It’s been four months since I returned from my 16-day JMT thru-hike, and the memories are already beginning to melt into one fuzzy, altitude-blurred dream of the Sierra. While on the trail, I developed a vision to collect everything I learned and assemble these lessons into a single document, which you can find below.

People often describe hiking the JMT as Type II Fun, i.e., an experience that is fun to look back on but not very fun while you’re doing it. There is some truth to this for sure. However, I believe you can reclaim some of your hike as Type I Fun if you maintain the right mindset. I hope the stories, pictures, and lessons below help you prep both physically and mentally for your future hikes, allowing you to be fully present as you enjoy the beauty of the trail.

Before I jump in, here is a brief history of how I got to hiking the JMT in the first place.

Background of my trip

I first decided I wanted to complete the JMT in 2017 when I was still a college student. There was no real reason I wanted to do it. I knew I liked hiking, and I had heard that the JMT was the pinnacle of American backpacking, which is an enticing enough claim on its own. I remember that year, I applied for permits as a solo hiker and listed a ton of dates for the lottery. I was denied a permit for all of the dates. I honestly thought that would be the end of my attempts to hike the trail, but…

Fast forward to 2022. I was about to complete my fourth year of grad school and found myself obsessed yet again with the thought of going out on the trail. This time, I had a new idea: a father & son backpacking trip with my dad, who first introduced me to backpacking when I was twelve years old (I’m 26 now). Even at 70, he was still kicking ass physically, and after doing 2 Philmonts together, I had no doubt we could get through this as a hiking duo. We started prepping for the application process, and I promised myself, “if I get the permit this time, I am going to go — no matter what.”

Funny enough, I won the lottery right away. And not only did we get a permit — we got the quintessential JMT southbound (SOBO) permit starting from Happy Isles. And for the exact day I wanted. It felt like a sign from above that I would certainly be doing this thing.

My dad and I planned to park our car at the endpoint in Lone Pine on 7/22, spend the night at the Backpacker’s Campground in Yosemite on 7/23, and then start at the official JMT trailhead in Happy Isles on 7/24. We planned a 19-day itinerary with two food pickups at Red’s Meadow and Muir Trail Ranch (MTR). Everything was meticulously organized — campsites, meals, gear, etc.

Needless to say, the trip did NOT go according to plan. This will become quickly obvious as you read through the lessons below.

My dad and I on the way up to Donohue Pass (Day 4), enjoying the beautiful view of Mount Lyell as we cross the Lyell Fork.

15 Lessons Learned

I’ve decided to organize my reflections on the trail into a numbered list of lessons learned. Some of these may sound obvious, but several I think are “unspoken” or perhaps even contradicted elsewhere online. I hope you find these teachings helpful in planning your future JMT trip.

1. Do not quit until you are completely sure you need to give up

I fully believe there could not be a single better lesson than this one for hiking the JMT.

On Day 7 of my trip, my dad voluntarily left the trail due to medical concerns. We had gotten a rough start to our trip, arriving in Yosemite at the just one day after the start of the Oak Fire (07/22/22). We spent Day 0 engulfed in smoke, got some relief on Day 1, and then on Day 2 we were finally hit with some of the worst smoke we had ever experienced. The smoke engulfed us on our ascent up Cathedral Pass. The combination of the smoke and higher elevation (10,000 ft) triggered a debilitating migraine for my dad. We hiked through the pain and eventually made it out of the smoke, but it was never quite the same afterwards. In the following days, that migraine would return every time we ascended above ~10,000 ft. Because of this, we found ourselves moving at a slower pace than we thought we would go, and we were about to fall a day behind our target 19-day itinerary. This was a hell-ish situation that we both hadn’t planned for.

To make matters worse, if we kept at the same slow pace we were going, we would begin to run short on food before we made it to our next resupply. The only way to avoid this was to press on and hike longer hours. The problem was: we were already putting in 12+ hour days (6:30 am to 6:30 pm) every day, and it just wasn’t physically or mentally sustainable. We had no time to enjoy the scenery or take enjoyable/relaxing breaks. At some points, we could barely carry on a conversation.

