Need to find a group for a 4 night trip

[chris390]

Hi I need to find a group for a 4 night trip in Yosemite. I'm currently checking out meetup.com, but are there any other suggestions? I don't plan on paying an arm and a leg for a guided service, unless its under 300 bucks for 4 nights which doesn't seem that likely.. how about some local groups that just meet up and go backpacking? Any of you locals know of some , please!!

[AlmostThere]

You don't get free guided trips on meetup. You get groups of people who love to backpack. They don't necessarily plan very well, and sometimes when people can't keep up or get irritating, bad things happen.

The way to make a meetup group work for you is to understand this, and to find the ones that have organizers who care about safety. And NEVER EVER expect anyone to bail you out - have all your gear, know how to use it (including map and compass) and DO NOT EVER think that you are on anything resembling a guided trip.

I am a meetup group organizer - and let me tell you, I am DONE with people thinking that a meetup group is a free guided trip. On trips of more than one night, I screen the people who sign up for those whom I have not gone overnight with before - and if you do not sound like you have the experience to increase the chances that the trip will be enjoyable and safe for EVERYONE including you, you don't get to go.

If you want a guided trip pay for it already. Leave the social groups alone. If you want social group experiences, which can be mixed and variable and not led by people who know their sleeping mat from a hole in the ground, give it a try, but have reasonable expectations. It's not going to teach you anything, provide a service, or guarantee you will wind up with people who are at all friendly or compatible with you.

The very best way to use a meetup group is to sign up for one, go on a lot of day trips and get to know people, make friends with them, and THEN go on an overnight with them. It's much easier to take someone for a three night trip when you consider them a friend, a known quantity, someone who won't be irritating for miles and ruin that precious time off you took to go on this trip. And then the group is much less likely to leave you out there - one of the things that upsets your average Search and Rescue Volunteer like nothing else - groups that leave people who don't understand a map, or have one. Which is why I say - know what you are doing when you go with social groups.

Check out REI, Sierra Club, Southern Yosemite Mountain Guides, Sierra Spirit - perhaps they can add you to a group that's already going for a discount. Don't count on it, tho - people who pay have the right to their own trip without strangers horning in on it.

[chris390]

I understand what you mean about people just wanting a free guided tour on meetup.. I have backpacking experience and would like to go with a group since I live across the country and will be coming there by myself, I'm also not able to meet others that may be on the trip and become friends with those people beforehand since I don't live in the area. But for people like me who have the right gear and have been backpacking before, it seems to be a good site, but are there any other sites that anyone knows of, or like I mentioned, very cheap guided type tours?

[AlmostThere]

If all you want is company, plan a trip on the John Muir Trail. You'll have tons of new friends. No preplanning needed.

[balzaccom]

I don't know of any cheap guided tours. And given the trails in the Sierra, you don't need a guide.

So the real question is how you can hike as a group...

AT is right, that meetups are one possibility. And he is also right that there are LOTS of people on the John Muir Trail. But it may also be hard to get a permit for those hikes, because they are so popular.

One option would be to check with the Sierra Club about their hikes, or REI stores in the Central Valley to see if they organize hikes ( some used to do that, don't know if they still do) or local community colleges in California sometimes do them.

I wish this were easier, but there aren't easy solutions to this...

[AlmostThere]

One person, showing up in the middle of the week, has more than a fair chance at a walk in permit. Just walk in when the wilderness office opens and ask for:

Lyell Meadow/JMT south
Sunset trailhead
Cathedral trailhead

If there's no spot for those, wait until they start releasing permits that were reserved and not picked up - used to be 11 am? - and try again.

I bet you would get the first choice. You can stay in the backpacker camp the night before you start, if you get a permit for the next day.

I've gotten a walk in permit for Grand Canyon of the Tuolumne on a Friday first try, no problem.

A friend did the entire JMT last year and plans to do segments of the PCT, just because he really enjoyed the camaraderie he found out there - he started a solo hiker. Thru hikers have an easygoing social thing that happens. Four days, you could exit at Reds Meadow, take the shuttle into Mammoth, take the YARTS or Greyhound or Amtrak or hop on a plane from there.

[chris390]

How about late May of this year, like May 22-28 for the Rae Lakes Loop? Is that too early? With the low snow pack in the Sierra's I'm thinking that would probably be a good time to go.

[AlmostThere]

It's still early, and that route goes pretty high over a 10000 pass, so some comfort and preparation for ice and snow are still needed for the loop in May. You don't know that there will not be more storms - there were storms until early May last year.

You'll also be turned around if the gate does not open - the road into Kings Canyon closes for the winter and doesn't reopen til Spring. It should be open in late May, or early June. Road closures have more to do with when the rangers manage to check the road than actual snowfall - there can be rockfall or dead trees across the road as well.

[chris390]

You are right about Glen pass, has anyone tried to cross Glen Pass in May? I know with the unusual low snow it may be possible but its hard to tell, it would be around Memorial Day this year. If the park approves the permits, does that mean that I'm good to go or can the road still be closed and my trip cancelled?

[chris390]

http://www.highsierratopix.com/communit ... 63&start=0 I found this trip report on Rae Lakes from last year, it's encouraging to know that someone passed Glen Pass with no problems in late May last year, I shouldn't have a problem this year but you never know til you get up there.