America’s Best Backpacking and Outdoor Adventures
By Michael Lanza “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 …
By Michael Lanza We step into the ankle-deep North Fork of the Virgin River, in the backcountry of Zion National Park, and water at refrigerator temperature immediately fills our boots. Until sometime tomorrow afternoon, we’ll walk in this river almost constantly, crossing it dozens of times—with the 50° F water, at its deepest, coming up nearly to our waists. As …
By Michael Lanza The air temperature feels not much above freezing, pinching our faces as we hit the trail just after 8 a.m. on our second day of backpacking in Glacier National Park. The still, glassy water of Elizabeth Lake captures a razor-sharp, upside-down reflection of the jagged mountains flanking it; only the upper slopes of the peaks above Elizabeth’s …
Ultralight Rain Jacket Montane Minimus Stretch Ultra Pull-on and Jacket $185 (pull-on)/$205 (jacket), 6 oz. (men’s medium pull-on) Sizes: men’s XS-XL, women’s US 6-14 (jacket only) Sunnysports.com From bone-rattling cold wind on a September dayhike in Glacier National Park and a back-to-back, rim-to-rim dayhikes across the Grand Canyon in October, to wind and rain while scrambling peaks in Idaho’s Sawtooth …
Backpacking Boots Zamberlan 491 Trackmaster GTX RR $220, 2 lbs. 8 oz. (men’s US 9/Euro 43) Sizes: men’s 8-13, women’s 6-11 rei.com For some backpacking trips, lightweight, mid-cut boots or low-cut shoes don’t cut it. With plans for a six-day hike of over 90 miles on the Continental Divide Trail through Glacier National Park in September—where snow had fallen just …