Adams and John Muir wildernesses protect those lands in as pristine a condition as you will find in any of the national parks. If you don’t have the time or desire for, say, a full John Muir Trail thru-hike, countless options for JMT section hikes and other trips exist throughout these wilderness areas.

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The photos in this story are from various trips in the Ansel Adams and John Muir wildernesses. Below the photo gallery, you’ll find links to many stories about High Sierra backpacking trips.

Please share your questions or comments about your own experiences in the High Sierra in the comments section at the bottom of this story. I try to respond to all comments.

And see my Custom Trip Planning page to learn how I can help you plan your next High Sierra backpacking adventure or any trip you read about at this blog.

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See all stories about backpacking in the High Sierra at The Big Outside, including “10 Great John Muir Trail Section Hikes,” “How to Get a Yosemite or High Sierra Wilderness Permit,” “High Sierra Ramble: 130 Miles On—and Off—the John Muir Trail,” and “In the Footsteps of John Muir: Finding Solitude in the High Sierra,” plus “America’s Top 10 Best Backpacking Trips.” Those stories about trips contain numerous photos and information on planning them. While roughly the first half of many stories about trips are free for anyone to read, reading them in full is an exclusive benefit for readers with a paid subscription to The Big Outside.

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For many serious backpackers, a thru-hike of the John Muir Trail looms as a sort of holy grail. But every JMT aspirant inevitably faces the question: How do you plan a 221-mile hike of “America’s Most Beautiful Trail?” Besides preparing physically for it, a JMT thru-hike poses myriad logistical and organizational challenges, from obtaining one of the country’s most sought-after wilderness permits to choosing an ideal time of year, the itinerary and number of days to take, gear, food resupplies, transportation, acclimating to elevations commonly between 9,000 and over 13,000 feet, and other details.

And, of course, you also want to know: Where are the best campsites along the JMT? What’s the best itinerary for backpacking the John Muir Trail?

This article offers expert tips regarding critical planning details and challenges when thru-hiking the John Muir Trail—unquestionably one of America’s 10 best backpacking trips. It draws on my JMT thru-hike and numerous trips in the High Sierra, as well as thousands of miles of backpacking all over the country over the past three decades, my 10 years as a field editor at Backpacker magazine and even longer running this blog.

Hi, I’m Michael Lanza, creator of The Big Outside. Click here to sign up for my FREE email newsletter. Join The Big Outside to get full access to all of my blog’s stories. Click here for my e-books to classic backpacking trips. Click here to learn how I can help you plan your next trip.

Two friends and I completed our JMT thru-hike in an admittedly insane seven days, hiking ultralight and averaging 31 miles per day. (The JMT spans 211 miles, but its southern end is atop Mount Whitney, where you still must hike over 10 miles downhill to finish the trip.) While the pre-trip prep proved time-consuming, it came together smoothly and we had a very successful—and quite memorable—trip.

Want to save a lot of time and ensure your JMT hike goes as well as possible? See my Custom Trip Planning page to learn how I can help you plan a JMT hike. At the bottom of that page you’ll find many comments from people who’ve received my custom trip planning, including a reader named Lauren who wrote: “Michael helped me plan my solo JMT thru-hike, and the process was beyond what I expected. He provided personal tips and perspectives from his own experiences as well as insight into what he’s seen others try and buy. He has amassed a wealth of detailed information about gear, training, trails, permits, regulations, transit, and all the details I knew would be a nightmare to suss out alone… It’s really like having a wilderness coach. Excited to plan another trip with him soon!”

Please share your questions or JMT tips in the comments section at the bottom of this story. I try to respond to all comments.

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Getting a Permit for Thru-Hiking the John Muir Trail

Obtaining a permit to backpack the entire trail represents one of the JMT’s greatest challenges—it’s one of the most sought-after backcountry permits in the country. JMT permits are in high demand for dates in July, August, and September. Check out the statistics on numbers of rolling lottery applications to start the JMT in Yosemite and their success rates at nps.gov/yose/planyourvisit/wpstats. (Spoiler alert: Nearly 70 percent of applications are unsuccessful during those peak months.)

The JMT crosses three national parks—Yosemite, Kings Canyon, and Sequoia—and two national forests, the Inyo and Sierra, as well as a pair of wilderness areas within those national forests, the Ansel Adams and John Muir. You must obtain a permit from the agency where you begin a JMT hike and that permit covers your entire trip.

Most thru-hikers try to begin in either Yosemite, the JMT’s northern terminus, or at Whitney Portal, which accesses the trail’s southern terminus, Mount Whitney.

Don’t have time for the entire JMT?
See “10 Great John Muir Trail Section Hikes.”

To hike the JMT southbound (the direction I recommend; more on that below), apply for a permit from Yosemite National Park at recreation.gov up to 24 weeks in advance of the date you want to start hiking, entering a weekly rolling lottery for a permit to start within a specific window of dates.

There are just two trailheads in Yosemite where you are permitted to launch a JMT thru-hike: the JMT’s northern terminus, the Happy Isles Trailhead in Yosemite Valley, which appears on the Yosemite permit application as Happy Isles to Past LYV (Donohue Pass eligible); and Lyell Canyon (Donohue Pass eligible)—the latter offering perhaps better odds of securing a permit, although starting at Lyell Canyon means you miss the JMT’s section from Yosemite Valley to Tuolumne Meadows. (Note: LYV represents Little Yosemite Valley, the park’s most popular backcountry camp, where JMT thru-hikers are not permitted to spend a night). See nps.gov/yose/planyourvisit/jmt.htm.

Backpackers starting at Whitney Portal to hike northbound reserve a permit through a lottery system conducted between Feb. 1 and March 1 at recreation.gov.

See “How to Get a John Muir Trail Wilderness Permit.”

Given the long odds of getting a full JMT permit during the peak season, consider the alternative of planning a trip on a long section of the trail—for which a permit can be much easier to obtain. I can help you figure out that itinerary and permit plan; click here.

I’ve helped hundreds of readers plan a JMT hike and other trips you read about at my blog.
Want my help with yours? Click here for expert advice you won’t get anywhere else.

The Prime Season for Thru-Hiking the John Muir Trail

A John Muir Trail thru-hike can often be done from early summer through September. But the best time for an ultralight thru-hike is mid-or late August to late September, when the mosquitoes have abated significantly and rain is rare—allowing you to use a tarp instead of a tent—the high passes are snow-free, and mornings are cool. Keep in mind there’s a chance of an early-season snowstorm—or increasingly in recent years, wildfires—interrupting your plans, especially in late summer.

How Many Days on the JMT?

Traditionally, backpackers have taken three weeks to thru-hike the entire JMT, a pace of about 10 miles a day. Today, with lighter gear, good training, and smart planning, many cut the time to two weeks or less. For instance, following a 15-day itinerary for backpacking the entire John Muir Trail requires averaging 14.7 miles per day—which is entirely feasible for fit backpackers.

Begin each day early—a smart plan to take advantage of the coolest hours of the day, anyway—and average 2.5 mph while walking, and you can hike 15 miles in six hours. Assuming two hours of rest time over the course of the day, that’s eight hours on the trail each day—an 8-to-4 workday. Even at 2 mph with two hours of down time, you can cover 12 miles in eight hours. Arrive with your legs in good shape and you’ll grow accustomed to that pace quickly. Experiment with backpacking longer days and traveling light on shorter trips before your JMT thru-hike.

Hiking southbound, you begin on the northern sections of the JMT, which are at moderate elevations and offer more possible resupply points to let you hike with less food weight than the trail’s southern half. By the time you reach Muir Trail Ranch, a common resupply point roughly near the JMT’s halfway point, you’ll have developed your trail legs for longer days, allowing you to carry less food weight for the southern half of the JMT.

Except for the high passes, the JMT is not, step for step, as difficult as hiking in other parts of the country. Give serious thought to food supply and daily mileage, because leaving Muir Trail Ranch with 10 or 11 days of food will add about 20 pounds to your pack as you head for the JMT’s highest passes.

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Minimizing Pack Weight

Successful long-distance hikers live by a cardinal rule: Keep your base pack weight (including only gear and clothing weight, which remains constant, not food and water) low enough that you can hike at a strong pace and rack up decent miles every day. A base pack weight of 15 pounds or less is easy to accomplish without compromising comfort or safety; many thru-hikers get it significantly lower than that.

During the summer, given the generally dry weather in the High Sierra and nighttime lows that don’t often drop below 40° F, you can use lightweight to ultralight gear, including your pack, tent, bag, and footwear. No specialized gear is needed on this trip, other than a bear canister; see the type of bear canister that I like in this review.

See my article “A Practical Guide to Lightweight and Ultralight Backpacking” for tips on lowering your pack weight. (Reading it in full requires a paid subscription to The Big Outside. If you don’t have a subscription, you can purchase that one article by clicking here.)

And see all reviews of ultralight backpacking gear at The Big Outside.

Plan your next great backpacking trip in Yosemite, Grand Teton,
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The Resupply Plan

Given the JMT’s remoteness, another of its major challenges is how few convenient opportunities to resupply food lie along it. They are, in order when hiking southbound:

• Tuolumne Meadows in Yosemite is a bit more than 21 miles on the JMT from Happy Isles Trailhead, the northern terminus. The Tuolumne Meadows store has a decent selection of groceries. You can ship a resupply package to yourself General Delivery at the Tuolumne Meadows Post Office, Yosemite National Park 95389; include your planned arrival date in the address. Grab a meal at the Tuolumne Meadows Grill.
• At Red’s Meadow (redsmeadow.com), a short hike off the JMT, resupply for the next 50 trail miles either by having someone meet you there, or for a fee, mailing or delivering a package in advance. Eat a big meal at the Mule House Café.
• Although it’s a few miles farther off the JMT than Muir Trail Ranch, Vermillion Valley Resort (vvr.place) provides lodging, free tent camping, showers, laundry, and an opportunity to resupply a bit north of MTR.
• Resupply a final time at Muir Trail Ranch (muirtrailranch.com/backpacker-resupply), about a mile off the JMT near the trail’s midpoint. Ship non-perishable food weeks in advance; a fee is charged.

Planning your next big adventure? See “America’s Top 10 Best Backpacking Trips”
and “Tent Flap With a View: 25 Favorite Backcountry Campsites.”

Acclimating to High Elevations

The John Muir Trail ranges in elevation from 4,035 feet at its northern terminus, the Happy Isles Trailhead in Yosemite Valley, to the 14,505-foot summit of Mount Whitney, its southern terminus. But much of the trail lies above 9,000 feet and it crosses six passes and a seventh named high point between 11,000 feet and over 13,000 feet (in order north to south): Donohue (11,056 feet), Muir (11,955 feet), Mather (12,100 feet), Pinchot (12,130 feet), Glen (11,978 feet), Forester (13,180 feet, highest pass on the JMT), and Trail Crest on Mount Whitney (13,650 feet). Two other passes approach 11,000 feet: Silver Pass (10,895 feet) and Selden Pass (10,800 feet).

The trail’s elevation profile represents yet another of its physical challenges and provides one of the best arguments for hiking it north to south: The highest elevations are in its southern half. When beginning at 4,000 feet in Yosemite Valley, you have time to gradually acclimate before reaching the first pass over 11,000 feet, crossing from Yosemite into the Ansel Adams Wilderness at Donohue Pass.

Alternatively, beginning at Whitney Portal, at about 8,370 feet, you’re already sucking air, starting with a heavy pack due to zero convenient resupply opportunities in the trail’s southern hundred miles, and will attempt to reach the JMT’s high point, Mount Whitney’s summit at 14,505 feet, on your second day. That’s a tough start.

Got any questions or suggestions regarding the JMT? Please share them below.

