Kings Canyon Rae Lakes Loop: The Ascent, Days One and Two, 4K 

He really is a gentleman, Rose. A couple of times over the years, he's even had to carry me -- and never once complained! --E

Thanks Albert -- this is truly one of the world's most beautiful hikes!! ❤

Haha! Part of my wonders if he did it just to hear you call him that 🤣🤦🏻‍♀️ but in all seriousness, wow I don’t know that I could have finished that without his help. Day one of backpacking is always the most brutal, but who knew my labral tear would act up like that. Grateful for Adam and my appetite stepping up to eat away some weight of the food in the pack - haha!

That's awesome to hear, Peter! One of our very favorite things about this channel is the chance to take many of you guys along on adventures you can't do any longer. We're very aware that time goes fast, and it won't be too many years before we're in that same situation ourselves. Hopefully then there will be others doing the same thing for us to watch as well! ❤️

Just looked up Fin Dome -- it looks incredible. Great suggestion -- will for sure have to go!

Thanks Jared! Rae Lakes is such a classic. Looking forward to getting back out there and maybe doing the one day version. You should give it a go!

Robert that is actually a SUPER cool idea! Maybe we could even do it as a bike and hike, where we bike to several different iconic trails and hike them all in a day! Seriously, we had never thought of this before but now that you've put it in our heads it will probably happen at some point. We're really digging this idea. Thank you!

Right?!? King's should be on everyone's bucket list.

He’s insane!! But very happy that he’s insane 🤣 don’t know how I would have made it through that first day!

We would love to bring you there one day. I’d carry your pack for you!! ❤️❤️

Thanks Rebeca! This day was amazing but I think the descent may have been even more incredible! Couldn’t believe this place exists!

This was pretty darn gorgeous. We're trying to decide if we could do it as a long one-day sufferfest next time!

Yes this would be about as beautiful a place to fish as one can imagine! We didn't see anyone fishing on this hike, but we have seen people fishing up in the Sabrina Lakes area a lot when we hike up there, and they all seem totally blissed out!

Aw thank you sharyn! It was definitely a mental challenge to stay positive through the pain in this one but we ended up pulling through! Thanks so much for encouraging us, it means the world ❤️

Thanks for noticing that, Bill -- we really believe that constant positive focus and attitude is just as important as constant physical training when it comes to doing really hard things. Like carrying the two backpacks is a perfect example: I truly looked at it as an opportunity to do something challenging and cool, which made it much easier and more fun when the legs got a little shaky! --A

Do it Gary! And no better time than the present because like you were saying, offseason hikes have no mosquitoes and they're also way less crowded. You will feel incredible out there! ❤️

Aw thanks so much David! Hope you've got some awesome hiking adventures planned for the weekend!

Haha, thanks so much! It was the least I could do after letting her go out with that janky pack. Should definitely have checked it fully loaded before we left. But, whatever, at least it was good exercise 😂

Thank you -- great and lesser known hike in the Sequoia area! ❤️

Yes! I hope you do get to do this one. It also gives you a little taste of the JMT and now we’re thinking we’d love to do the whole thing if we could. Would just need to figure out how to resupply, or maybe take some zero days. It would have been awesome to get another day just to spend enjoying the beauty of Rae Lakes!

Haha it was a Michael Connelly novel, so def worth a bit of suffering 😂 --A

@@LiveHardxLoveHard Ha ha. I heard about him so many times, never read anything. Which is your favorite, I would read that one. Reading Novel The Expanse, Earth 100's years into the future, we have colonized Mars and planets. Extremely good. It is written by the friends of George R.R. Martin

@@RidiPwn My favorite is a long series of novels called the Harry Bosch series -- they also made an awesome TV series out of it. So start with the first one -- I think it's The Black Echo -- and if you like it keep reading!

@@LiveHardxLoveHard cool, thanks

Haha we still laugh about that one -- poor Elise was actually kind of scraped up from it at the time, but now it's just straight up funny 😂

Aw thank you so much Kayla! We definitely are more of single day hikers usually- even though we like to do challenging long hikes, there’s something more manageable about them knowing you will get to rest the next day. Backpacking is definitely a whole other world, but it was nice experiencing a new type of challenge. Sometimes nice to push yourself in a new way!

livehardxlovehard Totally agree! Used to do a few popular backpacking trails in the Rockies! Enjoyed those experiences for sure!

Heck yes! Nothing better than hiking hard and then jumping into some glacial melt!!

Oh no, that’s so awful. We had a lot of friends who had to cancel as well. Fingers crossed for you this year, it really is a once in a lifetime experience ❤️

Thanks Iqbal -- this is one of the most beautiful hikes in the Sierra!

