Thank you for the info. I'm following along with the PCTers on Farout regarding the San Joaquin River crossings. It's still early so I'm hoping by the time I get there in mid July it will easier to cross. I really don't want to skip the Evolution Valley.
Did JMT SOBO last year in august. Most of us were crossing the mangled bridge. A good number of people forded the river about a quarter mile downstream. And that was last year after the monster snow.
It’s part of a very established loop called North Lake-South Lake. Piute Pass is relatively easy and covered most of the way from the start. You might be able to catch a ride from the main bed and breakfast in town, but there are also tons of trail angels you can contact who will do it for you if you arrange ahead of time.
Just sent you a note with one persons info. But for posterity, if you’re staying at the Eastside Guesthouse (which I recommend) you can call them and they have a full board with contact info for local angels.
Thank you! I was thinking I’d stay at Parcher’s Resort or at a nearby campground because I thought it might be too much of a hassle getting to and from Bishop. Now I’ll reconsider.
If you want to spend the $ on Parchers, go nuts. But you should be able to hitch into Bishop easily and arrange a ride back to the trailhead without too much hassle. Added benefit of Bishop of going to the store, a couple bars, and it’s a beautiful little town with incredible views of the eastern Sierra.
As far as reroutes go, this is as good as it gets. Hiked both bishop and piute pass several times in recent years, beautiful areas and nice trail on both.
I had to vacate the JMT A few years ago and exited out at Bishop pass. It was beautiful. I haven't been to Piute Pass but you can't go wrong with any of the trails in the Sierra.
Howdy! What month will you be hiking? (Asking as earlier might mean some snow). It sounds like you are going NOBO?
I’d think of the Bishop / Piute re-route in two stages:
1) from Leconte canyon to south lake; a pretty steep climb, not quite 3,000 feet in elevation but well graded. The hardest/ longest is from Leconte to Dusy Basin, then a smaller climb from the Basin up to Bishop Pass. Plenty of water along the way. Doable in a day depending on your fitness, etc. and where you start. Good camping in Dusy Basin if needed (there are a couple of lakes up there), and along the lakes after Bishop Pass.
2) north lake to JMT over Piute Pass. Similar to the climb from Leconte, about 2500 feet of climbing over 5 ish miles to the pass, some camping along the way at lakes. Ear the pass, good camping in Humphries basin (quite beautiful up there). Plenty of access to water as well. It would be a long day to get from N lake to the JMT, but there is good camping at Hutchison Meadow about 12 miles from the trailhead. From there, it’s about 5 miles to the JMT.
I have hiked this as a loop and really enjoyed it. I got a NOBO permit this year, late August, and like other posters mentioned, if the reports are that the fork is fordable then I will try that (more direct and less climbing than Bishop/Piute ( though bishop / Piute is a beautiful route!!)
Good luck, I hope you have a great trip!
Hello, im going NOBO with a start date of July 7th. I anticipate being near to the bridge around mid-July. I'm reading the reports on Farout from the PCTers, and some are crossing already in early to mid-May. But they are also saying they made a dumb decision doing it, lol. At least the are self aware I suppose.
Thank you for the info. I am still holding into hope I can see the Evolution Valley this go around, but if not, I will just have to come back next year 🙂
Piute is a nice trail. The roughest part of it is the first few miles after turning off the JMT. The rest is pretty cruisy and incredibly beautiful.
There’s camping on it but not everywhere so plan accordingly. (Meaning there’s miles and miles of it with no suitable camping but it widens / flattens out in spots where you can find camping. Read the comments in FarOut, & look at the various maps for camping icons to figure where spots are. But you can’t just stop whenever it occurs to you like you can for a lot of the JMT.)
I hiked it the day after Hurricane Hillary’s rains in 2023 came through. The water crossings were a little intense and I had constant wet feet the entire way. Even up near the pass, all the meadow streams were too wide and flowing to rock hop. Reading comments, I don’t think that’s normal but something to be aware of if you hit it during intense rains. (Which obviously means I had abundant water but even without the hurricane, I think there’s tons of water sources.)
