"Today was a nice day for a climb, and that is exactly what I got. To begin the hike, I drove past Guffy Campground and parked in a nice spot right where the Pacific Crest Trail starts going up to Wright Mountain. This spot is about a mile from the beginning of the trail to Pine Mountain. So I walked down the dirt road to reach the trail. It is marked with a trail fin on the side of the road. The trail descends at first along a ridge. The ridge then climbs quickly toward Pine Mountain. The pathway is rather direct, so switchbacks only seem to happen by accident. True to its name, there are many pine trees on its slopes and dotting the summit. I didn't time my exact arrival time, but I think it was somewhere around 2.5 hours from my parking space. With this HPS peak now in the bag, I continued on the Dawson Peak to complete a double HPS summit hike. Overall statistics will appear on my log for Dawson Peak." — MikeTeeples • Sep 29, 2018

"Pine Mountain was a very steep climb up North Backbone Trail. I parked my car by Guffy Campground along Blue Ridge Truck Trail, bumpy but passable for even cars if driven carefully. My friend and I hiked along Blue Ridge Truck Trail past the closed gate immediately after Guffy, and then joined the Pacific Crest Trail which roughly parallels and even crosses the road at times. We hiked to a use trail and summited Wright Mountain (8,505') first. We headed back to PCT. On PCT, we found a very narrow use trail and descended steeply to cross Blue Ridge Truck Trail, then still steeply down the same use trail to a saddle between Wright Mtn. and Pine Mtn. thus entering Sheep Mountain Wilderness amidst Jeffrey Pines and White Firs. We then took the North Backbone Trail steeply up and down a stark ridge, and then very steeply up again gaining Pine Mountain's north ridge, eventually reaching into the Lodgepole Pine forest as we neared 9,000'. We then gained the summit plateau as the forest thinned into wind-sculpted Lodgepoles and reached the summit with a rock-crafted windbreak. The North Backbone Trail ranges from steep to very precipitous in areas so be careful, and the loose talus ..." — brianpowell • Jun 10, 2017

"Stop #2 after Wright. North Backbone is a cool trail. Passed only one hiker. Smoke started to rise about the time I reached the summit. Could barely see Iron and Baden-Powell." — edg • Jul 30, 2016

"Ski lift trail to Baldy; onward north to Dawson and Pine and back up to Baldy (2x today; we skirted the summit of Dawson on the return from Pine, so only one summit of Dawson); then back to the Baldy Lodge grabbing Harwood on the way, where we saw two bighorn sheep. Back down to Manker Flats via the service road." — HikerMark • Jun 27, 2015

"2nd peak of 3-peak traverse on Sierra Club hike to Wright-Pine-Dawson. 2.2 miles w/1,500' gain from Wright Mountain along the south ridge trail. Minor class 2 in places. 30% chance of rain gave good cloud cover, not too sunny." — BradStemm • Sep 6, 2013