Okay, maybe not really lost, but I now have the experience to say, always bring your map. Always. We didn't really have too much of a plan when we went to Kings Canyon. I feel a bit like this park kind of falls in the shadow of Sequoia National Park. They're usually listed together as "Kings Canyon and Sequoia," even on the National Park Service's website. I didn't know until we had arrived at the park that a huge portion of it is pretty much inaccessible this time of year. There is a main road that is closed seasonally, so for us, the only way to reach it would have been an overnight hike which we did not have the time for, and may have been too snowy for what we packed for. So we were exploring a pretty small portion of Kings Canyon, open to the idea of heading in early to Sequoia if we had the time. We didn't. We went in knowing we had to see General Grant Tree, and after talking to a few people at Kings Canyon Visitor Center, we decided on hiking a relatively short trail that was close by, after we saw General Grant. We never made it to that trail. The actual trail that goes around General Grant is less than a mile and has wooden fences guiding the path and preventing people from stomping on General Grant's roots. How could we get lost in that, right? Well, like I mentioned, we weren't really lost. More like distracted... in a place we weren't familiar with... without a map. Since the trail around General Grant is so short and simple, we didn't even think of packing up like we would for a "real" hike. I pretty much just grabbed my backpack with whatever was already in it. Admittedly, I always keep certain standard items in there, like sunscreen, a first aid kit, a knife, etc., but unfortunately, our park maps were not included in those items. It didn't take very long of walking the path around the tree for us to start veering. We left the path to take some photos with fallen trees and some of the other giant sequoias that we were allowed to get close to. When I saw a green blaze nailed to a tree, my curiosity got the best of me. Since we knew the trail that we had intended to hike was close by, we thought maybe these were its blazes. Clearly, we weren't even thinking that through, because even if it was the right trail, we didn't know how far into it we were or which direction we were heading. Nevertheless, we kept following the green blazes. Every once in a while we would consider that we didn't know where we were even going, but we just kept naively thinking that if we just go a little farther, surely we'll make it to the end of the trail. We didn't. I've found out that hiking can often feel like gambling (which clearly I am an expert in, since I spent 10 minutes in a Las Vegas casino on the drive to California). What I mean is that when you are lost on a trail like we were, or even when you're just hiking a long trail that is out and back, rather than a loop, you find yourself weighing whether you should turn back. If you keep going, maybe it will only be a bit farther until the grand pay off at the end, but if it isn't, then you've dug yourself into an even deeper hole. That's how I was feeling on this trail. I knew the farther out we went, then the longer it would take to get back if we did decide to turn back later on. After following these blazes for about an hour and a half or so, we decided to cash out and head back. When we finally made it back to our car, we looked at the map and found out that we had definitely made the right decision to turn around. It would have been miles until we reached the end of the trail, which we found out was indeed not the trail we had planned on hiking, and if we had made it to the end, we would have had to walk several more miles down the road back to our car, which was still parked by General Grant. Since we spent so much time following the wrong trail, we never did get to hike our original plan. But I'd say we definitely got our adventure.
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About the blog.I started this blog in 2017 with the goal of seeing all the U.S. National Parks and writing about them. But as I kept writing and posting, I realized there's so much more I want to document in my life. So, the blog grew into something much broader and even more special to my heart. Archives.
January 2022
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