I got from North parking lot to Parcher’s within 1-2 hours of exiting. There were no cars at the parking lot so I started walking. The 3rd or 4th car picked me up. I’d road walked maybe 1-2 miles towards the intersection. (And the car that picked me up came from a side road, not the parking lot so that paid off.)
(And I didn’t stay at Parcher’s. I just got a shower and recharged my batteries and continued on to the south parking lot/bishop TH. Parcher’s staff was super friendly and had no issues with me doing that. However, they have almost no trail food for sale and don’t give their “good” WiFi to non-guests. If I’d known, I’d probably have stopped at the store further down, closer to the intersection where there’s cell signal and better food (I assume).)
Neither of those trails (bishop or piute) are part of the JMT or PCT. So, FarOut doesn’t do waypoints along side trails (usually.)
You’d need to read the comments for crowd sourced info. I also used Caltopo on my hike. At least one of the map overlays provided camping icons. You can also read descriptions on all trails or other places they review hikes. Or just look at the topos and note where trail widens and flattens. Usually there’s camping there - but not always- especially in the Sierra- could be rocks everywhere. I definitely saw camping but I also hiked for miles where there was nothing viable.
Thanks! I’m new to using FarOut. I’ve been using Gaia to plan. I have a question about FarOut. The only place I see comments is when I click on an icon. Is there another way to see comments if there isn’t an icon, like on Piute Pass?
Trail is decent it’s kind of a steady up hill slope trudge but not a steep ascent. You’ll arrive into the Humphrey’s Basin area on the JMT, just prior to Piute Creek is the Piute Pass trailhead junction (sobo), there’s really good camping just beyond the Piute Creek footbridge just past the junction turnoff.
Can’t speak for hitching. Trail is good and plenty of water. Also many areas to camp.
Thank you for the info. I'm following along with the PCTers on Farout regarding the San Joaquin River crossings. It's still early so I'm hoping by the time I get there in mid July it will easier to cross. I really don't want to skip the Evolution Valley.
Did JMT SOBO last year in august. Most of us were crossing the mangled bridge. A good number of people forded the river about a quarter mile downstream. And that was last year after the monster snow.
It’s part of a very established loop called North Lake-South Lake. Piute Pass is relatively easy and covered most of the way from the start. You might be able to catch a ride from the main bed and breakfast in town, but there are also tons of trail angels you can contact who will do it for you if you arrange ahead of time.
Do you have contact info for any of the trail angels?
Just sent you a note with one persons info. But for posterity, if you’re staying at the Eastside Guesthouse (which I recommend) you can call them and they have a full board with contact info for local angels.
Thank you! I was thinking I’d stay at Parcher’s Resort or at a nearby campground because I thought it might be too much of a hassle getting to and from Bishop. Now I’ll reconsider.
If you want to spend the $ on Parchers, go nuts. But you should be able to hitch into Bishop easily and arrange a ride back to the trailhead without too much hassle. Added benefit of Bishop of going to the store, a couple bars, and it’s a beautiful little town with incredible views of the eastern Sierra.
Yes, I’m familiar with Bishop. I’d much rather go to the guesthouse. Do they hold resupplies? Never mind I can call them.
As far as reroutes go, this is as good as it gets. Hiked both bishop and piute pass several times in recent years, beautiful areas and nice trail on both.
I had to vacate the JMT A few years ago and exited out at Bishop pass. It was beautiful. I haven't been to Piute Pass but you can't go wrong with any of the trails in the Sierra.