We had gotten through a pretty emotional moment at the end of Day 4 when my dad first brought up leaving the trail. I was incredibly angry that day — I could not accept that either of us might give up, especially so early on, right after completing our first pass. But when the conversation came up again on Day 6 as we departed our first resupply at Red’s Meadow, the tone of the conversation was different. This time, my dad told me he was 100% sure he wanted (and needed) to leave the trail. He told me that his unexpected altitude migraines would undoubtedly prevent either of us from finishing, and we also knew that the trail would only get harder as it trekked across higher elevations. We both had a moment of emotional breakdown before we accepted the reality of the situation. That night, we planned the logistics for him to leave the trail early next morning by backtracking a few miles to Red’s Meadow, where he would hop on the bus to go back to Mammoth Lakes (thankfully, we had cell phone service for this part of the trip!)

Then came the difficult decision of whether or not I wanted to continue the trail by myself. My dad was confident I could continue, but I had never backpacked solo before. I was terrified of doing another 10+ days (~150 miles) alone, so this decision was brutal. But to my surprise, I still wanted to keep going. I was feeling like I was in the best physical shape of my life, and I had essentially no reason to quit other than fear. So I made what I think is the best decision in a situation like this — continue one more day and reevaluate tomorrow.

Day 7 (July 30) began as one of my best hikes ever. I was still incredibly anxious but so excited to see just how far I could push myself now that I was going solo. I wanted to put in as long of a day as I could to try to make up the miles we had fallen behind, so I literally started jogging the trail (more on that later).

Day 7: My first day backpacking solo, feeling great as I embarked on a late afternoon ascent of Selden Pass.

Everything was going great until I reached the top of Selden Pass, where I immediately became aware of a massive thunderstorm forming on the other side. Afternoon thunderstorms are always a risk when going over passes, but I didn’t expect much that day since we hadn’t seen a lot of rain yet on the trip. I was super exposed and saw lightning just a few miles away, so I immediately began to sprint into some less-exposed forest, where I squatted by a cluster of short trees. Shortly after, another hiker in a similar predicament came running up from the other direction and asked if he could hide from the lightning with me. The storms continued around us, and we waited it out for about an hour together. It was quite a surreal moment for both of us, one for which I am thankful I had company. I felt super anxious from the storms, but as they subsided, I resumed my hiking again (it was now 5 pm) and went down some pretty sketchy, slick trail.

It was beginning to get dark in the canyon I was hiking down. As I looked for a campsite, a couple of older ladies hiking together were coming up from the opposite direction. They were incredibly frazzled and breathing rapidly; one of them was having a minor panic attack and begging to leave the trail. They asked me to help them find a campsite because they “couldn’t hike even a second longer.” The whole experience immediately brought my fear of failure back to the surface, and after 19 miles of intense hiking that was breaking me down physically, I finally began to break down mentally, too. I quickly found a campsite on the side of the canyon as it was getting dark and tried to calm down. I desperately messaged my girlfriend on my Garmin and told her I was panicking and didn’t think I could do this for another 10+ days:

A screenshot of my text on the evening of Day 7: the first time I seriously considered quitting after having a panic attack on my first night traveling solo.

This is when she texted me:

If you’re not sure whether or not to stop, then keep going until you don’t have any doubts.

Or in other words, don’t let fear and short-term struggles be the only reason why you quit the trail. I definitely wanted to quit, but I only wanted it about 95%. There was still that 5% of me that was holding on to the idea that I could get through this and see it to the end. It was exactly the advice I needed to hear. My fear was so overwhelming in the moment, but I didn’t really feel ready to quit. And so, just like the previous night, I made the decision to continue one more day and reevaluate tomorrow.

To be very clear — if you or a partner have a serious physical injury, are out of food, or are in an unsolvable predicament, you may not have the luxury to continue one more day. This advice applies primarily to situations where fear of the unknown is the major factor in your decision on whether or not to quit.

Unfortunately, the next turned out to be difficult, too. I had to scale Bear Ridge (in my opinion, the most annoying section of the JMT), and I was trying to hike as long as possible to distract myself from the thoughts of quitting. However, just as I was wrapping up my 15th mile and planning to pass out at Marie Lake, I spotted a couple of familiar faces ahead staring back at me from their campsites. When they saw me, they immediately yelled, “Holy s**t!”

