We spent the first few days of our trip driving across Nevada and hanging out in Sacramento.  On Sunday we stocked up on goodies at Trader Joes then drove to Samuel P. Taylor State Park to camp for the night.   With no public land remotely close to the bay area a $35 a night car camping spot is about as good as it gets.  Those of us living in Utah where there’s so much public land available for free camping don’t realize how lucky we are really are.   While $35 is pretty steep I would still consider camping there again on a future trip. This my fist time camping under redwoods and it was definitely a cool experience.   We spent the night and then wandered around the campground before heading off to Point Reyes.

Jumping on the Salt Flats

Samuel P. Taylor Campground

Massive Trees in our campsite

First stop of the day was the required photos of the The Point Reyes in downtown Inverness. I absolutely love this boat and the kids get a kick out of it as well.

We called the Roots who were just leaving Davis and still planned on meeting us at the Point Reyes light house for a short day hike before we started backpacking so we stopped at Drakes beach for a few hours to let the kids run around while we waited.

After Drakes Beach we drove to the lighthouse trail head and met up with Tyler and family. We made the hike down the 300+ stairs to check out the lighthouse and then drove to the visitor center to pick up our reserved backpacking permits before driving out to the Coast Camp trail head.

Once at the trail head it took us about a half hour to get our packs ready and start out on the 2 mile hike to coast camp. This was the first backpacking trip with all 3 boys  and it was a perfect test run for some future trips we have planned for later this year.   We made it to our site, set up camp,  and then headed down to the beach for sunset.  It was pretty windy and a bit cold but still fun. There were too many clouds for star trails but I did take a few long exposures from the ridge above our campsite.

April and boys on the trail

San Francisco light pollution over Point Reyes

Around midnight it started to rain and it kept going all night and into the morning.  We stayed in the tent and packed up everything, put on our rain gear, and April started packing out with the boys while I packed up the remaining gear. I figured I would soon catch up but our boys are such great hikers and had a  blast stomping in the mud and splashing in every puddle during their hike out that I didn’t catch up a until few hundred yards before the trail head.   It took us at least 30min to unpack our bags and repack the car then we headed up the road to find a spot where we could get internet access and check the weather.   Forecast was nothing but rain for the next 24hours so we called it quits and headed south along the 1 making quick stops at Agate beach,  Sausalito,  then over the Golden gate to San Francisco.

Bowen came REALLY close to grabbing this pelican in Sausalito

Lucky for us my brother was working in San Francisco all week so we got to crash in his hotel room in downtown San Francisco 1 block from union square.  The boys were utterly thrilled about the VIP lounge that was always filled with snacks and had amazing views of the city.  One of the first things I did was figure out the safety latches on the windows so I could shoot photos of the city.

We spent the next three days doing cheap touristy things around San Francisco. Baker Beach, long walks downtown, cable car museum, Ocean beach,  golden gate park, and a few trips for sunrise and sunset at Crissy Field. It was actually a nice pleasant change of pace from our usual trips.

The Golden Gate from Crissy Field.

Sunset from Crissy Field

On our last night in SF I was able to catch some lighting (from what I understand a pretty rare occurance in the bay area) from the window of our 15th floor hotel room).

We left SF and made a long stop in Sacramento before driving across Nevada and back to Utah.  Even with only two nights of camping it still was pretty fun to get out and see the city.

We started our trip by parking my car at the Crystal Lake trail head then we drove up that road to the Bald Mountain pass. The was plan was to backpack around Notch Mountain, spend then night at Ibantik Lake, then hike down to my car at the Crystal Lake TH. The first few miles of trail were slightly downhill so we made great time and had excellent views.

Notch Mountain as seen from Clegg Lake.

Notch Lake

Is only took a few hours to reach Ibantik lake so we set up camp then walked down the lake to fish and hang out. Lanik is 7yo, he had been fishing once before and loved it so Nick packed in an extra rod just for him. The fish were small but he was pulling them in left and right and that kept him very happy.

We made a short hike around the lake and followed an inlet stream to the south east where I found a 3′ mylar buzz lightyear balloon. We did a bit more fishing and watched an amazing sunset blow up the entire sky.

That night was pretty warm, the clouds were socked in and there was a bit of rain so no star trails. In the morning we woke up to thousands of mosquitoes attacking us so we packed up camp and scrambled across the lake to eat breakfast and do a bit more fishing before hiking up to the notch pass.

Nick looking north from the Notch

We made great time as we hiked down from the notch to the crystal lake TH. There was an insane amount of people around Wall lake, lucky for us that we never had to deal with the masses up at Ibantik. Short trip but a very fun trip none the less.