See all stories about backpacking the John Muir Trail at The Big Outside, including “Thru-Hiking the John Muir Trail: The Ultimate, 10-Day, Ultralight Plan,” “Thru-Hiking the John Muir Trail in 7 Days: Amazing Experience, or Certifiably Insane?” , which has more images, and “The Best Backpacking Gear for the John Muir Trail,” plus my Custom Trip Planning page to learn how I can help you plan a JMT hike.

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Sometimes it can seem like everyone who’s ever carried a backpack through mountains somewhere wants to thru-hike the John Muir Trail—especially when it comes time to reserve a JMT wilderness permit. And why not? “America’s Most Beautiful Trail” earns its nickname and ranks indisputably among “America’s Top 10 Best Backpacking Trips.” Consequently, few permits are harder to get; most people who enter one of the JMT rolling permit lotteries get rejected. This story explains the various ways to reserve a John Muir Trail wilderness permit—which you must do months ahead of your trip dates.

The tips below draw from my personal experience thru-hiking the JMT in an admittedly insane seven days as well as numerous trips on JMT sections (most recently in August 2022), in Yosemite, and throughout the High Sierra over more than three decades, including the 10 years I spent as Northwest Editor of Backpacker magazine and even longer running this blog.

Hi, I’m Michael Lanza, creator of The Big Outside. Click here to sign up for my FREE email newsletter. Join The Big Outside to get full access to all of my blog’s stories. Click here for my e-books to classic backpacking trips. Click here to learn how I can help you plan your next trip.

See “Thru-Hiking the John Muir Trail: What You Need to Know” and all stories about backpacking the John Muir Trail and backpacking in Yosemite and the High Sierra at The Big Outside. Most of those stories require a paid subscription to The Big Outside to read in full, including my tips and information on planning each hike.

See also “How to Get a Yosemite or High Sierra Wilderness Permit” and my expert e-books to multi-day hikes in Yosemite and other parks, including “The Best First Backpacking Trip in Yosemite.”

I’ve helped many readers plan their own JMT thru-hike or section hike and backpacking trips throughout the High Sierra and elsewhere, answering all of their questions (and many they didn’t think to ask) and customizing an itinerary ideal for them. See my Custom Trip Planning page to learn how I can help you and read hundreds of comments from others who’ve received my custom trip planning.

Please share any thoughts or questions about the JMT in the comments section at the bottom of this story. I try to respond to all comments.

Don’t Have Time for the entire JMT or didn’t get a permit?
See “10 Great John Muir Trail Section Hikes.”

John Muir Trail Wilderness Permits

The 211-mile-long John Muir Trail crosses Yosemite and Sequoia-Kings Canyon national parks and a pair of wilderness areas, the Ansel Adams and John Muir. You must obtain a permit from the agency where you begin a JMT hike and that permit covers your entire trip.

A high percentage of JMT permit lottery entrants don’t get a permit simply because the number of people seeking one every year far exceeds available permits. Check out the statistics on numbers of permits awarded in Yosemite (including for JMT starts) and their success rates at nps.gov/yose/planyourvisit/wpstats.

Spoiler alert: About 70 percent of applicants seeking a starting date during the peak period of mid-July through mid-August fail to get a permit reservation. But the success rate rises steadily to over 50 percent by mid-September—an excellent time to backpack in the High Sierra.

JMT thru-hikers generally begin in either Yosemite, the trail’s northern terminus, or at Whitney Portal, the starting point to reach the trail’s southern terminus on the summit of Mount Whitney. Backcountry campsites are not designated or assigned along most of the JMT; with few exceptions (largely in Yosemite), you may camp where you like but use sites that have clearly been used previously.

As I write in my “10 Tips for Getting a Hard-to-Get National Park Backcountry Permit,” the single most-effective strategy for maximizing your chances of getting a permit for a popular trip during its peak season is to consider at least two starting trailheads and itineraries—which requires knowing generally how far you want to walk each day—and a wide range of starting dates.

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Starting the JMT in Yosemite

To hike the JMT southbound (the direction I recommend), reserve a permit from Yosemite National Park at recreation.gov/permits/445859 up to 24 weeks in advance of the date you want to start hiking, entering a rolling lottery for a permit within a specific window of dates. You will be notified of whether you get a permit reservation within two business days after the lottery closes and will have three days to accept the permit or lose the reservation.

For example, to start a trip between Aug. 9-15, 2026, enter the lottery between Feb. 15 and Feb. 21. You will be notified of the result on Feb. 23 and must accept it (if successful) by Feb. 26 or forfeit it, and remaining reservations become available at 9 a.m. Pacific Time on Feb. 27 at recreation.gov/permits/445859 on a first-come, first-served basis. The weekly lottery ends in early May.

Yosemite issues all wilderness permits based on trailheads quotas and imposes a daily quota of 45 backpackers exiting the park via Donohue Pass on the JMT.

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One advantage of Yosemite’s rolling lottery is that, if you strike out in one lottery period, you will have plenty of time to apply again for the very next week.

The JMT’s northern terminus, the Happy Isles Trailhead in Yosemite Valley, is the starting point most often requested in the Yosemite lottery. There are just two trailheads in Yosemite where you are permitted to launch a JMT thru-hike or section hike—and specifically, to cross Donohue Pass, exiting Yosemite on the JMT—and those appear on the Yosemite permit application as Happy Isles to Past LYV (Donohue Pass eligible) and Lyell Canyon (Donohue Pass eligible)—the latter offering perhaps better odds of securing a permit. (Note: LYV represents Little Yosemite Valley, the park’s most popular backcountry camp, where JMT thru-hikers are not permitted to spend a night.)

See nps.gov/yose/planyourvisit/jmt.htm, which explains how to get a JMT permit for starting in Yosemite and how popular the JMT has become.

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Starting the JMT at Whitney Portal

To thru-hike the JMT northbound—or backpack a JMT section—starting at Whitney Portal between May 1 and Nov. 1, you must enter the Mount Whitney Zone permit lottery at recreation.gov/permits/233260 anytime between Feb. 1 and March 1; the form can be viewed but not filled out until Feb. 1.

Choose Mount Whitney Zone Overnight permit to create a permit good for multiple dates. Permit quotas are 100 people day use and 60 people overnight per day.

Lottery results are announced on March 15. The deadline to confirm a lottery reservation and pay the $15 per person fee is 9 p.m. Pacific time on April 21. On April 22, all unclaimed lottery permits are available for reservations at recreation.gov/permits/233260 starting at 7 a.m. Pacific Time.

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Backpack a Section of the JMT

If you fail to get a permit for a JMT thru-hike, consider a long John Muir Trail section hike—a satisfying consolation prize and a permit that’s much easier to get, especially starting from a trailhead in the Inyo National Forest.

The Inyo sprawls over the High Sierra between Yosemite and Sequoia-Kings Canyon, including a long stretch of the JMT through the Ansel Adams and John Muir wildernesses. A permit from the Inyo allows you to continue on the JMT into Yosemite or Sequoia-Kings Canyon.

The Inyo National Forest accepts reservations for 60 percent of trailhead quotas at recreation.gov/permits/233262 starting at 7 a.m. Pacific Time exactly six months before your start date—for example, on Feb. 1 for a trip starting Aug. 1. To finish by descending Mount Whitney to Whitney Portal, you must select permit type “Overnight Exiting Mt. Whitney.”

Forty percent of Inyo trailhead quotas open for reservations at recreation.gov/permits/233262 beginning at 7 a.m. Pacific Time two weeks prior to a trip’s start date.

See “How to Get a Yosemite or High Sierra Wilderness Permit” and more information at fs.usda.gov/main/inyo/passes-permits/recreation.

Get the right gear for the High Sierra. See “The 10 Best Backpacking Packs”
and “The 10 Best Backpacking Tents.”

Keep Your Group Small

The High Sierra national parks and forests all issue permits based on trailhead quotas on the total number of people starting trips every day and those quotas vary between trailheads. It stands to reason that smaller parties of one to four backpackers will have a better chance of landing a permit than larger groups.

See “How to Plan a Backpacking Trip—12 Expert Tips” and all stories with expert backpacking tips at The Big Outside.

Want my expert help custom planning your trip to ensure it’s as good as it can be? See my Custom Trip Planning page to learn how I can help you.

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Are you planning to thru-hike the John Muir Trail? “America’s Most Beautiful Trail” should be on every serious backpacker’s tick list. After hiking it in a blazing (and slightly crazy) seven days, I became convinced that—while that was quite hard—the traditional itinerary of spreading the roughly 221 miles (including more than 10 miles descending Mount Whitney that’s not part of the JMT) over about three weeks has a serious flaw: With limited food-resupply options, you’ll carry a monster pack that may not only make you sore and uncomfortable, it could cause injuries that cut short your trip.

As I write in my blog story “A Practical Guide to Lightweight and Ultralight Backpacking,” thousands of miles of backpacking over more than three decades—including the 10 years I spent as Northwest Editor of Backpacker magazine and even longer running this blog—have taught me that the single best step I can take to make all trips more enjoyable is simple: lightening my pack weight.

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In this article, I lay out a smart, complete, and proven ultralight strategy for thru-hiking the JMT in 10 to 11 days—and why you’d want to do it—plus, for anyone not able to average over 20 miles a day, a suggested two-week JMT thru-hike. While much of this story is free for anyone to read, reading the entire story, including specific tips that are based on my experience, is an exclusive benefit of a paid subscription to The Big Outside.

The John Muir Trail—definitely one of America’s 10 best backpacking trips—is ideal for going ultralight because of its generally dry summers, well-constructed footpath, and moderate grades. Backpackers who arrive with their legs in trail shape can knock off 20 to 22 miles a day—spending about 10 hours a day on the trail (including breaks) and averaging 2.5 mph, a reasonable pace for someone who’s fit and carrying a light pack.

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See my stories “Thru-Hiking the John Muir Trail: What You Need to Know,” “How to Get a John Muir Trail Wilderness Permit,” “10 Great John Muir Trail Section Hikes,” “The Best Backpacking Gear for the John Muir Trail,” and “A Practical Guide to Lightweight and Ultralight Backpacking.” 

See also my Custom Trip Planning page to learn how I can help you plan your JMT thru-hike or section hike or any trip you read about at The Big Outside, plus my expert e-books to backpacking trips in Yosemite and other parks.

Please share your thoughts on my tips below, or your own tricks, in the comments section at the bottom of this story. I try to respond to all comments.

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Permit Get a permit for the entire JMT from the park or forest where you plan to start, either Yosemite National Park or Whitney Portal on the Mount Whitney Trail in the Inyo National Forest. JMT permits are in very high demand for dates in July, August, and September.

To hike the JMT southbound, apply for a permit from Yosemite National Park at recreation.gov/permits/445859 up to 24 weeks in advance of the date you want to start hiking, entering a lottery for a permit within a specific window of dates.

Permits for hiking northbound, starting at Whitney Portal on the Mount Whitney Trail, are reserved through a lottery system at recreation.gov/permits/445860, conducted in February.

See “How to Get a John Muir Trail Wilderness Permit.”

See “10 Great John Muir Trail Section Hikes.”

Get the right backpack and tent for a hike like the JMT.
See the best ultralight backpacks and ultralight backpacking tents.

Not Down With 20-mile Days?

It’s not for everyone, of course. Many hikers allot three weeks, a pace of about 10 miles a day. Maybe the smartest strategy for you would be something in between—say, 16 days averaging about 14 miles per day. (I can help you plan that itinerary, including suggested camps. Click here to learn more.) Experiment with backpacking longer days and traveling light on shorter trips before your JMT thru-hike.