This gets me to my next lesson:

2. Make conversation with as many others on the trail as possible

My trail friends Greg and Nick, who kept me going from Day 8 until the end. Pictured together at the top of Forester Pass (Day 14).

Never underestimate the power and solidarity of connections you can make on the trail. Early on in the trip (Day 2), the two guys pictured above passed by my dad and me as we were hiking out of Yosemite Valley. We chatted briefly as they hauled ass past us. Somehow, three days later at Red’s Meadow, we caught back up to them. We saw them all freshened up after a shower at Red’s (a great idea, by the way), and we had a nice chat about how things were going.

It was three days later that I caught back up with them yet again. That’s when I heard those incredible words: “Holy s**t! How the f**k did you catch up to us?” Nick and Greg had taken a zero-day at Vermilion Valley Resort (VVR, another resupply spot), which, unknown to me at the time, was the only reason why I was able to catch up to them. After I told them the story about my dad needing to leave the trail and how I had been seriously considering quitting, they immediately told me: “we are absolutely not going to let you quit.” I didn’t really believe them, but I decided to go to bed and reevaluate again in the morning.

They weren’t lying. Nick, Greg, and I hiked together for the next eight days, and we made it all the way to Mt. Whitney together. Along the way, we decided to join forces with a couple we kept leapfrogging with (Sam and Cliff, also pictured), and the 5 of us summited Mt. Whitney together and hiked down to Whitney Portal for a celebratory burger. This group saved me more than once. They kept me from quitting on multiple occasions, helped get everyone safely across a flooded stream, and saved me from getting hypothermia during a freezing downpour.

You should always talk to the people you meet on the trail. Together we are stronger 😊

Day 16: The gang of unexpected trail friends finishes the JMT with a sunrise summit of Mt. Whitney.

3. Plan your campsites as you go (be flexible with your schedule)

This one was a tough pill for me to swallow as someone who likes to over-plan. Before the trip, my dad and I created a 19-day itinerary, and guess what — we didn’t follow any of it (minus the first night). This led me to make the conclusion:

The best campsites are the ones you find when you’re ready to be done for the day.

I’ll be completely frank: there is a ~0% chance you follow your exact itinerary. The truth is, you will never know exactly how many miles you can do in a day. The rainstorms we encountered were sporadic and slowed us down drastically. Once, we even had to sit still for 4 hours while we waited for a flooded stream crossing to calm down. You won’t know ahead of time what makes sense, so be flexible and allow yourself to pick campsites the night before or the day of. To add to this — listen to the most current tips/warnings from fellow hikers, as well as from guide apps/books.

That being said, if you’re interested to see where I stayed, here is an approximate log of the 16-day itinerary I ended up following. I am NOT recommending you follow this itinerary; nearly all of these campsites were selected based on our conditions each afternoon.

The 16-day itinerary I followed. Note: Exact mileage may differ from my estimates below.

Would I have planned to intentionally hike two of the hardest passes (Glen Pass and Forester Pass) in one day? Probably not, nor do I recommend it. But that day, we were feeling absolutely amazing, and so we decided to go for it. No regrets there.

To convince you why you shouldn’t pre-plan all your campsites, here’s a picture of where my father and I stayed on Day 4 (Island Pass). We had hoped to make it to Thousand Island Lake, but we were completely gassed and couldn’t keep going. A hiker we met on our way up suggested staying here. This campsite was incidentally one of the prettiest sites of the whole trip, and we enjoyed it so much more having just stumbled upon it.

Day 4: Our (unplanned) campsite near Island Pass. One of the prettiest campsites on the whole trip!

4. If you can afford to plan for more days, do it

It is most backpackers’ urge to finish the trail as fast as possible, and I can tell you that I am one of these people. Sure, it is great to impress yourself with how fast you can hike, but unless you’re competing to break the recent fastest-known-time record (which is ~72 hours), you’re probably not doing the JMT to intentionally rush through the beautiful scenery.

I’m telling you — hiking from 6 am to 6 pm (or later) every day sucks. You can do it a few times, but eventually, it will wear you down mentally and physically. It takes time to set up camp, refill your water, tend to your feet, and make dinner. By the time you get through this, the sun will already be setting, and it will be getting cold. If you get to your campsite late in the day, there’s just no time to sit still and look at the beautiful world around you.

