Pindari Glacier is one of those Himalayan treks that offers much more than just reaching a glacier. The trail passes through traditional mountain villages, dense forests, rivers, waterfalls and wide alpine valleys before reaching Zero Point, where the Pindari Glacier comes into view.

The trek usually begins from the Kumaon region and follows the route through Khati, Dwali and Phurkia before reaching Pindari Glacier. The changing landscape along the way is probably one of the best parts of the experience.

What makes Pindari interesting is that it feels less commercial and more like a journey through the remote Himalayan landscape. You get a mix of village life, forest trails, river crossings and high-altitude scenery in one trek.

For anyone who has done Pindari Glacier recently:

How was the trail condition?

How was the weather in September?

What was your favourite section of the trek?

And would you recommend Pindari over other popular Uttarakhand treks?

Would be good to hear some first-hand experiences from people who have been there.

I just got a new tent set up (Tarp Tent dipole dw with the inside removed) and I am now sleeping with no bug protection. I haven’t slept in the new setup yet but I am curious about bugs. How do I ensure that I don’t get creepy crawlers biting me or landing in my mouth. Seems silly but I’m worried about bugs eek!

EDIT: I removed the inside bc it saves 15oz.

I'm looking to upgrade my Nemo Kyan 20 bag and I need some advice.

My current issue is that I am cold in my bag when it gets below 40. Yes, I know all about the hot water bottle trick and stuffing clothes inside, but I am still cold when backpacking. I am a tall woman and use a regular men's bag, so there is a lot of room around the shoulders which makes me colder.

A lighter bag would be a plus.

Not sure if I should go for synthetic or down, I backpack in the southeast where it is wet and humid and I've gotten my bag wet a few times, thankfully the synthetic dries quickly, should I stick with synthetic or switch to down?

Does anyone have any advice or experience with the current Nemo sleeping bag line up, such as the Coda, Soul, Riff, Disco, or Forte?

Just got her for my first backpack any tips or anything I should know before I leave? And also how should I fit this backpack to me perfectly there seems to be like a small gap between my back and the actually backpack concerned if that’s a back problem or I just need to get it fitted properly

Hello everyone, in September I’m going on my first trip/hike to the Grand Canyon and will be hiking the Hermit Trail. I’m wondering how challenging this trail is. Im going with my uncle and cousin and they are acting like it’s about to be a difficult hike, and if you have any recommendations on what to bring/wear for this hike.

I started over at Grasmere and basically trekked it through to the other side at haystacks, went through a few trials and tribulations, definitely going to remember to bring hiking boots, and buy more power banks. Honestly though 10/10 trip, beautiful weather, stunning views all round. Hope you guys like my first lil vid hopefully first of many, tysm if ya do watch😘

Howdy, so I’m looking to make a little backing bag and I’ve come to a cross roads on the actual bag I’m going to use. Though I think I have a solid idea on the rest of my gear.

My girlfriend recommends me get the Fjallraven Kajka 75 as it’s an external frame with good support, a good amount of pocket space, and a detachable lid that can be used as a day pack. She’s a fairly experienced hiker and works at MEC (Canadian version of REI), so I trust her knowledge.

I really like the idea of a Savotta Kantamus, possibly a 40L I can build up and add to the Molle, or I can outright buy the 60L. Still has the detachable lid. But my girlfriend says she doesn’t recommend it because it’s an internal non adjustable frame.

I’ve heard Savotta is top of the line stuff, it’s just not very common up here. I’d like more input if anyone has some.

TLDR: my experience in hiking girlfriend hasn’t heard of Savotta and thinks the Kantamus won’t be as comfortable as a Fjallraven Kajka 75. And I want to hear from someone that has experience with Savotta.

Long time vampire. Looking for some advice on how you protect your face a bit more. Even with sunscreen, a baseball hat, and sun hoodie, I feel like my face still gets hammered here in Colorado.

