Great Sand Dunes! Ever since he first saw the dunes in a book when he was five or six, one of my group members wanted to visit. Unfortunately, that first visit didn’t turn out so well due to a sandstorm,…
Climbing Goat Peak near Wanless Lake
While researching trails to hike in the Cabinet Mountains Wilderness in western Montana last spring, I discovered a couple of things: 1) While there are many trails in the Cabinets, you can’t find good information about most of them, and…
Icebergs & Views at Iceberg Lake
As many of you know, I’m not huge into alpine lakes. They’re nice enough if they have a good view around them, but a lake for a lake’s sake is not my idea of fun. (But maybe that’s because I…
Cliff Lake and Climbing St. Paul Peak
The Cabinet Mountains Wilderness is considered one of the most remote areas to hike in the lower 48 states. It’s true that it’s pretty remote – at least in terms of the full spectrum of wild animals that call the…
Copper Lake and Chicago Peak – Remote Cabinet Mountain Views
One of the more view-saturated hikes we took in the Cabinet Mountain Wilderness actually has almost no trail. There is a trail – at least as far as Cliff Lake – but if you want to see everything in the…
Swiftcurrent Lookout – So Long a Hike, So Worth It!
I’m pretty much convinced that the Swiftcurrent Pass Trail to Swiftcurrent Peak is one of the most, if not the most, spectacular hike in Glacier National Park. (And yes, it might very well beat out the Highline Trail – at…
The Swiftcurrent Amphitheater – So Spectacular!
The most spectacular hike in Glacier National Park – and the most spectacular I’ve ever taken from Many Glacier – might very well be the hike up to the Swiftcurrent Lookout. The path passes three beautiful alpine lakes, a very…
The Beautiful Water & Wildflowers of Cracker Lake
I almost didn’t hike to Cracker Lake high in a mountain canyon above Many Glacier in Glacier National Park, Montana. It seemed like such a long hike. Friends told me there was a long section of forest. And at the…
The Best Day Hikes in Chiricahua National Monument
The first time we visited Chiricahua National Monument, we thought we must have entered a rock-formation-wonderland. We were used to the red rocks of Utah (Bryce and Arches have long been favorite national parks), but this was a totally different…
Reynolds Mountain Trail & The Dragontail
For sheer beauty, it’s hard to beat the Reynolds Mountain Trail in Glacier National Park. The trail is virtually unknown – the signs that do exist don’t help its popularity. But since you get to hike the Hidden Lake Trail,…