My favorite day of my whole trip was Day 11; instead of trying to go over Mather Pass, we stopped at the beautiful Palisade Lakes at the early time of 2:00 pm to do some laundry, go swimming, and sunbathe. Relaxing at a lake recharges the soul and will keep you going, I promise.

It’s not just about soaking up the scenery, though — budgeting for more days in your itinerary intentionally allows you flexibility in case something goes wrong. Need to take an unexpected “zero day” halfway through the trip? If you’ve budgeted for extra time, you’ll have the food you need and won’t need to worry about missing your ride/flight out of the Sierra. Plus, if everything goes well and you’re feeling great, you can get ahead of schedule, which is mentally a fantastic and comforting place to be.

Day 11: Enjoying the afternoon sun during an early stop (2 pm) at the beautiful Palisade Lakes. We went swimming, did laundry, and sunbathed for several hours before an early dinner and bedtime.

5. Do NOT underestimate the potential for serious rainstorms

Now for some unwanted news — you may get serious rainstorms on your hike. Here are the days (out of 16 total) it rained on us:

• Day 3 (entire evening)
• Day 7 (afternoon thunderstorms)
• Day 8 (most of the evening)
• Day 9 (entire day)
• Day 10 (afternoon sprinkles)
• Day 12 (thunderstorm w/ hail and a 12-hr overnight deluge)
• Day 13 (continued morning rain & flooding)

I didn’t take warnings about the rain seriously. I have been living in Northern California for several years and assumed it was impossible to get rain in late July or August, but to my surprise and many others’ surprise on the trail, it rained 7 of the 16 days I was out there.

Day 12 (and the morning of Day 13) was a nightmare that almost forced our entire group to quit. That afternoon, we got trapped in a pretty intense thunderstorm with lightning and hail as we were making our approach to Pinchot Pass. We had to wait it out for a couple of hours, and the downpour was more than my lightweight rain jacket (Outdoor Research - Helium) could handle. All of my clothes soaked through, and I started to get hypothermia. I was shaking uncontrollably, my lips turned blue, and my brain felt like it had stopped functioning. The only actual thought I could form was to curl up in a ball and pray that someone noticed and took care of me. Thankfully my new trail friends saw I was struggling and gave me some dry clothes and hot water. It was a surprising experience for me, as I had never experienced hypothermia before — nor would I have ever expected that that amount of rain could fall on the JMT in one afternoon.

Unfortunately, that was only a sneak peek of the rain to come. Later that night, as we went to bed around 9 pm, the rain picked up yet again. It continued. And continued. And it didn’t stop. I would sleep for an hour, wake up, listen to see if the rain had changed (it didn’t), and then try to go back to bed. Each time I woke up, the floor of my tent was getting more wet until around 3 or 4 am, I realized I was literally floating, and my entire tent floor and walls were completely saturated and dripping. My sleeping pad was the only thing keeping me from having a soaked sleeping bag.

I woke up in the dark around 5 am to the sound of Nick screaming expletives repeatedly as he, too, realized he was floating in a small lake, desperately trying to move all of his stuff to higher ground. All I could do was laugh at how ridiculous this situation was, thankful that my sleeping bag was still floating above the water. Below is a picture of my tent site when I woke up. This is my “waterproof” ground tarp half-floating in a 1-inch deep pool of rainwater.

My ground tarp after the overnight deluge on the evening of Day 12. I woke up floating in this, with everything around me completely soaked.

Some advice: consider not sleeping in a bowl-shaped tent site during a serious rainstorm (you will get flooded out 🙂). Later that morning, the rain lightened up, but we now faced the challenge of doing our normal day of hiking with entirely soaked clothes, tents, etc., which made hiking very uncomfortable (only wet socks!) and our packs several pounds heavier. To add insult to injury, the trail had completely flooded overnight. Here is a picture of Greg walking on the actual trail (not a river crossing) just north of the Woods Creek bridge. It was an incredible sight to see.

Morning of Day 13: Greg walking on the ACTUAL trail. It was utterly flooded under a few inches of water.

