Sometimes you eat the bear and sometimes you turn around to avoid being eaten by one.

"No, sir, that Minotaur isn't going to get out of this!"

So said the person who designed the western trail to Mt. Sally, but I'm getting ahead of myself.

Still glowing from my visit to the Santa Susana Field Laboratory, I hiked the fourth (or sixth) highest peak in the Santa Susana Mounta

Hey, Boeing, don't have a meltdown, I'm going to give it a glowing review.

Electing and hiring people based on identity rather than job qualifications turns out to have been a bad decision.

No peak, however small, is spared my peakbagging efforts.

I visited the Dead Sea Scrolls exhibit and tried to take pictures.

"I wouldn't say I'm specifically a hero for what I did. The real heroes do what I did and drive a Prius."

Most of the "peaks" are just bumps on a large ridge, but there were a dozen of them so...

One of the top questions I get is, "Are there really bison in Santa Clarita, California?" And, the answer is yes, there are.

I failed to bike Mount McKinley, failed a hike to the Pinnacle, but I did see the Aqueduct Cascades.

This was a hike with a large Meetup group near the Salton Sea. There were a few spots of fairly easy scrambling.

"Mt Bliss" has the sound of some Alaskan 17er, or maybe a neighbor of Mt Vinson. Set your expectations a lot lower...

I'm sacrificing my healthy eating for you, the least you can do is reimburse me for the $7.60.

It was eagles and lemonade and sharp spiky plants all the way down.

Twas a blustery, wintry day when I set off on my expedition to the distant peak...

It was another pleasant Simi Valley Saturday there in steep ridge land...

What is that, a railway? And, what's with the asterisks?

All will be explained!

I came back for more of the Upper Cabin trail but this time I took a rougher route up.

On Feb 1, 2025, parts of the Angeles National Forest reopened after the devastating Eaton Fire.

This is more of a road walk than an hike, but it is to the highest point in the Santa Susana Mountains along the north edge of the San Fernando Valley.

No, the title isn't a law firm: it's five peaks near Mt Wilson that I biked and hiked.

These are pictures and a video from the "Satwiwa Loop and Upper Cabin Trail" (link) on the western edg

I failed the first time, but this time I got the sheep.

These were taken near Mt Chapel on a Griffith Park bike ride. The Air Quality Index today was 'Unhealthy', with haze and pollution trapped in the Los Angeles basin.

Pacifico Mountain (7124') is in the back range of the San Gabriels so, generally speaking, it's more of a pristine environment than the front range peaks.

I biked Hostetter (from the 210 and La Tuna Canyon) to Verdugo Peak. All the way up, my bike was bugging me to do a fashion shoot and I obliged it.

The Tarzana area of Los Angeles hosts a geological feature known as the Vanalden "Cave". I'd heard about it but never bothered to visit until now. Getting to it was OK, even if the "cave" wasn't.

If you want to amuse and amaze your future ex-friends, let them know that it snows each year in the City of Los Angeles. Yes, that's right, it snows here each year!

I did the "3-2-1 Challenge" in the Frazier Park part of Kern County, not far from Gorman/Lebec. The challenge involves 3 peaks, 2 county highpoints (Kern and Ventura), and 1 hike.

Near Yermo, CA in the Mojave desert in California, there's a sculpture park against communism, censorship, and the current mainland China regime.

Is there a prosaic explanation for this sacred site? Goal Hiking investigates!

Known as the home of Spike and as the Paris of the Western World, Needles is also home to a historic railway station.

The original Del Taco location is located in Yermo, not far from Barstow in the Mojave desert. Unfortunately it was closed the day that I was driving by.

This is the highest point in Arizona. I had tried it several years ago in May. The snow made finding the trail difficult and because of that I had to turn around at the ridge.

After getting to 12,633' on Humphreys Peak, I descended about 20' below the Earth's surface in the nearby Lava River Cave.

In Utah, just over the border from Page, Arizona, lies one of the most coveted hikes around: The Wave. This is not it.

One of the highlights of the GSRT2024 was hiking Mt Taylor outside Grants, New Mexico.

Grants is a small town about 80 miles west of Albuquerque and you can see Mt Taylor from the latter.

After spending a few weeks in your more Alpine areas, it was a huge relief to get back to something warm and dry.

This was my second Colorado 14er and, unfortunately, I did it on a Saturday.

My first Colorado 14er was, aside from the altitude, fairly moderate.

Mt Oberlin is an 8,184' peak in Glacier National Park that's near the Logan Pass visitor center. While AllTrails says to "proceed cautiously", SummitPost calls it "friendly".

It doesn't go to a peak, but this is one of the top hikes in Glacier National Park.

On my way to Glacier National Park I had the not-so-bright idea of visiting our hat, aka Canada.

Normally I'm all over things volcanic, but this national monument didn't live up to expectations.

I kicked off my Great Summer Road Trip 2024 Extravaganza by hiking the River Trail to Thousand Island Lake in the Sierra Nevadas.

I was hiking up Mt. Baldy when a wildfire started.

Just because your ego demands you create a National Park doesn't mean you should.

I biked the highest point in San Luis Obispo County, Caliente Mountain.

None dare call it cheating, but I drove part of the way to the highest point in Orange County.

After the Sheep Hole Mountains failure, I needed to get as far away from Joshua Tree as possible.

The Sheep Hole Mountains are a small range not far from Twentynine Palms in the Mojave desert.

About a year before the devastating Eaton Fire, I hiked this front range peak.

No, not that Grand Canyon. The one around here.

Mt. Baldy - highest point in L.A. County at 10,064' - is currently closed due to the Bridge Fire which, as you'll see in a later post, I saw happen from the summit of Baldy.

The Vital Link is a fun, short-but-steep trail in the Verdugo Mountains. It's 3.8 miles & 1700' of gain round trip so it's fairly steep.

I did this 11,611' peak in the southern Sierras with a micro influencer I'd met online.

"What?" You're no doubt asking, because you know the two titular destinations are well over an hour apart.

While I later biked to the highest point in the City of Los Angeles, this time I just hiked it.

This was a fairly easy DPS peak near Lucerne Valley and Victorville.

Rising high above Burbank and Glendale are the perpetually snow-capped Verdugo Mountains...

I'd hiked Josephine Peak in the Angeles National Forest a few times, but this was the first time I'd biked it. It was very windy at times.

This post should be filled with pics from Death Valley, except I went there during a heatwave so I wasn't going to do much hiking.

Clingman's Dome is just a walk along a concrete walkway, but you get several highpoints.

Getting the Delaware Highpoint was perhaps my most dangerous high point ever.

In 2003 I climbed the Third Flatiron outside Boulder, Colorado. It was my first multipitch trad route.

I recently was in a situation where I needed to use my PLB and the uncertainty around Bullitt (aka "RCD 2023") caused a great deal of