The company . 14 Lyndon Ave

Six guides, 40 trips a year, 10 people at most.

We stayed small on purpose. Small groups fit the good campsites, the quiet springs and the permit quotas that big groups cannot use. And the guide knows your name by lunch.

Meet the guidesSee the trips
A campfire burning on a gravel riverbank at dusk, dark trees behind it

The story, from the logbook.

  1. Jun 2014

    One van, four guests

    Maya borrows her uncle's van and takes four friends of friends to a lake in the Sierra. They pay for gas and food. Two of them book again before the drive home is over.

  2. Mar 2016

    The first permit lottery

    Three summer weekends in the hut system come through. The company gets a name, a phone line and a desk in the back of a Los Gatos bike shop.

  3. May 2019

    Teo and the boats

    Teo joins with six kayaks and a ferry contact. The island trip sells out its first season. We learn to pack dry bags properly, the hard way.

  4. Sep 2022

    The shop on Lyndon Ave

    A room of our own, with a wall of maps and a rack for drying tents. Ash starts testing menus in the back kitchen.

  5. Oct 2026

    Still ten at most

    Six guides and about 40 trips a year. We could run bigger groups. We will not. Ten is where everyone still fits around one fire.

Leave no trace, in practice

  • Everything we carry in, we carry out. Food scraps too
  • We camp on durable ground, never on meadow grass
  • Fires only in existing rings, and only when allowed
  • Groups stay at ten so the trails and camps can take it

Permits and insurance, plainly

We apply for the commercial use permits that parks and forests require for guided groups. Those permits cap group sizes and set where we can camp, which is another reason we stay small. We carry liability insurance and every guest signs a short release before the trip.

We recommend you buy trip insurance for flights and cancellations. We do not sell it, so there is no upsell.

Who took the photos

The stock photos on this site come from photographers who share their work for free. Thank you to all of them.

Photo credits

Questions about us? Write to the trip desk.