Just a few minutes after this, around 9:30 am, we came across a normally small water crossing of a stream that feeds into Woods Creek. The stream was absolutely raging, probably around armpit level on an average person. It was too dangerous to cross. Downstream, just a few dozen feet, there was a waterfall into Woods Creek that would cause serious injury. We started thinking about leaving the trail, especially if the rain were to continue and keep the trail flooded out. Instead of completely giving up, we decided to wait it out and pray that the stream water level went down a foot or two to just low enough to cross. Af 1:30 pm, about 4 hours later, everyone made it safely across. Even then, the crossing was still waist-deep and pretty scary. We had lost much of our day hiking, but it was worth the extra precaution. That was, thankfully, our last experience with rain for the whole trip. However, it was, without a doubt, the worst 24 hours I have ever spent outside.

The moral of this story is: you should prepare for rain on the JMT, even if you don’t think it will happen. After all, there’s no way to predict on Day 1 what the weather will be like on Day 15.

6. Choosing lightweight gear is generally worth it but can be expensive

Many hikers spend most of their JMT planning focused on the incessant optimization of their gear list. There are many existing blogs, Reddit posts, and other resources that can help you identify your optimal gear given your price point. I will only briefly go into this topic, as I don’t think I can provide better advice than what is out there.

My base weight, when I was still planning on hiking as a duo and sharing gear with my dad, was somewhere around 18 lbs. It is a good goal to aim for a base weight of around 15-20 lbs (less is even better!) When my dad had to leave the trail, I, unfortunately, had to carry all of our shared equipment (e.g., stove, solar panel charger, water filter, multitool, …), bringing my base weight up by several pounds. It probably ended up in the 20+ lb range, but I couldn’t easily measure this since I was already on the trail. All I can say is that it was certainly not ideal.

Like all optimization tasks, there is some diminishing return as you get lower and lower in base weight. My general advice is:

If it is within your budget, go for the more lightweight items if they don’t severely sacrifice comfort or performance.

There are two points here: 1) within the budget and 2) not severely sacrificing comfort/performance. Even for an 18 lb base weight, which I would not consider “ultralight” according to its modern definition, my full list of gear cost around $3000 (brand new). As a Ph.D. student, this was quite a financial burden. Thankfully I took advantage of some discounts and support from my family throughout the year.

While my higher base weight by no means prevented me from completing the trip, I would have really liked to remove a few pounds of gear. The truth is, I didn’t need things like a mug, my heavier Nalgene water bottles, or camp shoes. I also didn’t need to go with the Osprey Exos backpack when there are other great packs like the Gossamer Gear Mariposa 60, which can be 0.5-1 lbs lighter (although I did enjoy the comfort of the Exos.)

Don’t be afraid to go a little outside your comfort zone by choosing lighter items, but don’t sacrifice anything serious; e.g., don’t pick a lightweight pack that is so uncomfortable it will cause you injury.

Below is a copy of my gear list for your reference. I will not comment here on my review of specific items, and I encourage you to consult other resources for better guidance in selecting your gear.

My Gear List (Summer 2022). Some items may be omitted because they were meant to be shared with my dad (e.g., solar charger, multitool). Use at your own risk: weights & costs may not be completely accurate. These are also not product endorsements.

7. Bring only food you will actually enjoy (i.e., taste-test your food first!)

When planning the food for my JMT trip, I found that I was often picking items that I thought I “should” eat, rather than items I knew I would enjoy eating. You’ll see lots of resources recommending high-nutrition energy bars (e.g., PROBARs), instant oatmeal packets, nut butters, tortillas, etc. While all of these are fantastic options that I would recommend you include in your meal plans, they won’t do a whole lot for you if they aren’t something you usually consume.

I’ll be honest, I wasted a lot of money and space on food I didn’t love. For me, my disliked foods were:

• My burrito lunches (homemade beans+rice mixture with tortillas — they didn’t rehydrate well or taste good)
• Nut butters (I spent my whole life not eating any nuts due to a peanut allergy, and so even the almond butter I brought was kind of gross to me)
• Hemp hearts (I had never eaten these before the trip)
• Sunflower seeds (I usually love these but wasn’t feeling them for some reason)

I highly recommend you taste-test your foods before going. At the very least, I suggest that you do not bring new foods that you haven’t tried at least once before. Ideally, the foods you bring should be things you crave. You will likely eat a lot more on the trail than you do on a normal day, and it is quite a challenge to eat more of something that you like less.

