America’s Best Backpacking and Outdoor Adventures
By Michael Lanza
After more than three decades of wilderness backpacking all over the U.S. and around the world, rarely does a new trip immediately leap into my all-time top 10. But that’s exactly what happened when three friends and I backpacked a north-south traverse of 94 miles through Glacier National Park in a glorious week in September, mostly following the Continental Divide Trail.
By Michael Lanza We reach an unnamed pass at 8,450 feet early on a September evening that could hardly be nicer, with temperatures in the low 60s and a soft whisper of breeze in the air. I’m hardly breaking a sweat; I love hiking at this time of day. Below us, the green valley of Johnson Creek falls away into …
By Michael Lanza
Never mind that it was the seventh straight bluebird morning of backpacking in mountains that constantly look surreal, like a painted mural backdrop in a movie. It didn’t matter that the trip had been a parade of wildlife. We even forgot about the heaviness in our legs from 15-mile days.
The menacing snarl piercing the silence seized our full attention.
By Michael Lanza
Precipice Lake sits in a granite bowl at 10,400 feet along the High Sierra Trail in Sequoia National Park, about a half-mile before 10,700-foot Kaweah Gap. Below the north face of 12,040-foot Eagle Scout Peak, with the nearest tree at least a couple of trail miles below it, the lake’s glassy, green and blue waters reflect a white and golden cliff with black water streaks that embraces the lakeshore across from the trail.
A ribbon-like waterfall, originating in a remnant glacier above the lake, pours down the cliff. Walking up to Precipice Lake reflexively triggers the part of our frontal lobe that’s responsible for the word: “Wow.”
By Michael Lanza Minutes after we walk past the sign warning that this section of the Timberline Trail is closed due to “a deep chasm,” with 100-foot drop-offs, created by flooding from a storm—rendering the creek crossing ahead of us “very unstable and unsafe”—Jeff and I reach the top of the ridge high above the east bank of Eliot Creek. …