Still, traditional backpackers can draw benefits from adopting strategies employed by fastpackers—including hiking southbound on the JMT. Besides giving you time to acclimate to the higher elevations of the southern Sierra, it gives you two resupply opportunities in the northern half (Tuolumne Meadows and Red’s Meadow) to keep your pack lighter while building up your trail legs. And it gives you half the trip—prior to reaching the last resupply opp, Muir Trail Ranch—to gauge your food needs and daily mileage capabilities.

By that time, you may find you’re walking farther every day than you anticipated and possibly eating (slightly) less than planned. Both realizations are common among people doing their first long trail. Backpackers are as likely to overestimate food as underestimate it.

Plus, except for the high passes, the JMT is not, step for step, as difficult as hiking in other parts of the country. Give serious thought to food supply and daily mileage, because leaving Muir Trail Ranch with 10 or 11 days worth of food will add about 20 pounds to your pack as you head for the JMT’s highest passes.

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You might even plan to hike shorter days for the trail’s northern half, as you’re getting stronger as well as to linger in places, but by the time you reach Muir Trail Ranch, be ready for longer days in order to reduce your pack’s food weight for the southern half of the JMT.

And that, really, is the whole point. Carrying too much weight on your back only makes a trip more difficult—and can make it miserable. You spend too much time thinking about when you can take a break from carrying your pack instead of thinking about where you are. That’s not why you’re out there.

Discard any misguided notion that you’ll “miss too much” by hiking bigger days—you’re still walking, after all, and only incrementally faster than you would walk with a heavier pack. You’re just walking for more hours each day—and more comfortably.

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Let’s face it: The real reason you’d hike slower with a heavier pack is that it’s crushing weight is slowing you down—not because walking at that pace somehow gives you a higher-quality experience. It’s usually quite the opposite.

See all stories about backpacking the John Muir Trail at The Big Outside and my Custom Trip Planning page for details on how I can help make your JMT hike exponentially better by giving you personally customized trip planning.

Find more advice about planning a JMT thru-hike in my story about our seven-day thru-hike, which has more photos and a video, plus tips on planning it, and this menu of stories offering expert backpacking tips at The Big Outside.

Whether you’re a beginner or seasoned backpacker, you’ll learn new tricks for making all of your trips go better in my stories “How to Know How Hard a Hike Will Be,” “How to Plan a Backpacking Trip—12 Expert Tips” and “A Practical Guide to Lightweight and Ultralight Backpacking.” With a paid subscription to The Big Outside, you can read all of those three stories for free; if you don’t have a subscription, you can download the e-book versions of “How to Know How Hard a Hike Will Be,” “How to Plan a Backpacking Trip—12 Expert Tips,” and the lightweight backpacking guide without having a paid membership.

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What makes for a great backpacking trip? Certainly top-shelf scenery is mandatory. An element of adventurousness enhances a hike, in my eyes. While there’s definitely something inspirational about a big walk in the wild, some of the finest trips in the country can be done in a few days and half of the hikes on this list are under 50 miles. Another factor that truly matters is a wilderness experience: All 10 are in national parks or wilderness areas.

I’ve probably thought about this more than a mentally stable person should, having done many of America’s (and the world’s) most beautiful multi-day hikes over more than three decades (and counting) of carrying a backpack, including my 10 years as a field editor for Backpacker magazine and even longer running this blog. In the final analysis, though, the criterion that matters most is more simple and intuitive: that it’s undeniably a great trip. And that character shows itself over and over in my picks for the 10 best backpacking trips in the country.

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Each hike here merits a 10 for scenery. The longest trips on this list can be chopped up into smaller portions. Each description below includes a difficulty rating on a scale of 1 to 5, with 5 being the hardest in terms of strenuousness and challenge. I’ve listed them in a random order that’s not intended as a quality ranking; I think that’s impossible.

I regularly update this list as I take new trips that belong on it—but it has remained largely unchanged for a while (I think you’ll see why), except for adding new photos and links to new stories each time I revisit one of these trails or parks; as well as adding some new Close Runners-Up trip suggestions, which accompany each hike in my top 10.

My advice: Do every one of these top 10 and runner-up hikes that you can, when you can—many of the top 10 are harder to get a permit for than the runners-up, so the latter group provide good backup plans. You won’t be disappointed with any of them.

The descriptions and photos below link to stories at The Big Outside that have more images and information about these trips (most of which require a paid subscription to read in full)—including tips on planning each one yourself and when to apply for a backcountry permit, which is generally months in advance.

See my affordable, expert e-books to several of the trips described below and my Custom Trip Planning page to learn how I can help you plan any of these classic adventures, variations of them, or any trip you read about at The Big Outside. You might also find helpful tips in my stories “How to Plan a Backpacking Trip—12 Expert Tips” and “How to Know How Hard a Hike Will Be.”

If you have a trip to suggest, please tell me about it in the comments section at the bottom of this story. I hope to get to them all. It’s a tough assignment, but I’m on it.

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A Grand Tour of Yosemite

Distance: 152 miles, with multiple shorter variations
Difficulty: 4

John Muir saw more than a few world-class wildernesses, and he focused much of his time and energy on exploring and protecting Yosemite. A lot of people would legitimately argue it’s the best national park for backpackers. After several trips there, I had thought I’d seen Yosemite’s finest corners, including many trails in the park’s core, its section of the John Muir Trail, and the summits of Half Dome and Clouds Rest.

Then, in two trips totaling seven days spread over two years, I backpacked 152 miles through the biggest patches of wilderness in the park, south and north of Tuolumne Meadows (also shown in the lead photo at the top of this story)—and discovered Yosemite’s true soul, a vast reach of deep, granite-walled canyons, peaks rising to over 12,000 feet, and one gorgeous mountain lake after another dappling the landscape. And after those two trips, I returned again to backpack a 45-mile hike that I subsequently dubbed “Yosemite’s Best-Kept Secret Backpacking Trip.”

See my stories “Best of Yosemite: Backpacking South of Tuolumne Meadows,” about the 65-mile first leg of that 152-mile grand tour of Yosemite, “Best of Yosemite: Backpacking Remote Northern Yosemite,” about the nearly 87-mile second leg, “Backpacking Yosemite: What You Need to Know,” and all stories about backpacking in Yosemite at The Big Outside.

Get my expert e-books to backpacking the 65-mile hike south of Tuolumne Meadows
and the 87-mile hike through northern Yosemite (which include shorter options).

Want more of a less-committing, introductory backpacking trip in Yosemite? See my story “Where to Backpack First Time in Yosemite.” The trip I suggest in that story is described in much greater detail in my e-book “The Best First Backpacking Trip in Yosemite.” That e-book offers planning tips and suggested daily itineraries for a primary route and alternate itineraries for backpacking trips in the spectacular core of Yosemite, between Yosemite Valley and Tuolumne Meadows.

Close Runners-Up:

See “The 10 Best Backpacking Trips in Yosemite” and “Heavy Lifting: Backpacking Sequoia National Park,” about a 40-mile family backpacking trip that featured campsites that made both my top 25 all-time favorites and my list of the nicest backcountry campsites I’ve hiked past, plus all stories about backpacking in the High Sierra at The Big Outside.

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Two Hikes in Glacier National Park

Distance of each: 90-94 miles, with shorter variations
Difficulty of each: 3

With rivers of ice pouring off of craggy mountains and cliffs, deeply green forests, over 760 lakes offering mirror reflections of it all, megafauna like bighorn sheep, mountain goats, elk, moose, and grizzly and black bears, and over a million acres in Montana’s Northern Rockies, most of it wilderness, little wonder that Glacier is so popular with backpackers.

Two big hikes of over 90 miles—both of which have multiple possible shorter variations—deservedly grace this top 10 list. On both, my companions and I saw all of those sights and large beasts described above—yes, including grizzlies—and enjoyed a surprising degree of solitude even while hitting many of the park’s highlights.

One, a 90-miler through northern Glacier, split into 65- and 25-mile legs, was a variation of a hike known as the Northern Loop, following a route I customized to hit some of Glacier’s best scenery, including the entire Highline Trail, the Many Glacier area, Piegan Pass and Stoney Indian Pass, the Ptarmigan Wall and Tunnel, and some of the park’s finest lakes and most-remote wilderness.

On the second hike, three friends and I backpacked about 94 miles through Glacier, from Chief Mountain Trailhead at the Canadian border in the park’s northeast corner to Two Medicine, combining parts of the primary and alternate routes of the Continental Divide Trail, and adding the high, alpine trail from Pitamakan Pass to Dawson Pass above Two Medicine. Yet again, we saw bighorn sheep, mountain goats, black bears, moose, and a griz, and heard elk bugling almost every morning and evening (because it was September)—not to mention vistas unlike anywhere else in America.

See my story about the two-stage, 90-mile hike “Descending the Food Chain: Backpacking Glacier National Park’s Northern Loop,” my story “Wildness All Around You: Backpacking the CDT Through Glacier” about the 94-mile hike, and “Déjà vu All Over Again: Backpacking in Glacier National Park,” about my most recent, weeklong hike in Glacier on a variation of the CDT route.

Get my expert e-books to backpacking Glacier’s Northern Loop and the CDT through Glacier.

And check out “10 Backpacking Trips for Solitude in Glacier National Park,” “How to Get a Permit to Backpack in Glacier National Park,” and all stories about backpacking in Glacier at The Big Outside.

Close Runners-Up:

Think of the Canadian Rockies this way: They resemble Glacier but with more and bigger glaciers and covering a much vaster area. For much of its distance, the 34-mile Rockwall Trail in Kootenay National Park passes below a long chain of sheer cliffs and mountains that conjure images of numerous El Capitans lined up in a row, but with thick tongues of glacial ice pouring off them. And the 27-mile Skyline Trail in Jasper National Park remains above treeline for more than half its distance, with nearly constant panoramas of massive walls of rock and a sea of mountains in every direction.

Retaining a surprising degree of anonymity considering that they’re situated between Glacier and Yellowstone, the Beartooth Mountains rise to over 12,000 feet and are most uniquely characterized by high, rolling, alpine plateaus over 10,000 feet. Like Glacier, the Beartooths have deep, glacier-carved canyons with remnant patches of ancient ice, and are home to moose, mountain goats, bighorn sheep, elk, bald eagles, gray wolves, black bears, and grizzlies—plus hundreds of trout-filled alpine lakes. See my story “Backpacking the High and Mighty Beartooth Mountains.”

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Teton Crest Trail

Distance: 33-40 miles, multiple variations
Difficulty: 4

One of my first big, Western backpacking trips was on the Teton Crest Trail in Wyoming’s Grand Teton National Park, and it so inspired me that I’ve returned more than 20 times since to backpack, dayhike, rock climb, backcountry ski, and paddle a canoe in the Tetons. I can’t imagine that jagged skyline ever failing to give me chills.

Running north-south through the heart of the national park and adjacent national forest lands, the Teton Crest Trail stays above treeline for much of its distance, with expansive views of the peaks, but also drops into the beautiful South Fork and North Fork of Cascade Canyon, Paintbrush Canyon, and the upper forks of Granite Canyon, and crosses Paintbrush Divide at 10,720 feet.

Various trails access it, allowing for multiple route options, any of them making for one of America’s premier multi-day hikes.

See my stories  “A Wonderful Obsession: Backpacking the Teton Crest Trail,” “5 Reasons You Must Backpack the Teton Crest Trail,” “How to Get a Permit to Backpack the Teton Crest Trail,” and “Walking Familiar Ground: Reliving Old Memories and Making New Ones on the Teton Crest Trail,” plus all stories about backpacking the Teton Crest Trail at The Big Outside.

I’ve helped countless readers plan a perfect, personally customized itinerary on the Teton Crest Trail. See my Custom Trip Planning page to learn how I can help you plan your trip.

