Adventure Plans

1. Introduction

The JMT is a long distance hiking route through the Sierra Mountains in California (USA). The route starts in Yosemite National Park and finishes 211 miles south on the summit of Mount Whitney, which is the highest peaks in the lower 48 US states. The route follows much of the PCT (Pacific Crest Trail) and can be completed in either direction.

This trail goes through some amazing wilderness scenery and has been on our bucket list for a few years. We decided it was now or never so in August/September 2025 we flew to California and hiked this trail from south to north (NOBO) and completed it in 15 days.

2. Before you go

As this hike goes through multiple US National Parks and Wilderness areas you'll need a permit to do it. Permits are generally released 6 months ahead of the date you want to start the hike. This can make it tricky to plan if you are coming from overseas, like we did.

Permits going SOBO (starting in Yosemite) are more competitive than going NOBO which is why we opted to go north, so we'd more easily get to the hike. More information on permits can be found here. Our permits started in Cottonwood Lakes. Permits starting at Whitney Portal are also super competitive with other hikers wanting to tackle Mount Whitney.

3. Getting there

Getting to/from the southern terminus of the hike is a challenge whether this is Cottonwood Lakes trail head or Whitney portal. As we flew into California we didn't have a car we could leave whilst on the hike and there is no public transport to the trail head. You'll need to hitch hike or find a trail angel. We luckily had family members who were happy to drop us off at the trail head.

The northern terminus is easer to access as you can get a YARTS bus from Yosemite Valley to Merced and from there hop on a train. Once we arrived in Merced we got a one-way hire car so we could explore the Sierra Mountains more and then eventually drive back to San Francisco Airport.

4. When to go

Like most hikes in the mountains, the hiking season is June to September. We prefer to visit these places when the mountain passes should be cleared of snow and the temperatures aren't too high (being fom the north of England we don't cope well in the heat). This is why we booked our permit to start the hike on 20th August.

5. Accommodation

Wild camp.

The only accommodation on the trail is the tent in your backpack. This is one of the main reasons why we chose to travel all the way to the USA for a hike. In much of Europe, wild camping is illegal so we really wanted to go somewhere where we wouldn't get in trouble for camping. And boy was it good! The culture in the USA is so different to home, so much better! You can pitch your tent at whatever time you like and leave you campsite whenever you like. This is very different to France where normally you can't pitch your tent until 7:00pm and have to be packed away by 9:00am, or England where we try and pitch our tent as late as possible and in the morning leave as early as possible.

We used the Far Out app to help us find the best camping spots each night - more on that in the Navigation section below.

6. Resupply

There are several places to pick up supplies on the way: Muir Trail Ranch (MTR), Red's Meadow (Reds), Vermilion Valley Resort (VVR) and Tuolumne Meadow. There are also several towns out of the Sierras where you can resupply by taking a side trail to reach, these include: Independence, Bishop and Mammoth.

As we only has a limited amount of time to complete the trail, we didn't want to have to take a side trail to get to our resupply, so we resupplied at MTR and Reds. Unfortunately this did mean we set out on the hike carrying 8 days of food (heavy bags, cry) to get us to our first resupply at MTR.

We were lucky to have family members living in the USA to help out with our resupply boxes. We spent a lot of time in the winter before this hike making all our own trail meals. We then shipped these over to the USA, where they were kindly repacked into the special bucket you need to send your resupply in. These were then shipped on to MTR and Red's for us, roughly 2-3 weeks before we aimed to arrived.

There are is a small shop at both MTR and Red's. You won't be able to resupply at MTR as this shops is mostly stocked with just hardware, great if you have forgotten your headtorch, toothbrush, bug-net, flipflops etc, any basic essential you might have forgotten or broken. The shops at Red's was great for getting snacks you might have been craving on the trail, and they also did sell hiker foods but these can be quite pricey. Both places had amazing hiker boxes - these are boxes with other hikers unwanted food and toiletries. From these you could pick up snack, homemade dehydrated meals, vitamins and much more. We picked up some peanut butter and extra suncream!

7. Navigation

We found navigating the JMT to be fairly easy. One you get on to the JMT, there aren't other trails or trail junction which makes finding your way very simple. Where there are junctions these usually lead to trailheads and are sign posted as such. We didn't use a paper map but prior to going, we downloaded the JMT route on the Far Out app. Being from the UK, we hadn't ever used the app for hike but once on trail we found it to be really easy to use and very useful for find camp grounds and water supplies! We would definitely recommend getting this before hitting the trail. The app route is tailored better for someone walking SOBO but we managed to use it just fine going NOBO.