That being said, I did have some real wins in meal prepping. The major winner: my breakfasts, which I prepped in bulk (see photo). The recipe for an individual serving was close to as follows:

Matt’s oat breakfast recipe:

• 50g quick cooking rolled oats (Bob’s Red Mill)
• 2 tbsp sliced nuts (almond, hazelnuts, macadamia, or cashew)
• 1 tbsp freeze-dried fruit (cherries, blueberries, cranberries, or strawberries)
• 1 tsp chia seeds
• 1 tbsp powdered milk
• 2/3 tbsp sugar
• 1/8 tsp salt
• Pinch of cinnamon/nutmeg (or other favorite spices)
• 1 drop of vanilla extract

A winner: Homemade quick oat breakfasts (there are ~40 servings here which were each individually packed in vacuum-sealed bags.)

These oat breakfasts rehydrated well, plus the variability of mixing up the nut and fruit combinations made it feel very new each morning.

One more quick shoutout for this section — I absolutely loved the tasty, calorie-dense Chicken Pesto Pasta from Peak Refuel. I loved this dinner so much the first night I had it that I actually saved up the extras for days when I felt the worst. A true lifesaver as I started getting tired of my food at the end of the trip!

My favorite freeze-dried meal: Chicken Pesto Pasta (Peak Refuel)

8. Pay close attention to your mind/body, and choose carefully when to push yourself

This one sounds like a no-brainer, but you’d be surprised how easy it is to forget. Like many grand challenges in life, the JMT is “more like a marathon than a sprint.” There will be some days that you feel great and will be eager to go as fast as possible. In general, I would say: when you feel good, go for it. But don’t get so obsessed with meeting your itinerary that you forget to check in with your mind & body.

As I mentioned previously, my first solo day (Day 7) was the strongest I felt mentally & physically while on the trail. I got so cocky about my newfound strength, that I actually jogged sections of the trail on my way down into Tully Hole and then later up Silver Pass. I was passing other hikers who commented on my quick speed, and I let all those ego boosts get to me. Later that evening, of course, I got stuck in a thunderstorm and had a panic attack. A quick wake-up call, to say the least.

The next morning I also discovered that my abrupt increase in hiking pace had also caused a minor injury: Achilles tendinitis in my right ankle. I could feel throbbing pain with every step I took and desperately messaged my girlfriend to ask her to send me instructions on how to tape up my ankle properly (see photo below).

Taping up my right Achilles on Day 8 after I went a little too hard the day before (~19 mi). My ankle would not fully recover until after the trip.

My Achilles pain stayed with me the remainder of the trip, and there was no way I could hike that fast again. As the days continued, I learned to ignore my pain, practiced better stretches, began soaking my feet in cold water, and developed a nice ibuprofen regimen. But the pain never fully went away. Needless to say, pushing myself so hard on Day 7 was not worth it.

To summarize with a simple lesson: hike at your own healthy pace. This is challenging in groups where your buddies prefer to go significantly faster (or slower) than your comfortable pace. I’ve dubbed this the “hiking death spiral”, where the faster person(s) get all the break time, and the slower person(s) spend all their time hiking to catch up, only to feel super burned out with very little time to rest.

There’s no good solution for this, other than to 1) pick different hiking buddies, or 2) compromise somewhere in the middle. Obviously, if you’re already on the trail, you’re probably not going to pick different hiking buddies. So instead, you will need to find a way to compromise and follow a schedule that is healthy for everyone. It is totally okay to do short sections of the trail at your own pace and to be further ahead/behind others in your group (i.e., “hike your own hike”). But at the end of the day, it is vital that you stick together for your safety and health. Be sure to check in on others in your group and meet up at checkpoints frequently enough so that you can ensure no one has gotten lost or injured. This camaraderie could prove to be lifesaving, especially if you find yourselves caught in a storm or other emergency situation (more on this later, too!)

9. Bring an electronic copy of Elizabeth Wenk’s JMT Guide with you and read it as you go

I purchased a physical copy of Elizabeth Wenk’s John Muir Trail guide several years before my trip. (Side note: check out her new, 6th version now!) I thought that reading the book in advance would be a great way to prep before the trip — I would read the whole thing first and then leave the book at home. Turns out that this book is difficult to digest or understand if you aren’t currently ON the trail itself.