Yearning to backpack in the Tetons? See my e-books to the Teton Crest Trail
and the best short backpacking trip in the Tetons.

Close Runners-Up:

A two- or three-day hike linking any of the east-side canyons in Grand Teton National Park, such as the nearly 20-mile Paintbrush Canyon-Cascade Canyon loop (the most popular in the park). See “The 5 Best Backpacking Trips in Grand Teton National Park.” Or virtually any backpacking trip in the Wind River Range (see below).

The Wonderland Trail

Distance: 93 miles, with shorter variations
Difficulty: 4

No multi-day hike in the contiguous United States compares with the Wonderland Trail around Mount Rainier—because there’s no mountain in the Lower 48 like glacier-clad, 14,410-foot Mount Rainier.

Backpacking the Wonderland Trail, one repeatedly sees Rainier fill the horizon at a seemingly unbelievable scale, a sight always thrilling and inspiring. This trail features some of the most beautiful wildflower meadows you will ever see, countless waterfalls and cascades, crystalline creeks and raging rivers gray with “glacial flour,” and likely sightings of mountain goats, marmots, deer, and possibly black bears.

Accessed from several trailheads, it can be thru-hiked in its entirety—commonly done over nine to 10 days—or you can backpack shorter trips of varying lengths on sections of the Wonderland. The full loop is a strenuous trip, with over 44,000 cumulative vertical feet of elevation gain and loss, and choices you make like which direction to hike the loop, where to begin it, and whether to take a popular detour onto the higher and more-scenic Spray Park Trail, all affect the trip’s overall difficulty—which I spell out in detail in my expert e-book “The Complete Guide to Backpacking the Wonderland Trail in Mount Rainier National Park.”

This much I will guarantee: The Wonderland Trail is the kind of adventure that stays with you long afterward.

See my stories “5 Reasons You Must Backpack Mount Rainier’s Wonderland Trail,” “How to Get a Permit to Backpack Rainier’s Wonderland Trail” and “An American Gem: Backpacking Mount Rainier’s Wonderland Trail,” about a 77-mile hike on what I consider the WT’s best sections (a route described as one of the alternate itineraries in my e-book).

Close Runner-Up:

See my story “Full of Surprises: Backpacking Mount Hood’s Timberline Trail” about a trip very similar in character to the Wonderland Trail—but much shorter and requiring no permit reservation—the 41-mile Timberline Trail around Oregon’s Mount Hood.

Want to hike the Wonderland Trail? Get my expert e-book
“The Complete Guide to Backpacking the Wonderland Trail in Mount Rainier National Park.”

Zion’s Narrows

Distance: 16 miles
Difficulty: 2

The North Fork of the Virgin River carves out a uniquely deep, slender, and awe-inspiring redrock canyon in Utah’s Zion National Park, with walls up to 1,000 feet tall that close in to just 20 feet apart in places. Springs gush from cracks in the walls, nourishing lush hanging gardens. On clear nights, a black sky riddled with stars fills the narrow strip visible between the rock walls soaring overhead.

In the low-water levels when backpackers typically make the two-day descent of The Narrows, you’re walking most of the time in water from ankle-deep (most commonly) to, occasionally, waist-deep, over a cobblestone riverbed that makes for slow progress.

Click here now for my e-book to Backpacking Zion’s Narrows.

But you’ll feel no desire to rush through one of the most enchanting hikes in the National Park System (especially since the lower end is often crowded with dayhikers, while the trip’s first day and second morning are much quieter).

See my story “Luck of the Draw, Part 2: Backpacking Zion’s Narrows.”

Close Runners-Up:

Paria Canyon and Buckskin Gulch
Traversing Zion National Park
The Needles District and Maze District of Canyonlands National Park
Coyote Gulch, Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument
Death Hollow Loop, Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument
Aravaipa Canyon, Arizona

Get the right gear for your trips. See “The 10 Best Backpacking Packs”
and “The 10 Best Backpacking Tents.”

John Muir Trail

Distance: 221 miles
Difficulty: 4

The John Muir Trail’s 211 miles from Yosemite Valley to the highest summit in the Lower 48, 14,505-foot Mount Whitney in Sequoia National Park, has often been described as “America’s Most Beautiful Trail”—and hyperbolic as it sounds, it’s hard to argue against that lofty claim.

The two- to three-week journey through California’s High Sierra (totaling 221 miles, including the 10-mile descent off Whitney, not actually part of the JMT) stays mostly above 9,000 feet as it traverses mile after jaw-dropping mile of a landscape of incisor peaks, too many waterfalls to name, and countless, pristine wilderness lakes nestled in granite basins.

You climb over numerous passes between 11,000 and over 13,000 feet, with views that stretch a hundred miles. Although not a place for solitude during the peak season (mid-July to mid-September), the JMT may be the one hike on this list that every serious backpacker probably aspires to accomplish.

The hardest part may be what comes long before you lace up your boots: getting a JMT permit, which necessarily requires figuring out your itinerary and how many days you will spend on the trail.

See all stories about backpacking the John Muir Trail at The Big Outside, including “How to Get a John Muir Trail Wilderness Permit,” “Thru-Hiking the John Muir Trail: What You Need to Know,” an “Ultimate, 10-Day, Ultralight Plan” for a JMT thru-hike, and “Thru-Hiking the John Muir Trail in Seven Days: Amazing Experience, or Certifiably Insane?”

Close Runners-Up:

See “10 Great John Muir Trail Section Hikes,” “High Sierra Ramble: 130 Miles On—and Off—the John Muir Trail,” “Heavy Lifting: Backpacking Sequoia National Park,” my story about a remote, partly off-trail, 32-mile traverse of the John Muir Wilderness, and all stories about High Sierra backpacking trips at The Big Outside.

Want to hike the Teton Crest Trail, John Muir Trail, or another trip on this list?
Click here for expert custom trip planning you won’t get elsewhere.

South Kaibab to Lipan Point, Grand Canyon

Distance: 74 miles, with shorter variations
Difficulty: 5

Every backpacking trip I’ve taken in the Grand Canyon deserves a spot on this list—the place possesses all the qualities of a great adventure, in a landscape like nowhere else on the planet. But when a longtime backcountry ranger in the park told me this 74-mile hike was “the best backpacking trip in the Grand Canyon,” of course I had to check it out.

After backpacking it, I decided: He’s right.

For starters, the South Kaibab is one of the best trails in the entire National Park System. Beyond that, this route follows one of the of the prettiest and most adventurous “trails” in the canyon, the Escalante Route, which involves some tricky route-finding and exposed scrambling. This hike also includes an outstanding section of the Tonto Trail, the beautiful and surprisingly rigorous Beamer Trail, and another lovely, rim-to-river footpath, the Tanner Trail.

Plus, you’ll enjoy some of the best backcountry campsites you’ve ever spent a night in, including beaches on the Colorado River, and the kind of solitude that’s rare in many national parks.

See “The Best Backpacking Trip in the Grand Canyon.”

Get my expert e-books to “The Best Backpacking Trip in the Grand Canyon”
and an easier alternative, “The Best First Backpacking Trip in the Grand Canyon.”

I’ve helped many readers plan a perfect, personally customized backpacking itinerary in the Grand Canyon—a place where trip planning is complicated by seasonal temperature extremes and road access, scarce water sources, high competition for backcountry permits, and significant differences in character and difficulty between trails and routes.

See my Custom Trip Planning page to learn how I can help you plan your Big Ditch backpacking trip.

Close Runners-Up:

Almost any other trip in the Grand Canyon. See “10 Epic Grand Canyon Backpacking Trips You Must Do,” “How to Get a Permit to Backpack in the Grand Canyon,” and all stories about backpacking in the Grand Canyon at The Big Outside.

Hike all of “The 12 Best Backpacking Trips in the Southwest.”
For a beginner-friendly trip, see “The 5 Southwest Backpacking Trips You Should Do First.”

The Southern Olympic Coast

Distance: 17.5 miles
Difficulty: 2

The 17.5-mile hike from the Hoh River north to La Push Road, on the southern coast of Washington’s Olympic National Park, is still one of my kids’ most memorable backpacking trips—mostly for the hours they spent playing in tide pools on the beach (they were nine and seven at the time). But it’s also one that backpackers of all ages find gorgeous and fascinating.

It features giant trees in one of Earth’s largest virgin temperature rainforests; frequently mist-shrouded views of scores of sea stacks rising up to 200 feet out of the ocean; boulders wallpapered with sea stars, mussels, and sea anemones; rugged and very muddy hiking on overland trails around impassable headlands; sightings of seals, sea otters, whales, and to my kids’ delight, lots of slugs; and rope ladders to climb and descend very steep terrain—including cliffs.

Consequently, while just as scenic, it’s less crowded than the more popular northern stretch of the Olympic coast. The 73-mile-long finger of the park on the Pacific Ocean protects the longest stretch of wilderness coastline in the contiguous United States—and one of America’s most unique backpacking adventures.

See my story “The Wildest Shore: Backpacking the Southern Olympic Coast.”

Close Runner-Up:

Honestly, nothing.

But for classic wilderness trips in the Pacific Northwest, I suggest the hike to Cascade Pass and up Sahale Arm to Sahale Glacier Camp, in North Cascades National Park, with a jaw-dropping campsite view; this 80-mile hike (and shorter variations of it) in the North Cascades; the Spider Gap-Buck Creek Pass Loop in the Glacier Peak Wilderness; and certainly, Mount Hood’s Timberline Trail.

See all stories about Olympic National Park and stories about the North Cascades at The Big Outside.

See “Tent Flap With a View: 25 Favorite Backcountry Campsites.”

The Wind River Range

Distance: multiple routes and distances
Difficulty: 3 to 5

The Winds can’t honestly be described as “undiscovered,” by any stretch. Still, as popular as a few corners are, much of this Wyoming range offers a rare combination of periods of solitude amid some of the most dramatic peaks and beautiful mountain lakes in the country—lots of lakes. Rank U.S. mountain ranges according to the best scenery and lakes, and I think the top two are the Winds and the High Sierra—and you could argue which is number one for as many years as it would take to visit every lake in the Winds.

I’ve taken several trips into the Winds over the past three decades, backpacking, climbing, and one really long dayhike—all of them outstanding, but a few places stand out.

One was a camp in Titcomb Basin—where granite peaks rise to over 13,000 feet from lakes at over 10,000 feet—on a 41-mile loop where two friends and I hiked past a constellation of beautiful lakes and took a spicy off-trail route over 12,240-foot Knapsack Col.

On long stretches of a lonely, 43-mile loop in a less-visited area of the Winds, we enjoyed one of the best backcountry campsites I’ve ever had, crossed four high passes, and walked one stunning trail after another past numerous alpine lakes, including two of the prettiest backcountry lakes I’ve hiked past without camping at.

I’ve climbed in and hiked through the Cirque of the Towers on multiple epic adventures, including a 27-mile, east-west dayhike across the Winds and a 96-mile, mostly off-trail, south-north traverse of the Wind River High Route. But most recently, a friend and I hiked across the Cirque to cap off a four-day loop from Big Sandy that crosses four passes and features camps by beautiful lakes—a route I consider the best multi-day hike in the Winds.

The Winds can seriously make you wonder: “Why don’t I just come here all the time?”

Don’t forget anything important! See “An Essentials-Only Backpacking Gear Checklist.”

See “The 10 Best Backpacking Trips in the Wind River Range,” “5 Reasons You Must Backpack the Wind River Range,” “The Best Backpacking Trip in the Wind River Range? Yup,” and all stories about backpacking in the Wind River Range at The Big Outside.

Close Runner-Up:

See my stories about another high, rugged mountain range where you can find solitude, northern Utah’s High Uintas: “Backpacking—and Sandbagging—Utah’s Uinta Highline Trail” and “Tall and Lonely: Backpacking Utah’s High Uintas Wilderness.”

