January 23rd to 24th 2010: Point Reyes

The second annual Bay Area BPL (backpackinglight.com) Point Reyes backpacking trip took place in late January.  Although I went alone last year, Em joined me this year and we had a great time.

All of the photos I took are below.  For more details and photos by the other people, check out the following link:

http://www.backpackinglight.com/cgi-bin/backpackinglight/forums/thread_display.html?forum_thread_id=28191

During the hike in, we saw lots of mushrooms, but this one really stood out.

As this was a sunny Saturday followed by a week of storms, lots of day hikers made the hike out to Alamere Falls.

 

This photo was taken standing where the falls go over the cliff, looking north along the stretch of beach we'd walk to get to Wildcat camp.  Due to the storms and a high tide, getting around the point while staying dry looked tricky.

 

Down at the beach, the falls had more volume than I'd ever seen, but not as much as I expected.   In other words, in the future, I would not make a special trip out to the falls to see it after a storm.

 

Em and I knew we didn't have a chance of making it around the point without getting wet, so we preemptively took off our shoes and socks.   We made it around the point dry, but then the tide kept coming, getting me just above the knees and Em just below the waist.  Click here for a high resolution version of this photo, which was taken after the danger zone.

 

On the hike in we gathered Miner's Lettuce and Watercress, the latter of which is shown in this photo.   To provide for a more festive atmosphere, I lugged in a 7 pound bag of charcoal, over which we cooked our pasta and grilled shrimp.  Although the food turned out well, we wouldn't do it again as it was very slow.

 

On the hike out, we passed this amazing patch of Nettles and Miner's Lettuce.  If we had brought gloves and snips we would have collected nettles on the way in.

 

Back at the car, showing off my one finger weight pack and unconventional hiking clothes.  Specifically, while changing into my hiking clothes at the car prior to the hike, I started to put shorts over my long johns then decided not to bother.  Thus I hiked both ways and spent most of the time in camp wearing only my long underwear (over my usual synthetic boxer/brief underwear).  It was very comfortable since when I got hot I could expose my lower leg; I plan to backpack with these 'pants' in the future.

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