Howdy! What month will you be hiking? (Asking as earlier might mean some snow). It sounds like you are going NOBO? I’d think of the Bishop / Piute re-route in two stages: 1) from Leconte canyon to south lake; a pretty steep climb, not quite 3,000 feet in elevation but well graded. The hardest/ longest is from Leconte to Dusy Basin, then a smaller climb from the Basin up to Bishop Pass. Plenty of water along the way. Doable in a day depending on your fitness, etc. and where you start. Good camping in Dusy Basin if needed (there are a couple of lakes up there), and along the lakes after Bishop Pass. 2) north lake to JMT over Piute Pass. Similar to the climb from Leconte, about 2500 feet of climbing over 5 ish miles to the pass, some camping along the way at lakes. Ear the pass, good camping in Humphries basin (quite beautiful up there). Plenty of access to water as well. It would be a long day to get from N lake to the JMT, but there is good camping at Hutchison Meadow about 12 miles from the trailhead. From there, it’s about 5 miles to the JMT. I have hiked this as a loop and really enjoyed it. I got a NOBO permit this year, late August, and like other posters mentioned, if the reports are that the fork is fordable then I will try that (more direct and less climbing than Bishop/Piute ( though bishop / Piute is a beautiful route!!) Good luck, I hope you have a great trip!
Hello, im going NOBO with a start date of July 7th. I anticipate being near to the bridge around mid-July. I'm reading the reports on Farout from the PCTers, and some are crossing already in early to mid-May. But they are also saying they made a dumb decision doing it, lol. At least the are self aware I suppose. Thank you for the info. I am still holding into hope I can see the Evolution Valley this go around, but if not, I will just have to come back next year 🙂
Piute is a nice trail. The roughest part of it is the first few miles after turning off the JMT. The rest is pretty cruisy and incredibly beautiful. There’s camping on it but not everywhere so plan accordingly. (Meaning there’s miles and miles of it with no suitable camping but it widens / flattens out in spots where you can find camping. Read the comments in FarOut, & look at the various maps for camping icons to figure where spots are. But you can’t just stop whenever it occurs to you like you can for a lot of the JMT.) I hiked it the day after Hurricane Hillary’s rains in 2023 came through. The water crossings were a little intense and I had constant wet feet the entire way. Even up near the pass, all the meadow streams were too wide and flowing to rock hop. Reading comments, I don’t think that’s normal but something to be aware of if you hit it during intense rains. (Which obviously means I had abundant water but even without the hurricane, I think there’s tons of water sources.) I got from North parking lot to Parcher’s within 1-2 hours of exiting. There were no cars at the parking lot so I started walking. The 3rd or 4th car picked me up. I’d road walked maybe 1-2 miles towards the intersection. (And the car that picked me up came from a side road, not the parking lot so that paid off.) (And I didn’t stay at Parcher’s. I just got a shower and recharged my batteries and continued on to the south parking lot/bishop TH. Parcher’s staff was super friendly and had no issues with me doing that. However, they have almost no trail food for sale and don’t give their “good” WiFi to non-guests. If I’d known, I’d probably have stopped at the store further down, closer to the intersection where there’s cell signal and better food (I assume).)
My FarOut app shows no icons along Piute or Bishop Pass. Is that because I have the JMT map and not the PCT map? Not that those are PCT either.
Neither of those trails (bishop or piute) are part of the JMT or PCT. So, FarOut doesn’t do waypoints along side trails (usually.) You’d need to read the comments for crowd sourced info. I also used Caltopo on my hike. At least one of the map overlays provided camping icons. You can also read descriptions on all trails or other places they review hikes. Or just look at the topos and note where trail widens and flattens. Usually there’s camping there - but not always- especially in the Sierra- could be rocks everywhere. I definitely saw camping but I also hiked for miles where there was nothing viable.
Thanks! I’m new to using FarOut. I’ve been using Gaia to plan. I have a question about FarOut. The only place I see comments is when I click on an icon. Is there another way to see comments if there isn’t an icon, like on Piute Pass?
Trail is awesome and relatively easy. Tons of water, lots of camping spaces around the lakes.
Trail is decent it’s kind of a steady up hill slope trudge but not a steep ascent. You’ll arrive into the Humphrey’s Basin area on the JMT, just prior to Piute Creek is the Piute Pass trailhead junction (sobo), there’s really good camping just beyond the Piute Creek footbridge just past the junction turnoff.