Ready to hike one of the world’s great treks?
Click here now for my e-book “The Perfect, Flexible Plan for Hiking the Tour du Mont Blanc.”

Idaho’s Sawtooth Mountains

Distance: 36 miles, with longer and shorter variations
Difficulty: 2

The Sawtooths are one of the West’s most under-appreciated mountain ranges, with national park-caliber scenery, but nowhere near the numbers of hikers found in the most popular parks (although more and more backpackers are exploring the few popular areas of the Sawtooths).

Having backpacked and climbed through most of the range since settling in Idaho more than 20 years ago, the multi-day hike I’d recommend there is a five-day, roughly 36-mile route from Redfish Lake to Tin Cup Trailhead on Pettit Lake, including an out-and-back side trip to one of the finest lakes basins in the entire range.

Requiring a short shuttle that can be arranged locally—the Sawtooth trails aren’t conducive to creating long loop hikes—this trip crosses four passes over 9,000 feet and features campsites on some of the Sawtooths’ best mountain lakes, below endless jagged ridgelines.

See my story “The Best of Idaho’s Sawtooths: Backpacking Redfish to Pettit.” My expert e-book “The Best Backpacking Trip in Idaho’s Sawtooth Mountains” tells you all you need to know to plan and pull off this trip and includes three alternate itineraries that allow you to shorten the hike to four days or extend it to six or seven days.

Close Runners-Up:

See my stories “Mountain Lakes of Idaho’s Sawtooths—A Photo Gallery,” “The Best Hikes and Backpacking Trips in Idaho’s Sawtooths” and “Going After Goals: Backpacking in Idaho’s Sawtooth Mountains,” about a 57-mile hike in the more remote southern Sawtooths.

See also my story about the Idaho Wilderness Trail, a nearly 300-mile, long-distance trail I helped conceive that passes through the Sawtooths, and all stories about Idaho’s Sawtooths and neighboring White Cloud Mountains at The Big Outside; plus my story about another under-appreciated mountain range dappled with gorgeous lakes, northeastern Oregon’s Wallowas, “Learning the Hard Way: Backpacking Oregon’s Eagle Cap Wilderness.”

I’ve helped many readers plan an unforgettable backpacking trip in the Sawtooths.
Want my help with yours? Find out more here.

Whether you’re a beginner or seasoned backpacker, you’ll learn new tricks for making all of your trips go better in my stories “How to Know How Hard a Hike Will Be,” “How to Plan a Backpacking Trip—12 Expert Tips,” and “A Practical Guide to Lightweight and Ultralight Backpacking.” With a paid subscription to The Big Outside, you can read all of those three stories for free; if you don’t have a subscription, you can download the e-book versions of “How to Plan a Backpacking Trip—12 Expert Tips,” the lightweight and ultralight backpacking guide, and “How to Know How Hard a Hike Will Be.”

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Like moths to a flame—or perhaps pikas to talus—at some point, many serious backpackers will decide they must thru-hike the John Muir Trail. But some will wonder whether they’re ready or have the time for a 221-mile hike that may take up to three weeks—and many will fail to get one of the most sought-after wilderness permits in the country. What then?

Well, there’s no better Plan B for a JMT thru-hike than knocking off a section of it as a consolation prize or to dial in your strategy and gear for eventually adding “America’s Most Beautiful Trail” to your tick list. And for virtually any JMT section hike, you’ll have much better chances of getting a wilderness permit than you will for a JMT thru-hike.

Hi, I’m Michael Lanza, creator of The Big Outside. Click here to sign up for my FREE email newsletter. Join The Big Outside to get full access to all of my blog’s stories. Click here for my e-books to classic backpacking trips. Click here to learn how I can help you plan your next trip.

The Best Hikes on the John Muir Trail

I put together the John Muir Trail section hikes described in this article—which vary greatly in distance and lie spread out along the entire JMT (most of which overlaps the Pacific Crest Trail/PCT)—based on my personal experience thru-hiking it in an admittedly insane seven days as well as numerous trips on JMT sections and throughout the High Sierra from Yosemite to Sequoia-Kings Canyon National Park. I’ve also backpacked thousands of miles all over the country over the past three-plus decades, including the 10 years I spent as Northwest Editor at Backpacker magazine and even longer running this blog.

You’ll see on maps that it’s certainly feasible to combine some of the section hikes described below in a longer, partial-JMT trek. And some of the trips in this article hit wonderful stretches of the JMT while also covering significant distances off the JMT, exploring other, very worthy corners of the High Sierra.

Camping restrictions exist on some heavily used sections of the John Muir Trail; check each park’s or forest’s website when planning a trip. Bear canisters are required throughout the High Sierra. (See my favorite bear canister in this review.)

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This article includes links to feature-length stories about trips, which contain numerous photos and often a video. See also “How to Get a John Muir Trail Wilderness Permit,” “Thru-Hiking the John Muir Trail: What You Need to Know,” and all stories about backpacking the John Muir Trail at The Big Outside, plus “America’s Top 10 Best Backpacking Trips.”

Many stories at my blog, like this one, are partially free for anyone to read, but reading them in full (and seeing all the trips I describe in this story) is an exclusive benefit of subscribing to The Big Outside—which gives you full access to all stories at this blog, including my expert tips on planning the many trips I’ve personally taken and written about.

Check out my Custom Trip Planning page to learn how I can help you plan any of these adventures, variations of these best hikes on the John Muir Trail, your JMT thru-hike, or any trip you read about at The Big Outside, and my expert e-books to many classic backpacking trips.

If you have any questions or suggestions for other JMT sections or High Sierra trips, please share them in the comments section at the bottom of this story. I try to respond to all comments.

Planning your next big adventure? See “America’s Top 10 Best Backpacking Trips”
and “Tent Flap With a View: 25 Favorite Backcountry Campsites.”

Tuolumne Meadows to Reds Meadow

36 miles

From the Lyell Canyon/Rafferty Creek Trailhead at the east end of Tuolumne Meadows, at 8,700 feet in Yosemite, you can hike just over a half-mile to jump on the JMT southbound. From there, you’ll remain on the John Muir Trail for the next 35 miles to Reds Meadow.

A likely easier permit to get compared to starting at the JMT’s traditional northern terminus, the Happy Isles Trailhead in Yosemite Valley, this section hike ascends some 2,300 feet to cross 11,056-foot Donahue Pass from Yosemite into the Ansel Adams Wilderness, then mostly cruises downhill past Thousand Island and Garnet lakes and a few smaller ones before reaching Reds. 

A relatively easy but scenic JMT introduction, this 35.7-mile section also offers the logistical conveniences of not requiring two vehicles or to pay for a shuttle or have someone drop you off, with public bus and shuttle services connecting Tuolumne and Reds (as well as Yosemite Valley). Add about 24 miles—making it a 60-mile hike—by starting at Yosemite Valley, also a great, weekend or three-day JMT section hiking to Tuolumne Meadows.

See photos and read about this section of the JMT in my story “Thru-Hiking the John Muir Trail in 7 Days: Amazing Experience or Certifiably Insane?”

Plan your next great backpacking adventure in Yosemite
and other flagship parks using my expert e-books.

Agnew Meadows to Yosemite Valley

52 miles

You may notice that this hike is the only one in this article described as hiking the JMT northbound—not because any of these trips cannot be hiked in either direction, but because many JMT thru-hikers and section hikers go southbound in order to gradually acclimate to the higher elevations of the southern trail. But the benefit of hiking this section northbound is an easier wilderness permit to obtain—versus trying to start at the JMT’s northern terminus in Yosemite Valley—for a hike that combines a great stretch of the trail through the Ansel Adams Wilderness and the JMT’s entire Yosemite segment.

From Agnew Meadows at over 8,300 feet—where there are various possible starting trailheads—the shortest route to the JMT reaches it just 3.7 miles from the trailhead, at the west shore of Shadow Lake, where you’ll turn north and remain on the trail for the next roughly 48 miles to Yosemite Valley (depending on the route you take through Tuolumne Meadows and whether you opt for diversions off the JMT to Clouds Rest and Half Dome).

After passing two of the trail’s prettiest lakes, Garnet and Thousand Island, this route ascends steadily to enter Yosemite at 11,056-foot Donohue Pass. From there, it’s virtually all downhill through Lyell Canyon to Tuolumne Meadows, Cathedral Pass and Lakes, the meadows of Sunrise below the peaks of the Cathedral Range, past the Half Dome Trail junction—a highly recommended side trip—and the brink of thunderous, 594-foot Nevada Fall, finishing at the JMT’s northern terminus, the Happy Isles Trailhead in Yosemite Valley.

See photos and more info about this route and Yosemite in “High Sierra Ramble: 130 Miles On—and Off—the John Muir Trail” and “The 12 Best Dayhikes in Yosemite,” and see all stories about backpacking in Yosemite at The Big Outside.

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North Lake-South Lake Loop

57 miles

From the Piute Pass/North Lake Trailhead, at 9,360 feet, to the South Lake/Bishop Pass Trailhead, at over 9,800 feet, this near-loop—the trailheads lie a short drive apart—constitutes, mile for mile, not just one of the best hikes along the John Muir Trail, but also one of the best multi-day hikes in the High Sierra.

Located within the John Muir Wilderness of the Inyo National Forest (which is the permitting agency) and a corner of Kings Canyon National Park, this hike features nearly 27 miles of the JMT’s finest miles along the South Fork San Joaquin River, past alpine lakes rippling below soaring cliffs in the Evolution Basin, over 11,955-foot Muir Pass, and through LeConte Canyon, with its own towering granite walls and peaks.

The loop also crosses two other passes, Piute at 11,423 feet and Bishop at 11,972 feet; Humphreys Basin at 11,000 feet below Mount Humphreys, which towers to almost 14,000 feet, and the wall of peaks along the Glacier Divide; plus Dusy Basin at over 11,000 feet, below the massive crest of the Palisades’ 13ers and 14ers; and follows the courses of Piute and Evolution creeks past waterfalls and roaring cascades. There’s not a dull moment on this entire hike.

Find more information at fs.usda.gov/recarea/inyo/recreation/recarea/?recid=21048&actid=51 and fs.usda.gov/recarea/inyo/recarea/?recid=20358&actid=50.

Want to hike the John Muir Trail?
Click here for expert, detailed advice you won’t get elsewhere.

Rae Lakes Loop

41 miles

This 41.4-mile loop in Kings Canyon National Park earns its status as one of the most enduringly popular backpacking trips in the entire High Sierra—and certainly one of the best hikes on the John Muir Trail, even though much of the loop stays off the JMT, exploring the backcountry of Kings Canyon National Park amid the skyscraping peaks of the southern High Sierra—for a few good reasons.

But foremost that it features an outstanding section of the JMT through the Rae Lakes Valley and over 11,978-foot Glen Pass, the loop’s only high pass.

Starting at Road’s End, at 5,035 feet in Yosemite Valley-like Kings Canyon, the loop gradually ascends the valleys of the South Fork Kings Canyon River and Bubbs Creek (when hiking clockwise) and finishes down the Bubbs Creek Valley.

Besides the convenience of a loop hike at a distance that many backpackers will consider moderate—plus just one high pass to cross, making it a bit easier than several section hikes in this article—it also begins on the west side of the High Sierra, less than a day’s drive from major airports and most Californians, helping to explain the huge demand for this permit.

Find more information at https://www.nps.gov/seki/planyourvisit/rae-lakes-loop.htm.

Do the JMT right. See “How to Get a John Muir Trail Wilderness Permit”
and “Thru-Hiking the John Muir Trail: What You Need to Know.”

