>>2648980We then turned north onto the 204 and switchbacked up the hill. There were many trees down across both of these trails and sometimes there would be a patch 50 feet long where the trail was completely buried, we had to hike around and look for the trail again a few times. The 204 was a great climb though and once we got to the junction of the 204 and the 224 we had lunch and hiked northwest to the 208.
Once we hit the 208 we hiked eastward back to the vehicles. We had planned to camp for two nights but we went really hard constantly hiking and finished our loop way earlier than we thought so we decided to push through and finish. The section of the 208 in yellow was pretty difficult on account of all the fallen trees. Eventually we made it through and back to the Gum Pond TH at 4pm on the dot.
Only saw 5 other people while there, one guy solo camping just before we set camp the first night and a few teenagers and a young man the next day, but only in the Sipsey Fork area. No one was to be found in the central part of Sipsey. Overall 10/10 place to hike and camp, I'd recommend to stay along the hiking only trails unless you don't mind somewhat 'boring' straight stretches along old roadbeds. I would like to return solo soon and go offtrail backpacking. Picrel was our camp and my cozytarp. Loved the tarp, wondering how it will work out in the winter because it is silnylon and very flammable, don't want it to burn up near the fire.