The washed out bridge is no problem, Ellen. It's fairly wide there, so it's not deep and no scary current. We just took our boots off and waded right across. So excited for you! We really enjoyed going the direction we did, and it might be fun for you since you've already done the other direction. But as you know, you simply can't lose when it comes to Rae Lakes. Can't wait to hear how it goes!!

Thanks so much Courtney! And that is so awesome you’re going to have such an amazing time. We did this in July. Just make sure to prepare for the mosquitos and it will be great! ❤️

Thank you so much! Stoked to hear you love the adventures, and that the picture quality is turning out alright. We did just a GoPro 8 for this vid but have since started incorporating the iphone 12 because we find that does much better in low light. Trying to learn and improve little by little!

Thanks! Keep making your adventure videos!

Haha that’s exactly what I said! Sadly I’m sure it was some sort of cheesy assassin book 🤣🤦🏻‍♀️ so technically camping is supposed to be in designated areas- there are specific campgrounds and this is a permit lottery trek, which means you have to notify the rangers ahead of time what camp you plan to stay at each night. But the rangers were really cool and gave us tips about cool spots away from the “main” campgrounds where you could stay for the night. Holy moly the water was so cold! One would think after sweating all day you wouldn’t notice it but it was simply that freezing!

@@LiveHardxLoveHard Assassin book 🤣 It must have been research for him to run back for it 🤣 It sounds like you were lucky with the Ranger tips, much better getting some peace and quiet 😁

@@TheDeterminedRunner Adam loves to pretend his entire life is an assassin novel haha! This time the antagonist was BEARS. Hope you get to do this trek sometime, it really is spectacular. OR maybe do it as an ultra run - we met a few runners doing it all in a day and were super inspired!

@@LiveHardxLoveHard it sounds like a great run 🏃‍♂️🏃‍♂️

You are not required to stay in designated areas, just so long as you practice Leave No Trace principles and camp away from water on a durable surface (i.e. dirt, sand, or rock). You need to leave an itinerary with the rangers so they'll have an idea of where to go looking for you if you don't come back out on schedule, but you are not required to camp at the sites you chose ahead of time. That said, there are some large established sites, some even with bear boxes that you can store your food in (Rae Lakes for instance). If you find that you can't hike as far as you thought when you applied for your permit back home, you can stop sooner. You should try really hard to exit on your exit date (when hiking in Yosemite, they seem to have gotten really tight about this). For this reason, if I'm on a hike that I think will take me 6 days, I'll submit a plan for 7 - just in case.

Completely agree! This is definitely one of the more underrated yet wholly spectacular treks in CA, if not the US!

Thank you -- glad you liked it! Rae Lakes really is incredible. We used AllTrails, and just downloaded the Rae Lakes Loop off of there. It worked great! ❤️

Haha when I was growing up, my dad told me that's exactly why he chose it! Yours as well? --A

@@LiveHardxLoveHard when I was 10 we did the infamous south coast track, a few weeks after Graham McPherson went missing. Back then I was smaller than my sister, and naturally expected a lighter pack, but my pack was heavy so being a 10yearold kid, I complained. So dad made me swap packs with my sister, I never complained about how heavy my pack was again, ever. Lesson learned. This was one of very few lessons my father taught me without his fists. He was moderately human in the outdoors. So I've got relatively good memories of dad in the outdoors. The adventures were priceless though, and some fond memories run deep, and for that the rotten bugger deserves some credit. We reckon we know where GM went missing, the currents are strong and the sea unforgiving. The southern ocean commands her own respect

@@AdamEdington I have very similar memories of my dad, from the fists to the love of outdoor adventure. Always try to remember him with gratitude on a summit.

@@LiveHardxLoveHard I'm so sorry to hear that, and on the other half of that, I'm glad you can find some goodness from the situation. If you want to talk more about it, but not so publicly, reply my email. I've developed a hard won philosophy as a result, and I find outdoor adventure really clears the head and puts things into sharp perspective.. At the same time it's really difficult to be down when you hoof it from one million dollar view to the next and soak your head in ice water that's so clear you just wanna get in it.

Haha, yep! We try to use mostly our own music for our vids (especially the more recent ones) so anything you hear with vocals is Elise.

We went in August, which is an absolutely gorgeous time to go if you can get a permit! ❤️

That's a good question. We do put on very strong broad spectrum sunscreen, and carry it with us to reapply, so that gives us pretty good protection. For the hat, Adam usually only turns it backwards when we're shooting because it lets the camera see his face (sometimes he forgets, but usually he turns it). But once the cameras are off he def turns it right back around to the front because he does not like sun blazing into his eyes. ❤️