Kearsarge Pass Trailhead to Whitney Portal

48.6 miles

This section hike is not for the faint of heart or backpackers who struggle with high elevations. But the reward for this serious effort is some of the biggest scenery and highest points on the John Muir Trail, including the summit of Mount Whitney—certainly a highlight of any JMT thru-hike or section hike.

While it begins with a climb of almost 2,700 feet in 4.7 miles from the Kearsarge Pass Trailhead, at 9,185 feet, past a string of small lakes in the John Muir Wilderness to 11,845-foot Kearsarge Pass—where you enter Kings Canyon National Park—you’ll reach the JMT south of Glen Pass in just 7.5 miles and follow it southbound for 30.7 miles to its southern terminus atop 14,505-foot Mount Whitney.

The JMT makes a gradual ascent of the Bubbs Creek Valley to 13,180-foot Forester Pass, the trail’s highest, enters Sequoia National Park and descends through a stark alpine lakes basin at over 12,000 feet, and then makes a long, grueling ascent of almost 4,000 feet up the west face of Whitney to its broad summit.

From there, it’s a long, 10.4-mile and over 6,000-foot descent to the Whitney Portal Trailhead at nearly 8,400 feet. Starting at the Kearsarge Pass Trailhead lends you better odds getting a permit than trying to start at Whitney Portal—one of the most popular trailheads in the High Sierra.

See my stories “Thru-Hiking the John Muir Trail in 7 Days: Amazing Experience or Certifiably Insane?” and “Roof of the High Sierra: A Father-Son Climb of Mount Whitney.”

Get the right gear for your trips.
See “The Best Backpacking Gear for the John Muir Trail.”

See all stories about backpacking the John Muir Trail at The Big Outside and “America’s Top 10 Best Backpacking Trips.”

Whether you’re a beginner or seasoned backpacker, you’ll learn new tricks for making all of your trips go better in my stories “How to Know How Hard a Hike Will Be,” “How to Plan a Backpacking Trip—12 Expert Tips,” and “A Practical Guide to Lightweight and Ultralight Backpacking.” With a paid subscription to The Big Outside, you can read all of those three stories for free; if you don’t have a subscription, you can download the e-book versions of “How to Plan a Backpacking Trip—12 Expert Tips,” the lightweight and ultralight backpacking guide, and “How to Know How Hard a Hike Will Be.”

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So you’re planning to thru-hike the John Muir Trail and making all of the necessary preparations, and now you’re wondering: What’s the best gear for a JMT hike? Having thru-hiked the JMT as well as taken numerous other backpacking trips all over the High Sierra—mostly between late August and late September, which I consider that the best time to walk the Sierra, to avoid snow and the voracious mosquitoes and blazing hot afternoons of mid-summer—I offer the following picks for the best ultralight and lightweight backpacking gear and apparel for a JMT thru-hike.

Indisputably one of the best backpacking trips in America—and among the very best I’ve taken over three decades of backpacking, including the 10 years I spent as Northwest Editor and lead gear reviewer for Backpacker magazine and even longer running this blog—the JMT meanders for 211 miles through the magnificent High Sierra, from Yosemite Valley to the summit of the highest peak in the Lower 48, 14,505-foot Mount Whitney (where backpackers must then descend another 11 miles to finish the trip at Whitney Portal trailhead). See my story about thru-hiking the JMT in seven days.

Hi, I’m Michael Lanza, creator of The Big Outside. Click here to sign up for my FREE email newsletter. Join The Big Outside to get full access to all of my blog’s stories. Click here for my e-books to classic backpacking trips. Click here to learn how I can help you plan your next trip.

With few opportunities to resupply along the trail—and given the generally dry weather in the Sierra in summer—you can easily and should hike the JMT with the lightest gear that works for you (or that you can afford). Maximum pack weight will depend on how many days you spend on the trail and your food weight, but it’s quite feasible to keep your base pack weight (everything but food and water) within 15 pounds or less—and certainly no more than 20 pounds—without compromising safety or comfort in camp.

See my stories “Thru-Hiking the John Muir Trail: What You Need to Know,” “Thru-Hiking the John Muir Trail: The Ultimate, 10-Day, Ultralight Plan,” and “A Practical Guide to Lightweight and Ultralight Backpacking,” my Custom Trip Planning page to learn how I can help you plan your JMT thru-hike and any trip you read about at The Big Outside, and my expert e-books to backpacking trips in Yosemite and other parks.

The following suggestions for major gear items would also be solid picks for almost any backpacker who wants to go lighter and hike more comfortably in many mid-latitude mountain ranges in summer—although items like your tent and footwear would depend on the typical weather and bugs (and time of year).

Most recommendations below have a link to my full review of each. Click on the name of any product to buy it; those are affiliate links, meaning you can support my work on this blog by purchasing through them, at no cost to you.

Please share your thoughts on these gear suggestions for the JMT, or your own suggested gear, in the comments section at the bottom of this story. I try to respond to all comments.

Planning to hike the John Muir Trail?
Click here for expert, detailed advice you won’t get elsewhere.

Backpack

For a backpack, I like a few models that weigh under three pounds: two top-loaders with traditional features like lots of external pockets, the Osprey men’s Exos 58 or 48 ($260, 2 lbs. 11 oz. for the Exos 58) and women’s Osprey Eja 58 or 48 (read my review) and the Deuter Aircontact Ultra 50+5 and Aircontact Ultra 45+5 SL ($250, 2 lbs. 11 oz. for the 50+5, read my review); and two mimimalist, utralight packs, the Hyperlite Mountain Gear 3400 Windrider ($349, 55L, 1 lb. 15 oz., read my review) and Gossamer Gear Mariposa 60 ($315, 60L/3,661 c.i., 1 lb. 14 oz., read my review).

See my picks for the best ultralight backpacks.

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Tent

In late summer, outside the buggy season in the High Sierra, I prefer using a backpacking tarp shelter like the Hyperlite Mountain Gear Ultamid 2 ($699, 1 lb. 2 oz., read my review), Sea to Summit Escapist Tarp ($229-$249, 10.5-15.5 oz., two sizes), and Slingfin SplitWing Shelter Bundle ($355, 1 lb. 5 oz., read my review). I often sleep under the stars on a clear night, but a tarp, besides protecting you from rain and some wind, can trap a surprising amount of warmth underneath it on a calm night.

If you want a two-person tent, get one that weighs under three pounds, like the MSR Freelite 2 ($465, 2 lbs., read my review), the Nemo Hornet Osmo 2p ($430, 2 lbs. 1 oz., read my review), the Big Agnes Tiger Wall UL2 ($480, 2 lbs. 3 oz., read my review), the Slingfin 2Lite, which can pitch with trekking poles ($505, 2 lbs. 10 oz. or 2 lbs. 6 oz, read my review), or if you’ll accept higher weight for more space, the Big Agnes Copper Spur HV UL2 ($550, 2 lbs. 11 oz., read my review).

My top picks for a solo ultralight are two that pitch with trekking poles, the Hyperlite Mountain Gear Mid-1 ($599, 16.8 oz., read my review) and the Gossamer Gear The One ($255, 1 lb. 2 oz., read my review). For a solo ultralight tent that’s semi-freestanding, check out the Nemo Hornet Osmo 1p ($400, 1 lb. 13 oz., read my review).

See “The 10 Best Backpacking Tents,” all backpacking tent reviews at The Big Outside, plus “5 Tips For Buying a Backpacking Tent” and “How to Choose the Best Ultralight Backpacking Tent For You.”

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Sleeping Bag

For backpacking the JMT in late summer, I carry a down sleeping bag rated around 30 degrees F, with a high down fill rating (800 or above), because it’s warmer, lighter, and more packable than a synthetic bag or down bag with lower fill quality (if also more expensive), and well suited to the dry Sierra summers, where there’s little risk of getting a bag wet.

People who get cold more easily may want a bag rated 20 to 25 degrees, although you can wear layers to supplement the bag’s warmth.

Looking for an affordable down bag? I recommend the men’s or women’s Mountain Hardwear Bishop Pass 30 ($245, 1 lb. 12 oz., read my review).

See “Pro Tips for Buying Sleeping Bags,” “10 Pro Tips For Staying Warm in a Sleeping Bag” and all sleeping bag reviews at The Big Outside.

Want to tackle the JMT?
See “Thru-Hiking the John Muir Trail: What You Need to Know.”

Insulation

When nighttime lows will generally remain above freezing, as is usually the case on the JMT at least into mid-September, take an ultralight puffy jacket like the Mountain Hardwear Ghost Whisperer  2 Down Hoody ($360, 8.8 oz., read my review), the Black Diamond Approach Down Hoody ($360, 10 oz., read my review), the Patagonia Micro Puff Hoody ($329, 9 oz., read my review), or the warmer Feathered Friends Eos Down Jacket ($389, 11 oz. , read my review) or Himali Accelerator Down Jacket ($330, 12.5 oz., read my review).

See “The 12 Best Down Jackets,” “How You Can Tell How Warm a Down Jacket Is” and all puffy jacket reviews at The Big Outside.

Plan your next great backpacking adventure in Yosemite and other flagship parks
using my expert e-books.

Rain Shell

On the John Muir Trail—or anywhere in the High Sierra—in summer, where rain occurs only rarely and most often as a passing (although possibly quite intense) thunderstorm, you don’t need the kind of super-technical (and heavier) rain shell you might use in, say, in Alaska, the Pacific Northwest or the Northeast. In fact, if you generally head out in warm, dry weather—common in many Western mountain ranges in summer—you may only need a less-expensive and ideally lightweight shell, like the Black Diamond Fineline Rain Shell ($189, 10 oz./283.5g, read my review), an impressive value in part because it has an adjustable, full-coverage hood, a feature sometimes lacking in moderately priced rain jackets, and solid rain protection even for wet environments.

Another option for backpackers who rarely see rain is an ultralight, waterproof-breathable rain jacket, like the Rab Downpour Light Waterproof Jacket ($165, 7.7 oz., read my review) or the Outdoor Research Helium Rain Jacket ($170-$180, 6 oz., read my review).

See all reviews of rain jackets and outdoor apparel at The Big Outside, “The Best Ultralight Hiking and Running Jackets,” and my “5 Expert Tips For Buying a Rain Jacket for Hiking.”

See “10 Great John Muir Trail Section Hikes.”

Shoes and Boots

If all of your gear is light, on a well-constructed trail like the JMT that’s often dry in summer, get lightweight, highly breathable, non-waterproof boots or low-cut shoes like the PCT-inspired Danner Trail 2650 ($170, 1 lb. 7.5 oz., read my review), the La Sportiva TX3 ($159, 1 lb. 9 oz., read my review), or trail runners like the Hoka One One Speedgoat 6 ($155, 1 lb. 3 oz.), also available in a very light mid-cut, the Hoka One One Speedgoat 6 Mid GTX ($180, 1 lb. 9 oz., read my review).

If you prefer more supportive footwear that’s still relatively light, I recommend two shoes that are a super value and come in waterproof-breathable and non-waterproof, mid-cut and low-cut models: the Hoka One One Anacapa series shoes ($155-$185, 1 lb. 10.5 oz.-2 lbs., read my review), and the Oboz Katabatic series ($145-$190, 1 lb. 9 oz. to 2 lbs., read my review).

See all reviews of hiking shoes at The Big Outside.

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Trekking Poles

Trekking poles should be essential gear on any backpacking trip, but for the JMT—if you’re going lightweight or ultralight, as you should be—get very light poles that are ideally adjustable and very packable. Among the best are the folding and adjustable Black Diamond Distance Carbon FLZ ($220, 12 oz./pair, 105-125cm, read my review), the collapsible and adjustable Gossamer Gear LT5 ($195, 10 oz./pair, read my review), and the folding, adjustable MSR Dynalock Ascent Poles ($190, 1 lb. 1  oz./pair, read my review).

