The trip to Kings Canyon National Park can be summarized in three letters -- B - I - G!! Big mountains, big trees, big river, big falls, big descents, big climbs and big appetites. There is nothing small in Kings Canyon.
With the Southern Sierra Nevada Mountain range receiving 200% of normal snowfall this winter, the Kings River was a raging froth of thunderous white water. It was a sight and sound to behold. None of us had experienced anything quite like the power and strength of cycling and hiking along such a swift-moving river before. "Tumultuous" is an adjective that best describes the Kings River this year.
Joining Dick and Geno on this trip were Rich "Posey Prince" Blackmarr and Frank "Marco Pantani" Gerace. Besides their good humor, both impressed us with their culinary skills in Kitchen Stadium and the group enjoyed some extraordinary meals around the ol' campfire.
The featured ride was the 60-mile roundtripper from Grant Grove to Cedar Grove down in the bowels of Kings Canyon. There is a thrilling, switchback, 19-mile, 3,000' descent to the bridge crossing at Boyden's Cave and a 9-mile, 1,500' climb along the river to Cedar Grove. The descent was awesome and the climb back out -- beastly.
The group did a 11-mile hike on the second day from "Road's End" near Cedar Grove to Mist Falls on the Paradise Valley Trail. This was a spectacular hike following the Kings River through alpine forests with several significant ephemeral falls cascading down the canyon walls into the Kings River. Most of the river was a series of major cataracts with white water tumbling over big boulders the size of houses with occasional tree trunks stuck in between them.
Mist Falls, with a drop of about 150', was at the end of a mile-long cataract cascading down 1,000' from Paradise Valley. The velocity and power of the water were like flames shooting out from a jet engine with mist spraying out for several hundred feet at the base of the falls. The roar of the falls and power of the swift water were AWESOME!!
On the third day, Marco and Geno did a 42-mile ride on the Hume Lake Road loop while Dick and Rich did a hike up to Lookout Point. Unlike Yosemite, Kings Canyon has far fewer visitors so the roads were a delight to cycle and we had the hiking trails virtually to ourselves.
