Thanks for the report. Thanks in particular for the Heatsheets report. It's good to know that they live up to their reputation.

Regarding crowds: The relatively few people you encountered sounds really great. My wife and I visited Devil's Postpile National Monument, a very popular area, and it was practically wall-to-wall people.

I think the trick to finding solitude is to go to less popular areas, many of which are just as nice as the popular areas. A couple of weeks ago, a friend and I went on a three day backpack in the San Gorgonio Wilderness here in Southern California. We saw nary a soul. The SGW is about two hours drive from downtown Los Angeles! We went to a remote area following a pretty much abandoned trail. We heard no human/mechanical noise save the (very) occasional overflying aircraft.

Don't get me wrong, the Sierra is very beautiful. By the way, got any pics posted online?

Pics of my backpack if you like: http://picasaweb.google.com/jim.barbour/BigTreeCamp/#slideshow