Laurabelle's Blog

Three years ago I tried to hike the Rae Lakes Loop in Kings Canyon National Park. We had a good time and took a bunch of pretty pictures, but I got altitude sickness and had to turn back after two days. This year I'm in a bit better shape, so we thought we'd give it [...]

Back in August (yeah, yeah, I know, I'm behind) my college friend Maggie and her other half, Louis, came to California for a hiking trip with Jeff and me. The destination was the Rae Lakes Loop in Kings Canyon National Park. Our permit reservation was for entrance on the Thursday before Labor Day, and we [...]

On the last weekend in July, Jeff and I went backpacking in Lassen Volcanic National Park. It was a good trip (much better than our last few), but the adventure started early this time. I had planned everything carefully in advance; we had our wilderness permit and everything ready to go. But at the last [...]

This weekend Jeff and I tried our hike to Sky High Lakes and Summit Lake a second time. I guess the third time will have to be the charm for this one. We drove up to Yreka on Friday and got to the ranger station in Fort Jones just in time to get our campfire [...]

I am not generally a spontaneous person; I like to plan things out. Jeff and I had plans for this weekend (maybe not perfect plans, but plans nonetheless). As you might guess, our plans didn't exactly work out. We had been planning to hike the Alder Creek Fall trail (starting at Wawona near Yosemite's south [...]

This weekend Jeff rode in Waves to Wine 2007: 155 miles from San Francisco to Lake Sonoma, biked over two days. I did not ride, but I went along and volunteered. Jeff left the apartment at 6am in order to get to San Francisco in time for the 6:30am start. I stayed behind and went [...]

At the end of September Jeff and I will be participating in Waves to Wine, a two-day bike tour from San Francisco to the Napa valley to raise funds for the National Multiple Sclerosis society. He will bike; I will volunteer since the idea of my biking ~150 miles is laughable. Multiple Sclerosis is an [...]

Jeff and I planned a hike in the Marble Mountain Wilderness for our first wedding anniversary. This was to be a three-day, eighteen-mile hike encompassing creeks and lakes and ridges. All the good stuff, really. The hike started out well, if warmer than Jeff would have liked. We drove up to Yreka on Friday and [...]

Friday was a holiday at Jeff’s work, so I took a day off too, and we made a day trip to Yosemite National Park. The day commenced at 3:30am, and we were on the road by 4:40am. The highways were empty that early in the morning, so we made good time and reached the trailhead [...]

Yesterday Jeff and I went out to Mount Diablo and hiked the Mitchell Canyon and Eagle Peak loop. We meant to do the hike last weekend but didn’t make it; this week we had better luck. In fact we had a fairly active weekend. Friday evening was guest night at Berkeley Ironworks, so we invited [...]