It never occurred to me that I was bringing a smartphone and thus could keep an electronic copy on there. One of the hiking buddies (Cliff) I met on the trail had done just this, and he kept us up-to-date and informed daily, reading it aloud to us as we crossed into each new section of the trail. Wenk’s writing is fantastic and captivating, and she provides insights and observations that will make you appreciate the trip much more. I highly recommend this e-book approach, especially if you plan to bring a smartphone!

Elizabeth Wenk’s newest, 6th version of her popular John Muir Trail guide. The definitive resource while you’re on the trail!

10. The bugs are NO JOKE

If you’re going to be on the trail in the early-ish season (June, July, even early parts of August), you will certainly encounter bugs. Depending on the year’s conditions, it could be A LOT of them. This includes the extremely pesky, biting mosquitos, as well as some flies that like to follow you and buzz around your face for five minutes as you’re hiking. We encountered tons of mosquitos in the first half of the trip, particularly on the first few days while still in Yosemite (July 24-27ish). They continued to pop up at different locations throughout the trip, but as a SOBO hiker, it does gradually get better as you go to more arid, higher elevations in the south.

We initially brought Sawyer’s picaridin insect repellent with us. Unfortunately, picaridin doesn’t seem to stop these Sierra mosquitos. Eventually, I switched over to DEET. Yes, DEET sucks and is mildly toxic to you and outdoor life. It also dissolves some plastics. But it’s one of the only things that work. Just use it responsibly and minimize its accumulation on your gear and in the environment (e.g., alpine lakes and streams).

I highly recommend you also spray your tent and clothing with permethrin. I should have done this before the trip; instead, I scrambled to buy some and apply it when we made it to the store at Tuolumne Meadows. It was well worth the added cost and effort. While I did not have one, I also recommend you look into purchasing a mosquito head net. You will appreciate it.

My anti-bug (and anti-sun) setup: a Buff CoolNet UV+ Insect Shield worn as a neck gaiter. It worked moderately well. A mosquito head net would have worked better.

11. Backpacking bidets are un-ironically amazing

I never thought I’d say this, but having a bidet in the backcountry is a game-changer. Everyone I hiked with unanimously agreed. I brought the CuloClean portable bidet attachment. It’s an extremely lightweight (0.42 oz) nozzle attachment you push into the opening of a plastic squeeze water bottle. I used it with an empty disposable plastic water bottle. Note: if you use a flimsy disposable bottle, it will likely get crushed by the end of your trip, so be prepared to get a backup. There is so much water available in the Sierra that you will have no problem sacrificing a little bit of your water to clean up “down there” daily.

Check out this video by Paul the Backpacker for a hilarious and informative discussion on how to use one properly. Whatever style and procedure you end up doing, you will be an expert by the end of the trip. Once you get good at using one, you will find that you are much cleaner than if you had only used toilet paper. On top of that, should you choose to bring TP still — perhaps to double-check if you did a good job — you won’t need to bring very much. I think I only ended up using 1/4 roll for the whole 2.5-week trip.

A portable backpacking bidet attachment from CuloClean. This attachment is as light as a few sheets of toilet paper and gets you much cleaner!

12. Trail running shoes are great! But wear what feels best

I had doubts about hiking 220 miles in trail runners, as I had been taught for years that waterproof hiking boots were the only appropriate shoes to wear for backpacking. It turns out that trail runners work great, and I was almost completely blister-free for those 2.5 weeks (I only had some issues during the flooding event). I wore HOKA Men’s Speedgoat 4 shoes (see picture). I have been a big fan of HOKA shoes due to their extra cushioning, and these felt perfect on me (the traditional Altra Lone Peaks just don’t feel great). I bought two pairs of Speedgoats — one to train in and a fresh pair for the trip. This plan worked great.

Why are trail running shoes good for the JMT? 1) They’re lightweight, and 2) they dry easily and are breathable. Sure, they’re less durable and offer less protection from rocks, but I found their lightweight nature and breathability worth the trade-off.

You will get your shoes wet nearly every day. This is the inconvenient truth of hiking the JMT — there are water crossings almost every hour (sometimes several). Even if you are a water-crossing acrobat, you’re going to accidentally get a footcompletely submerged every once and a while. In this kind of environment, it’s much better to have shoes that can dry out quickly, as no amount of waterproofing is going to help you if you get a bucket of water inside your boot.