If you want to use a tent that pitches with trekking poles—eliminating the significant weight of tent poles from your pack—make sure your poles are sufficiently sturdy and telescope out to the needed length for pitching your tent; those poles are also usually collapsible (rather than folding or fixed).

See “The Best Trekking Poles” and my stories “How to Choose Trekking Poles” and “10 Best Expert Tips for Hiking With Trekking Poles.”

Get the gear that’s right for you. See my specific tips on buying a pack, tent, boots, and sleeping bag and all reviews of backpacking gear, ultralight backpacking gear, and hiking gear and all stories about backpacking the John Muir Trail at The Big Outside.

NOTE: I tested gear for Backpacker magazine for 20 years. At The Big Outside, I review only what I consider the best outdoor gear and apparel. See my Gear Reviews page at The Big Outside for categorized menus of all of my reviews and my expert buying tips.

Whether you’re a beginner or seasoned backpacker, you’ll learn new tricks for making all of your trips go better in my stories “How to Know How Hard a Hike Will Be,” “How to Plan a Backpacking Trip—12 Expert Tips,” and “A Practical Guide to Lightweight and Ultralight Backpacking.” With a paid subscription to The Big Outside, you can read all of those three stories for free; if you don’t have a subscription, you can download the e-book versions of “How to Plan a Backpacking Trip—12 Expert Tips,” the lightweight and ultralight backpacking guide, and “How to Know How Hard a Hike Will Be.”

All day, clouds the color of a bruise pile up across the sky, conceding the sun only brief, teasing appearances before blocking it out again. Carrying packs bursting with nine days of food, we hike past lakes, each one higher and prettier than the last. More than seven miles from where we began our walk, we stroll into the basin of a sprawling lake whose image captured in historic Ansel Adams photographs has in many ways come to define the public’s mental picture of what is arguably America’s finest mountain range, the High Sierra: Speckled by scores of rocky islets below the distinctive profile of aptly named Banner Peak, Thousand Island Lake today bares whitecapped teeth pushed up by strong gusts of wind.

We cross the John Muir Trail—which we’ll rejoin farther south in a couple of days—and pick up a use trail tracing the north shore of Thousand Island Lake. Not long after that path disappears into the rocky ground, we find a campsite semi-protected from the buffeting wind by a copse of stunted conifer trees, a couple minutes’ walk from the lake’s southwest corner, at just under 10,000 feet in the shadow of Banner Peak.

That evening, the clouds begin to fragment like river ice in spring, scurrying past us. As the sun hovers above mountains to our west and eventually tucks in behind them, its light streams over the bellies of the clouds floating past at greatly varying altitudes—some low, some very high, others in between the lowest and highest clouds. The combination of rays of sunlight at the red end of the spectrum and multiple levels of clouds, mixed with patches of deep blue, creates a skyscape that shifts its colors every few seconds and a nearly hour-long spectacle of one of the most striking sunsets I have ever witnessed.

John Muir certainly had it right when he called the High Sierra “the range of light.”

After dark falls and we tuck into our tents, we hear the wind gather itself in some unknown place high above us. Over slow minutes, it builds in volume until crashing with a roar through our camp in a tsunami of air that seems to shake the earth for long, tent-flapping seconds. After passing by, it leaves us in a quiet calm that rarely lasts more than a minute or two before the next great gust builds and barrels into us. This continues throughout the night.

Hi, I’m Michael Lanza, creator of The Big Outside. Click here to sign up for my FREE email newsletter. Join The Big Outside to get full access to all of my blog’s stories. Click here for my e-books to classic backpacking trips. Click here to learn how I can help you plan your next trip.

My longtime adventure partner David Ports, my 24-year-old nephew Marco Garofalo, and I have embarked on a nine-day trek of nearly 130 miles that will rival the very best High Sierra backpacking trips I’ve ever taken—including my thru-hike of the John Muir Trail.

Hiking barely more than half the usual distance of a full JMT thru-hike, we’re following an itinerary I created—which could be hiked in shorter pieces (see details in the trip planning information at the bottom of this story, available exclusively to paid subscribers to this blog)—that takes us into the Ansel Adams and John Muir Wildernesses and Kings Canyon National Park, exploring gorgeous high lakes basins, crossing passes that scrape the stratosphere at 11,000 to 12,000 feet, hiking some off-trail terrain and traversing one of the finest sections of the John Muir Trail.

I’ve been dreaming about this hike for months.

See “10 Great John Muir Trail Section Hikes.”

The Minarets

On our second morning, we hike cross-country south from Thousand Island Lake over a couple of passes above 10,000 feet and a couple of lakes basins, finally descending to the wind-rippled, brown waters of Ediza Lake at nearly 9,300 feet. There, we pick up a trail—with Marco flying ahead of David and me going uphill—ascending steeply to stunning Iceberg Lake at almost 9,800 feet. Tucked up hard against cliffs, Iceberg sits below a few of the well over a dozen 11,000- and 12,000-foot spires known as the Minarets, lined up like chipped and broken bowling pins.

And we’re not done climbing. From Iceberg, we follow an improbable, strenuously steep and rough trail of sorts across a slope of talus and scree angling upward around Iceberg to Cecile Lake, at 10,260 feet in another rocky bowl at the feet of the Minarets. With any semblance of a trail terminating there, we poke around to find a route across yet more talus and drop down a steep, narrow gully to aptly named Minaret Lake—arguably the prettiest lake we’ve seen today. We hike past at least a few other parties camped here, finding a spot for our tents amid conifer trees a short walk from the lakeshore for water and far enough from other backpackers that we see no one else all evening and the next morning.

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Fortunately, the Sierra weather gods are smiling on us. This day had launched with clear, sunny skies and pleasant temperatures—and this weather pattern will persist for six straight days, giving us comfortably cool nights for sleeping, mornings in the forties Fahrenheit and afternoons at elevation in the 60s. In the High Sierra, where between hot temps and the intense alpine sun, afternoons can feel like you’re hiking under a grow lamp, we spend half of our hiking time hardly breaking a sweat.

That evening, we sit on granite rocks watching the full moon rise in the V formed by the valley of Minaret Creek below us; and the next morning, our third, dawn light sets the Minarets glowing like the embers of a well-tended fire, reflected in the slightly rippling waters of Minaret Lake.

Marie Lake and Sallie Keyes Lakes

On yet another calm, clear day with comfortable temps and a blazing sun, we walk up to the shore of one of the most beautiful water bodies on the JMT: Marie Lake. A sort of downsized Thousand Island Lake, Marie spreads out like a spilt drink in a basin at over 10,500 feet. Numerous islands, large and small, speckle its surface and peninsulas jut into it from all sides. We drop our packs on granite slabs, strip off sweaty T-shirts and shorts, and plunge into the chilly but refreshing water, enduring the cold for just a few minutes, and sit in the sun to dry off and warm up—with the cool breeze aiding the former and slightly hindering the latter—followed by a long, relaxing lunch break.

It’s our sixth afternoon and, with lighter packs as we burn through our food weight, we’ve hit our stride, coming off back-to-back days of around 17 miles, one with over 5,000 feet of cumulative uphill and downhill, the other over 8,000 feet. (Marco again sets a pace impossible for David and me—both the age of Marco’s dad—to maintain, blasting ahead and waiting for us at trail junctions or lakes, where we’ll arrive to see he’s already taken a swim. When we see a white-bearded backpacker coming down the trail toward us, I ask him, “Did you see the young guy cranking uphill?” He quickly responds, “Yea, cranking up! It just ain’t fair.” To which I agree and David nods with resignation.)

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And the JMT has rewarded our efforts with scenery that acts as a balm for sore muscles and joints—the regular percussion of countless waterfalls and cascades, a constellation of lakes, and views of a sea of jagged mountains from high passes.

But the finest scenery of this trip still awaits us.

After our rejuvenating swim and lunch, we make the relatively easy climb over Selden Pass at 10,880 feet and drop to the lovely Sallie Keyes Lakes, twins wrapped in open forest at 10,170 feet, finding a protected site for our tents a short walk from the lakeshore—where we take another brief swim and will enjoy another gorgeous sunrise tomorrow morning.

Plan your next great backpacking adventure in Yosemite and other flagship parks using my expert e-books.

Evolution Basin and Muir Pass

In the cool air of our eighth morning, we ascend the JMT out of Goddard Canyon, passing the thunderous waterfalls and steep cascades on Evolution Creek and pulling our shoes and socks off to ford the frigid creek at a flat, wide, and slow spot. Hiking up the gentle, forested Evolution Valley, we step off the trail at an established campsite where the creek widens and slows in a broad meadow, its calm waters reflecting the puffy clouds and peaks across the valley. Minutes later, at the ranger station, the ranger tells us the perfect weather we’ve been experiencing for a week is about to shift to a cycle of afternoon thunderstorms—with a pretty good chance of one later this afternoon.

The forest thins as we ascend switchbacks above the valley. Granite cliffs come into view on both sides and ahead of us. Abruptly, the waters of another JMT gem appear in front of us: Evolution Lake. If you’re fairly new to the southern High Sierra, walking up to Evolution Lake requires the brain to recalibrate your sense of scale. We have reached one of the JMT sections—and there are several—that earn it the nickname “America’s most beautiful trail.”

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We follow the JMT’s easy, meandering course through meadows around the contours of the lake, which stretches a mile or more up Evolution Basin, passing other backpackers and a few tents already set up in early afternoon. Cliffs soar to tall peaks on all sides, including the 13,000-footers Mounts Mendel and Darwin and the 12,329-foot Hermit. Little clusters of small conifer trees offer some protection for camping; but as we climb farther up the Evolution Basin, where the trail ascends the rocky slope above Sapphire Lake, the wide-open terrain offers no such protection.

As the ranger foretold, dark storm clouds mass above the upper basin, moving toward us. When the wind-driven rain and hail begin, we find a couple of large boulders off the trail and hunker down on the ground in their lee, avoiding some of the precipitation and most of the wind. But the storm apparently has no intention of just blowing over quickly. We retreat to lower ground in the basin, just above Evolution Lake, hurriedly pitch the tents and crawl inside, inflating our air mats and slipping inside our sleeping bags for warmth to wait it out. More than an hour after the storm began, it dissipates; we unzip tent doors to see sunshine and mostly blue sky again in the direction we’re going, although the storm remains very dark over Evolution Lake.

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See all stories about backpacking the John Muir Trail and backpacking in the High Sierra and all stories with expert backpacking tips at The Big Outside.

The Gear I Used See my reviews of the outstanding backpack, tent, sleeping bag, down jacket, ultralight rain jacket, hiking pants, trekking poles, air mattress, stove, and headlamp I used on this trip.

See also my Gear Reviews page for best-in-category reviews and expert buying tips.

Whether you’re a beginner or seasoned backpacker, you’ll learn new tricks for making all of your trips go better in my “How to Plan a Backpacking Trip—12 Expert Tips,” “A Practical Guide to Lightweight and Ultralight Backpacking,” and “How to Know How Hard a Hike Will Be.” With a paid subscription to The Big Outside, you can read all of those three stories for free; if you don’t have a subscription, you can download the e-guide versions of “12 Expert Tips for Planning a Backpacking Trip,” the lightweight and ultralight backpacking guide, and “How to Know How Hard a Hike Will Be.”

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“Umm, hey buddy, you okay?”

It’s 4:30 a.m., a time of day that puts us in the questionable company of cat burglars and alpinists. Our headlamp beams seem to bounce off the inky black of a moonless night in Yosemite Valley. Four of us are taking the first steps on the 221-mile John Muir Trail. And my friend Mark Fenton is staggering like a frat boy on a weekend bender.

