Best of the John Muir Trail 2025

This is a montage of photos from my August 2025 thru-hike of the John Muir Trail. I hiked northbound (NOBO) starting at Cottonwood Lakes and ending at Happy Isles. Along the way I met and hiked with various great people, a few of whom are pictured here. I had good weather until some severe afternoon thunderstorms the last couple of days.

I can highly recommend The Trek website and Elizabeth Wenk’s amazing guidebook, which you can get in a NOBO edition on Kindle, as planning sources. The FarOut app is incredibly helpful for navigation.

Gear selections are quite subjective; my gear list is linked below. For me at age 67, keeping my pack weight down was essential. Training at altitude was also important for me, although I’m pretty average physically. Mentally, the concept of “embracing the suck” helped me a lot.

I’ve posted some articles about the JMT on The Trek, and will write more in coming weeks. I hope they’ll help and inspire others to take this amazing journey in future years.

My JMT “Origin Story”: https://184.168.31.10:444/my-jmt-origin-story-take-two/

Six-week prep countdown: https://thetrek.co/six-weeks-to-mount...

Final trail prep: https://thetrek.co/final-john-muir-tr...

My gear list including weight: https://lighterpack.com/r/ctgapk

Elizabeth Wenk’s guidebook: https://www.amazon.com/John-Muir-Trai...

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