We tried for three of the "private property" California County high points and got two of them. And then we joined the Cooks in the Alabama Hills for five days of desert hanging out and climbing.
Part One:
Since 2005 I've been trying (fairly casually) to summit each of the 56 California County high points (for 58 counties; there are two high points, including Whitney, that are each the high point of two different counties). This is commonly attempted variation on the 50 United States state high points goal.
Several of these county high points are on private property, and each such has it's own access issues (usually a tangled mess varying from "no way" to "OK every once in a while"). Tactics vary from trying to get permission, to night-time ascents, to just going and hoping to not be seen. Tricia and I opted for the third tactic on this trip, thinking too that off-and-on rain would likely help us avoid any human contact. All three high points we attempted were in the central, western part of the state. One of two we got done has a reputation for being the hardest to get to of all the private high points. One of the successes involved a 13 mile round trip, and the other an 11.5 mile, up and down hike on difficult terrain.
The first success (the high point itself is in the sun):
Our entire 13 mile hike was on fire roads:
High point number two required hiking way up and down again and again in this type of terrain (note the rocks; they're tough hiking when one has to do, in part, miles of them through tall grass):
Here it is, still in the distance:
At and coming down from the summit:
On the way out we got pounding rain, finished the hike just as Vicki pulled back up to the start point, hopped in, and drove away:
Tricia took some shots too, but she hasn't downloaded them yet.