About

Hi, I'm Eric. I'll be your guide.

Not an office. Not a booking agent. Not a guide you'll meet for the first time at the trailhead. When you book Yosemite Life, you get me, on the phone, on the email, and on the mountain.

63^/63 National Parks Visited

1,200+ Miles Guided in Yosemite

17^yr In the National Parks

WFA Wilderness First Aid Certified

LNT Leave No Trace Certified

I've been drawn to the outdoors for as long as I can remember. As a kid, nothing made me happier than being outside, camping, hiking, or spending time in the woods as a Scout. Somewhere along the way, being in nature stopped being a hobby and became a core part of who I am.

My first National Park visit was in 2008, standing on the summit of Haleakala National Park. A year later, my brothers and I backpacked through Great Smoky Mountains National Park, the trip that truly hooked me on backpacking and life in the mountains.

In 2009, the Ken Burns series The National Parks: America's Best Idea aired, and I made a quiet decision that would shape the next chapter of my life: I was going to visit every U.S. National Park.

Why Yosemite

My favorite National Park is Yosemite.

There's something about that valley, the granite, the waterfalls, the giant sequoias, the way the light shifts as the sun drops behind the walls. I've watched Half Dome glow orange, stood under moonlit meadows, and felt that unmistakable pull that says: you're exactly where you're supposed to be.

I return to Yosemite more often than anywhere else. Over time, it stopped feeling like a destination and started feeling like a responsibility, to know it deeply, to respect it, and to help others experience it the right way.

63/63 wasn't the end. It was the foundation.

Why I Guide

I didn't start guiding to turn Yosemite into a product.

I guide because of what this place does to people when they're given the space to actually receive it. I've seen the moment someone stops moving long enough for the valley to land. When the scale of the granite finally registers. When the noise of ordinary life becomes genuinely impossible to hear and something quieter and more important takes its place.

That moment doesn't happen on a crowded shuttle or a rushed summit push. It happens when you go deeper than the typical visit allows, with someone who knows where to look and when to be quiet.

After visiting all 63 National Parks I've learned that the experiences that stay with you aren't the ones you check off a list. They're the ones that change something. The ones you're still thinking about years later when you need to remember what matters.

That's what I'm trying to give people. Not a hike. Not a service. An experience that stays.

-- Eric