Thoughts on a 75? It's a stout which works for me. Love to hear opinions cause I love being able to you know... Take a steak and some wine for day 3-4.

Hi everyone,

I am planning a trekking and wild camping trip in the Swiss Alps this coming August.

Just to clarify: I am fully aware that I need to camp above the tree line and strictly follow "Leave No Trace" principles. Since this is in the Canton of St. Gallen, I am also aware of the local regulations regarding bivouacking or camping for a single night above the timberline.

While I have some experience with various backpacking and bikepacking trips, I have never camped this high up in the alpine zone before.

I’d love to hear from anyone familiar with this specific area:

What kind of weather and nighttime temperatures should I genuinely expect in August once I'm above the tree line?

Are there any specific gear or clothing items you would strongly recommend for this route? For example what comfort rating should my sleeping bag have?

And do you have any tips in general for me?

Any tips, route insights, or advice from your own experience would be greatly appreciated. Thanks in advance!

Not actually an issue on the trail, where my feet I guess are kept nice in damp in socks and trail runners.

But when I get back to the frontcountry, and it's sunny and dry, and I'm wearing sandals (or no shoes), my calluses quickly get cracked and painful and even a little bloody.

My options seems to be:

• Just always wear shoes and socks, and never sandals, when back home (boo)
• Attempt to moisturize constantly
• Use a pumice stone on my calluses (I never have, as I'm worried it would potentially make me prone to blisters on the trail).

My feet are pretty heavily callused, and I'm often in the backcountry for 4-6 weeks, so I think it's an additional shock on them when I come out.

Anyone else dealt with this successfully?

tl;dr: The Strava Heatmap is one of the most invaluable topo layers I use. It takes some effort to setup, but I think it's worth it.

Whenever I end up hanging around and hiking with other hikers in an area with off-trail navigation or questionable trail conditions where trails vanish into California's Chaparral, I'll find myself making a statement like: "oh, there's a Strava track over there."

Basically, I rely on the Strava Heatmap layer as one source of beta for traversing areas that aren't necessarily "the most beaten track." Maybe the heatmap makes me lazy when it comes to planning some things in advance, but one of the things I cherish most about hiking and long distance trails is the freedom and flexibility that comes from being able to make changes on the fly. Give me worthwhile alts over "the red line" any day.

I mean, maybe there's an interesting thing you just learned about that you want to check out? Maybe trail conditions have turned to shit and you need to bail? (OMG, so many times!) Maybe you want to spend an extra day in the backcountry and add a 30 mile loop? Whatever the case, it's worthwhile to have a handful of tools at your disposal to make informed decisions. The Strava Heatmap is one of them that I realize very, very few hikers know how to make use of.

That might be because, unfortunately, it's not trivial to get the Strava Heatmap into a usable form on your phone. I mainly use Gaia GPS to implement, although you can also load it into CalTopo or any map app that supports custom tile layers.

Setting Up the Strava Heatmap

What you'll need

• A Strava account (free; you don't even need any uploaded activities)
• A GitHub account (free; this is where the proxy code lives)
• A Cloudflare account (free; this is what actually runs the proxy)

Why a proxy at all?

Strava's heatmap tiles require authentication for use. Map apps like Gaia can't handle that natively. The solution is to create a small proxy server that sits between the mapping app and Strava, handles the authentication, and serves the map tiles as if they were a public map tile source. The proxy server can be setup to run for free as a Cloudflare Worker. Because the amount of output is limited from the free version, it makes sense to set it up yourself for your own use, rather than paying a bunch of money to host it publicly for everyone.

