About Andrew & June
The Human
I’m Andrew. 56 years old. I’ve been hiking in Southern California and the Eastern Sierra for most of my adult life. I work full-time running Our Good Nature Web Agency — digital marketing and automation — and I’m building HikeATrail as a long-term lifestyle business centered around doing the thing I love most.
I’m not a professional athlete. I’m not a certified wilderness guide. I’m a working adult who hikes as much as possible, takes it seriously, and has learned a lot of things the hard way over the years. That experience — the real kind, not the Instagram kind — is what this site is built on.
I plan to relocate to the Eastern Sierra permanently in the next few years. The mountains aren’t just content for me. They’re where I’m headed.
The Dog
June is my trail dog and the second voice on this site. She comes with me on most hikes that allow dogs, and she has a very clear point of view on trail quality. If she’s bounding ahead and checking back on me every fifty yards, it’s a Tail-Wagger. If she’s dragging in the heat and I’m carrying her water, I’ll tell you that too.
June’s Dog Report on every trail page is her honest assessment: shade availability, water sources, paw safety, crowd stress, leash practicality, and wildlife concerns. She doesn’t sugarcoat things. Neither do I.
The September 23 Permit
I have a Mount Whitney day hike permit for September 23, 2026. That date is driving everything this year — the training hikes, the gear decisions, the content calendar. The Whitney Journal is a real-time document of what it actually takes to prepare for and summit the highest peak in the contiguous United States. Every training hike is a trail review. Every gear test is a gear review. The summit post will be the most complete trail review on this site.
“The summit is optional. Coming home is mandatory.”
That’s the brand philosophy. And I mean it. This site will always tell you when something is dangerous, when you should turn around, and when the Instagram shot isn’t worth the risk. There are no heroics here. Just honest information from someone who’s been on California trails long enough to know what guidebooks leave out.
What This Site Is Not
HikeATrail is not a trail navigation service. We don’t provide GPX files or turn-by-turn routing — for that, use AllTrails or Gaia GPS. What we provide is trail intelligence: the context, the honest difficulty, the logistics, the experience around the hike. The question we answer is “should I do this hike and what should I expect if I do” — not “how do I get there.”
Get in Touch
Have a trail tip, a correction, or a question? Reach out here.