“No problem, just a little vertigo I get hiking in the dark. I’ll be fine.” As if scripted for a sitcom, he then lurches too near the edge of the trail—which drops off into the dark roar of the Merced River far below.

From that moment on, he becomes known as Stumbles.

We laugh, because the nickname’s funny and appropriate, and because our packs weigh in at only six pounds, and because the four of us have trained and trained some more for the insane undertaking we’ve just begun—so we’re practically running uphill effortlessly, feeling as fit as racehorses. But mostly we laugh because we are only at the beginning of an odyssey that seemed impossible when we first contemplated the idea. We haven’t yet entered the zone of constant pain, so it’s easy to delude ourselves into believing that we aren’t pursuing an ambition of fools.

Besides, we’re in Yosemite, a place crazy with distractions. In the faint first light, 600-foot Nevada Falls looks like a wavering white apparition, and our inability to see it well seems to amplify the sound of the free-falling water sheering through air like a liquid guillotine. Deer bound away silently in the chilling dawn. At mid-morning, from ledges at 9,000 feet, we go slack-jawed at a shark’s grin of peaks: Tenaya, Tressider, Cathedral, Matthes Crest. We’re giddy as little girls, knowing this is just a scenic appetizer for the feast of alpine vistas awaiting us over the course of the week ahead on the JMT: snow-draped mountains and jagged granite spires, passes from 11,000 to over 13,000 feet, and a constellation of lakes reflecting it all upside down.

That’s right, I wrote “the week ahead.” We’re out here as guinea pigs testing a theory that, by arriving ultra-fit and going ultralight, we can collapse a hike normally stretched out over three weeks or more into seven days. We’re taking what Ray Jardine preached in The Pacific Crest Trail Hiker’s Handbook back in the 1990’s—a then-controversial gospel that called for drastically slashing pack weight and ramping up daily mileage—to a questionable extreme. The math sounds pretty simple: trim pack weight by two-thirds (or more), and hike three times as far. A lot of Ray’s disciples have since embraced the ultralight strategy with great satisfaction, including many Pacific Crest Trail thru-hikers, who would not complete that 2,600-mile thru-hike in one season without going light.

See “Thru-Hiking the John Muir Trail: What You Need to Know.”

Hi, I’m Michael Lanza, creator of The Big Outside. Click here to sign up for my FREE email newsletter. Join The Big Outside to get full access to all of my blog’s stories. Click here for my e-guides to classic backpacking trips. Click here to learn how I can help you plan your next trip.

I’ve made a steady evolution into that style of backpacking, going from regularly lugging 50-pound loads for eight or 10 arduous miles a day to carrying sub-30-pound packs on 15- or 20-mile days. Instead of suffering under an unwieldy load and taking five days to hike 40 miles, I’d walk more comfortably and finish in three days, or hike farther in the same five days, and feel less taxed physically. I’ve found it easier to train for walking farther with a moderate load than for walking less distance with a heavy one. And based on personal experience and what I’ve seen happen to other hikers, I’m convinced that backcountry injuries are more often attributable to excessive pack weight than to excessive miles.

To purist backpackers who object that I’m not stopping to smell the roses—or whatever it is one smells when bent double under a huge pack—I point out that I’ve simply gone from walking 2 mph to walking 3 mph. I’m not missing anything; in fact, I’m going farther and seeing more than I used to. But just finishing a day on the trail feeling great was evidence enough for me.

Get the right backpack for hikes like the JMT.
See “The 10 Best Backpacking Packs” and the best ultralight backpacks.

Fastpacking the John Muir Trail

For a few years, the idea of speed-hiking the JMT had been stabbing the button of my obsessive-compulsive disorder, demanding my attention like a tiny thorn in my sock. I learned that fit hikers going überlight were sailing “America’s most beautiful trail,” as the JMT is often called, in just 10 days; it sounded reasonable, given the Sierra’s dry, mild summer weather and the trail’s moderate grades. Then I bumped into one ultralight guru who suggested cranking it in seven days. Another Muir Trail veteran told me that “30- to 40-mile days are totally doable.”

Unfortunately, where another hiker might think that pounding out 31 miles a day for a solid week sounds just slightly over the top, my admittedly altered brain chemistry rationalizes, “How hard could that be?” I also had the ulterior motive of simply wanting to hike the entire trail, but knowing I couldn’t possibly abandon my working wife and two young kids for three weeks. Before long, I’d convinced myself that a seven-day thru-hike of the JMT—221 miles including the 11-mile descent off Mt. Whitney (the 211-mile JMT terminates at its summit), with more than 40,000 feet of elevation gain—was not only feasible: It would even, quite possibly, be fun.

Right now, anyway, my prognostication is looking pretty good. At the risk of sounding cocky, we’re chewing up ground. We roll into Sunrise High Sierra Camp—nearly 13 miles out—by 10 a.m., as fresh as if we just did a 10-minute warm-up. The afternoon heat drains us, but we refuel on burgers, fries, and milkshakes at the Tuolumne Meadows café at around mile 22, and rendezvous with Mark’s wife and kids, who’ve driven there with our camping gear and a food resupply for the next two days. Then we set out again with 18-pound packs to hike into the evening.

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In the mountain dusk of 7 p.m., we pitch our tarps near a windswept, unnamed alpine tarn at 10,180 feet in Lyell Canyon. We pass the ibuprofen like we’re doing shots, rub tired-but-not-aching feet, and take stock. On our first day, we’ve walked 34 miles, with 7,000 feet of uphill. Mark’s pedometer reports the day’s mind-boggling tally: 72,376 steps. We should look like enemy combatants with open-ended leases at Guantanamo, but instead, we’re just tired.

As we take an icy dip in the lake, below a skyline of granite cliffs, Stumbles tells me with an ears-wide grin, “You know what? I can’t believe how good I feel.”

I smile, naively thinking: We’ve got this thing licked.

Planning a John Muir Trail Thru-Hike

“Subject: Re: You’re going to do what in 7 days?!”

That was Mark’s response to my e-mail, months earlier, baiting him with a passing mention of my plan. Mark, who lives south of Boston, is an author of books on fitness walking and a former U.S. race-walking team member who’s now, like me, past 40 with a demanding career and a young family. I wanted him in, but knew I couldn’t just invite him outright. Mark’s a hyper-analytical MIT guy: He would react to this supremely irrational idea in a very rational way—dismissing it as a plan for masochists.

I knew that before agreeing to this level of insanity, he would have to go through something like the stages of grief: First there is denial (“No way I’m doing something that stupid”), then anger (“Why me?!”), followed by bargaining (“Okay, I’m tentatively in, but I reserve the right to back out at any time”), depression (“Oh, my God, we’re actually going to do this”), and finally, acceptance (“I’m an idiot”).

Get the right shelter for a trip like the JMT. See “The 10 Best Backpacking Tents”
and “How to Choose the Best Ultralight Backpacking Tent for You.”

Honing my sales pitch as Fenton chewed on my proposal, I started recruiting a team of the blissfully ignorant.

My fellow-Idahoan friend Todd Arndt takes hours-long trail runs and still fondly recalls the time we hiked 8,000 feet up out of Hells Canyon—108° F., no shade. Todd’s a doctor, so if one of us perished—assuming it’s not him—at least we’d have someone who’s qualified to pronounce the time of death. When I called him and broached the idea, there followed a long pause, then he said slowly, as if he’d just bumped his head very hard: “That. Sounds. Great.”

Heather Dorn, mother of two girls and living at the time in Pennsylvania, exhibited impeccable judgment—a valuable wilderness asset—by avoiding my calls and emails for weeks. But proving demonstrably that a Y chromosome is not a prerequisite for bad judgment, she ultimately gave in to the lure of the impossible disguised as plausible.

And Mark Godley, of the Bay Area, was tough enough for it: He had hiked with me through the rugged Bailey Range of the Olympics carrying a sleeping bag the size of a prize-winning pumpkin. In a two-career marriage with three preschool children, he couldn’t escape for a week, but would join us for our last two days.

And a month after that first e-mail to Fenton, he was in. Defying reason, I had a team.

We set out to get in the shape of our lives in four months—going out on 5 a.m. speed hikes, grinding out 25-mile dayhikes in blistering heat, doing ridiculous numbers of lunges. A few weeks prior to meeting up in Yosemite Valley, Fenton and I banged out a one-day, 32-mile hike of the Pemi Loop in New Hampshire’s White Mountains with 10,000 feet of ups and downs.

We were ready. Or so we thought.

Hike stronger and smarter. See my stories “Training For a Big Hike or Mountain Climb”
and “10 Tricks For Making Hiking and Backpacking Easier.”

Tell me what you think.

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Will 2019 be the year that you hike the John Muir Trail? While next summer may seem very far off, an ambitious undertaking like a thru-hike of “America’s most beautiful trail”—more than 220 miles and anywhere from under two weeks to over three weeks—requires significant advance planning, and the time period for applying for a permit for it is coming up soon. Take your first step on that adventure right now by watching this video from my thru-hike of the JMT, and then click the link below to my story about that great trip, with my tips on how to do it right. Plus, read on to see how I can give you the best expert advice you’ll find to planning a JMT thru-hike.

Calling the JMT “America’s most beautiful trail” can sound hyperbolic, given the competition in places like Grand Canyon and Glacier national parks, southern Utah, and even elsewhere in California’s High Sierra.

But the description has stuck hard to the John Muir Trail for many years, nonetheless—and it’s hard to argue against the claim.

Want to hike the John Muir Trail? Click here for expert, detailed advice you won’t get elsewhere.

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Meandering 211 miles from Yosemite National Park to the summit of Mount Whitney (where you then face an 11-mile descent to finish the trip), it crosses a landscape dappled with thousands of lakes, and mountain passes over 13,000 feet high (like Trail Crest on Mount Whitney, in the photo above) below peaks soaring to 14,000 feet. Sheer granite cliffs loom everywhere, and roaring waterfalls are too numerous to even all have names. The JMT passes through contiguous, pristine wilderness in three national parks—Yosemite, Kings Canyon, and Sequoia—and two federal wilderness areas, the John Muir and Ansel Adams.

I’ve backpacked all over the U.S., and I still consider the JMT one of “America’s Top 10 Best Backpacking Trips.” I think you’ll see why in this video. After watching it, scroll down to the link to my story about that trip.

Get the right backpack for a hike like the JMT. See my picks for “The 10 Best Backpacking Packs”
and the best thru-hiking packs.

Wondering whether you are up to it? Read my story about my thru-hike, where you can view lots of photos and read some of my tips on planning this adventure of a lifetime yourself.

Yearning to backpack in Yosemite? See my e-guides to three amazing multi-day hikes there.

The JMT has grown enormously popular, making it increasingly difficult to get a permit for a thru-hike, and the time period for applying is coming up soon. See my “10 Tips For Getting a Hard-to-Get National Park Backcountry Permit.” Find more info at nps.gov/yose/planyourvisit/jmtfaq.htm.

If you can’t get a permit for a JMT thru-hike or just don’t have the time next year, find some shorter, comparable backpacking trips by scrolling down to Yosemite and Sequoia at my All Trips Listed By State page at The Big Outside, or get my detailed, expert advice on backpacking in Yosemite in my downloadable e-guides to three amazing multi-day hikes there.

Tell me what you think.

I spent a lot of time writing this story, so if you enjoyed it, please consider giving it a share using one of the buttons below, and leave a comment or question at the bottom of this story. I’d really appreciate it.

Visit my Youtube page, where you’ll find many more videos from other great trips I’ve written about here at The Big Outside. You may find some ideas for your next big adventure. You can also scroll through menus at my Trips page of all of my stories at The Big Outside.

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