That being said, wear the shoes that feel the best. I saw many hikers wearing full-on hiking boots, and all of the ones I chatted with said they loved their shoes and would never give them up. As far as I can tell, it doesn’t really matter that they’re bulkier as long as you like them.

Finally, I regret not bringing ankle gaiters. During my practice hikes, I never had problems with rocks getting in my shoes, especially since I always wear long pants while hiking. But you’d be surprised how easy it is to get tiny rocks (grit) in your shoes on the JMT. Every time we took a break, I found myself removing some.

The HOKA Men’s Speedgoat 4 shoes I wore on the JMT (pictures from before the trip). I used Superfeet Carbon insoles and had almost no issues. In general, wear what feels the most comfortable for you!

13. A cold foot soak in the evening feels great 🙂

Being on a trail with so much fresh mountain water comes with another added benefit — a free cold water source to soak your feet and legs. I would do this every evening for 10-15 minutes, and sometimes even after lunch. You can soak your feet either in a stream or nearby alpine lakes. You’ll also find it great to massage your feet afterward.

As always, if you take good care of your feet, they will take care of you!

Day 3: My dad and I soaking our feet in the Tuolumne River during our afternoon break. It felt amazing!

14. Bring a Garmin inReach Mini, or another satellite communicator, especially if traveling solo

Garmin inReach MINI 2, currently available for $400. I had no regrets about my purchase and choice to bring one!

It might seem excessive to buy yet another piece of gear to bring with you — especially one that is so expensive ($400, not including the subscription)— but I found the Garmin inReach Mini indispensable on my trip. If you’re hiking in a group, you probably only need one device to share.

At the very least, this device offers peace of mind. Just knowing that you have a way to get help or send a message to a family member should you need to will give you a larger sense of freedom to enjoy the outdoors.

I also appreciated the use of its tracking and MapShare feature. I enabled tracking points every 30 minutes which were automatically sent to the Garmin MapShare website, where my friends/family could follow our daily progress. When my dad had to leave the trail (and I went solo), this was also a great way to stay in touch with him to make sure he made it home safely and to coordinate plans for getting picked up at the end of the trip. I also stayed in touch with my girlfriend, who, as I discussed earlier, provided me with a lot of support, including directions on how to tape my ankle and reports about weather conditions.

When I joined up with Nick & Greg, they could borrow my inReach to text their loved ones after over a week of no-contact — which I think was much appreciated by both them and their families. Several weeks of no communication can be a lot of time in the modern world!

15. Bringing a smartphone is worth it for the camera and ability to use a GPS hiking app (e.g., FarOut)

Besides providing you with a way to contact friends/family before or after the trip, as well as an app interface for using the Garmin inReach, a smartphone also provides you with a great camera and hiking guide app(s). I used my iPhone to take thousands of photos and videos, which was worth the added weight.

What I didn’t know before I left is that the FarOut (formerly, Guthooks) app also has a great JMT guide. I was able to download the app when I briefly had cell service at Red’s Meadow. While the JMT guide does cost some money, I found it worth it for its elevation map, water sources, community comments, and recommended campsites. Having all that information made it so much easier to plan out our hiking. Check it out at https://faroutguides.com/. I am not sponsored – just a fan of this app!

Screenshot from FarOut app with the John Muir Trail guide loaded in elevation view, making it easier to plan your hard days (e.g., hiking Forester Pass)

Conclusion

Thank you for reading, and I hope these lessons help you have a more enjoyable future JMT trip. If there is any grand takeaway I have for you, it’s this: a healthy mindset will make for a much more enjoyable trip. It is guaranteed that you will run into something unexpected on your hike, whether that be equipment failure, weather, injury, etc. You have to trust yourself that you will find a way to work through it.

After all, you are not spending your valuable vacation time hiking the JMT just to test your wilderness survival abilities — you’re there to be immersed in some of the most beautiful scenery that is only accessible to those crazy enough to walk hundreds of miles to see it. If you keep a healthy mindset, you will find that even the hardest days are pretty amazing.

Take care, and happy hiking!

Our final sunset (Day 15) at Guitar Lake below Mt. Whitney. A perfect end to a beautiful and challenging JMT thru-hike!