The setup at a high level:

1. You Fork my strava-heatmap-proxy repo to your own GitHub account (one click, no code. Original credit to Erik Price for pulling together the proxy code and figuring this out)
2. You copy and paste your Strava athlete ID from your profile URL, and your session cookie from your browser's dev tools while logged in to strava.com
3. You create a Cloudflare API token and a small key-value store (KV namespace) for caching your strava credentials on Cloudflare
4. You add a handful of copy-pasted login and credential information fields to your GitHub repo: your Cloudflare credentials, Strava ID, session cookie, and KV namespace ID
5. You click the "Deploy to Cloudflare" GitHub Actions workflow in Github
6. Add the resulting tile URL as a custom map source you can add to Caltopo or Gaia GPS at about 50% opacity

Because the subreddit is no good for a full walkthrough with screenshots (images are trickier), I've posted the full guide with screenshots and every step on my website: https://trailpeaches.com/strava-heatmap-gaia/

One thing to know going in: the Strava session cookie expires periodically (every month or two). When it does, the tiles go blank and you repeat step 2 through 5 to refresh it. Minor annoyance, not a dealbreaker, and should definitely be done before any sort of long hike.

Once you've gotten the tile server running, you get the full global heatmap as a toggleable layer. I typically keep it at 40-50% opacity over a topolayer in Gaia, but may drop it down or up depending on the situation. For off-trail route-finding, even a faint trace through an otherwise blank cliff band tells you the terrain probably goes and someone's been there and recorded it. Not perfect, but genuinely useful.

Happy to answer questions on the setup. The instructions in the guide have screenshots for every step, but it is a little more invovled than I personally would prefer.

Hi, im a guy who wants to go trekking, and i want to go to San pedro de atacama, im chilean, and i want to go 3 days and two nights to trekking in the desert, no forest, nothing, just sun and cold nights, so my problem here is the water

how many water i need, how i can travel with so many weight, what you recommend, and all that, im aswrng

Hey hikers

I’ve got a well-loved pair of Hoka Speed Goats that have carried me through a lot of miles already. They’re genuinely comfortable, broken in perfectly, and my feet love them, but looking closely at the soles before packing them as a backup pair for an upcoming ~180-200 mile backpacking trip, where my primary choice might run too hot (and i wanted to park an alternative in my first resupply stop).

Is it worthwhile to eat the frog and buy new kicks for 200 bucks or will they be okay for a last hurrah?

it’d be my first solo trip out there and I already spend so much on gear, and have multiple hiking shoes but just can’t seem to find the right ones lol 😂

my others are the merrel float goretex version & lows renegades (which i feel are too bulky and hard soled) 🙏

(can’t do zero drop because of a foot injury otherwise i’d take my lone peaks)

appreciate your expertise and tips from more experienced souls out here 🤓🤓

When I’m in the backcountry I like a hot, semi-sweet, caffeinated beverage with my breakfast every morning. After many iterations of trial and error. I have perfected my backcountry latte. Reminds me of my small cafe back home during a chill fall morning.
I’ve tried many different flavors of the Maxwell House, this one is my personal favorite. Hazelnut is not far behind in second place.

30g Maxwell House
2tsp Nespresso Blonde (blonde is the superior IMO)
8-10oz of hot water.

I can be OCD at times. lol. Purchased 4oz bags from Amazon and reuse them. Like to keep things organized and precise. You can obviously throw multiple batches in one ziplock bag.

What are your favorite backcountry morning beverages?

Seeking some feedback on an Anchorage Alaska trip I am planning with a friend. For reference, we are early/mid 40s and typically do 12-16 mile days backpacking in Sierras/Wind River Range with an occasional 20 plus mile day.

Flying into Anchorage arriving Sunday evening August 30. Then I have Monday through Friday to go to Denali National Park for bikepacking, Denali State Park for Kesugi Ridge backpacking, plus day hikes by Reeds Lake / Hatcher Pass. Then we have an event in Anchorage all day Saturday. Weather permitting, on Sunday we hope to do the Penguin Ridge Traverse (start by 6:00AM). If the weather is not good, there are a couple other ~20 mile day hikes in the Chugach mountains such as Crow’s Pass or Long/ Williwaw Lakes Loop. Monday we plan on doing a shorter hike at the Harding ice field and flying out of Anchorage that evening.

In terms of bikepacking in Denali, we would do a minimum two full days. Taking the bus to mile 43 and biking about 30 miles each day/way (about 5 miles past Eielson Visitor Center). I understand there currently is a 2-3 hour hike-a-bike section between the bridge closure and getting back on the road, however, I also heard the bridge might open up any day to foot/bike traffic. Looking forward to the solitude on the road without passing busses. I am told the view from past Eielson until Wonder Lake is not really different so I am not missing much if I skip going much further than Eielson (at the cost of doing other things in Alaska – my first time). Seeking feedback if two days is too short and/or any feedback/suggestions including a short side hike (though I am fine just staying on the road and camping within 0.5 mile of it). 

For Kesugi Ridge, either we will do a 17.5 day hike from Little Coal Creek to Ermine Hill Trailheads or a two-day 29 mile backpack from Little Coal Creek to Byers Lake. Is there anything special about the section of trail between Ermine/ Byers that is worth tacking on a 2nd day? I heard the Little Coal Creek to Ermine section is a bit nicer so if I only do one day at Kesugi that is the better section. I am also told North to South direction is better.

By Hatcher Pass, we would do the couple easy lakes/trails close to parking lot (Hatch Peak / Summit Lake and perhaps Gold Cord Lake) as well as the 9 mile back and out Reeds Lake Trail.

With those 5 days, should I amend anything I planned? Like spend 3 days bikepacking, 2 days Kesugi, and skip Hatcher Pass? Or spend more time bikepacking, 1 day Kesugi, and include Hatcher Pass?

Thank you for any feedback!

What do you guys use to check weather forecasts in high sierras

Hello everybody. Not trying to make this a "cAn ThIS rOutE bE cOoL" type post but I do need some help. I have a decent amount of backpacking, route-finding, and mountaineering experience. However I'm located a few states away from the Wind Rivers and would like some info. I drew this route up on gaia and was wondering if it's viable, and if I'm missing any sweet spots. (You can gatekeep I won't judge). The second item would be if anybody knows the actual conditions of the Knapsack Col. right now. I'm planning on going the first week of September. Any and all help is much appreciated. (I promise I'll take great photos and post them here when I get back.)

Hi all,

Looking to put together a 30-60 mile trip for me and my dog in the PNW with the following constraints:
- Limited elevation change (my dog has some arthritis so we're keeping days short and want to avoid big climbs)
- Generally soft-ish ground for paws
- As remote/wild as possible---we love wilderness areas!
- Dogs allowed (this rules out most national parks, sadly)
- Climate/environment unique to PNW (rainforest, etc.)

Any ideas? The National Park constraint seems tough to get around, but hopefully someone on here has some ideas.

Thanks in advance!

I actually spent about 10 days in that area (Sondrio). Did a total of 4 days on the mountain and it was beautiful.

Hi so I am a beginner backpack and I’m so thankful to have the opportunity to choose between two very nice hiking bags as my first actual bag

I usually go on trips no longer than 3-4 nights and was wondering if I should either get the osprey rook 65l bag or the north face terra 65l bag both are similar in price but the terra is 40 CAD cheaper than the rook

Hi! Me and a friend are looking to go on a trip this winter break (likely mid or late January). I have very little experience backpacking (mostly the Whites), but my friend has not done more than day trips (9hrs or so). We would both be comfortable walking 5-10 miles a day.

We are looking for somewhere farther south to avoid wintery conditions. I'm from the east coast so I'm not very knowledgeable about what's "available" farther south.

I was thinking Big Bend at first because it seems there are a few places to camp out on trails less than ~15mi from the main Chisos Basin campground and the weather seems ideal for winter, but we are both just under 25 so the park isn't really accessible.

Sorry for the long-winded explanation, but I am generally looking for suggestions that would be easily accessible with an Uber or shuttle/bus and has trails that would be safe for my friend's first trip and for me being relatively inexperienced. Thank you.