Top 5 day hikes in California, from below sea level to 14,505 feet

You park two miles south of CA-190 on Badwater Road and walk straight into a canyon made of banded mud and gravel that has been carved into fins and side gullies. There's no water on the route and very little shade. In January neither of those matters much.

The loop options nest inside each other, so you can pick the length at the trailhead rather than the night before. The Badlands Loop from Zabriskie Point is 2.7 miles and 535 feet of climbing. The Gower Gulch loop is 4.3 miles and 850 feet, with an optional extra mile out to Red Cathedral, a wall of oxidized red rock at the head of the canyon. Stitching the whole thing together makes a 7.8-mile circuit.

The one rule that isn't negotiable: this is a wash, and washes are where flash floods go. The Park Service's own line is not to hike canyons during an active rainstorm or when there's a high chance of precipitation. If there's rain in the forecast anywhere upstream, pick a ridge instead.

Pinnacles is the eroded core of a volcano that the San Andreas Fault has been dragging north for millions of years. It erupted 23 million years ago near what is now Lancaster, some 195 miles southeast, and the High Peaks are what's left of it. The Condor Gulch–High Peaks loop is 5.3 miles and about 1,300 feet of climbing. The longer High Peaks–Bear Gulch loop, which drops through the talus caves on the way back, is 6.7 miles and about 1,425 feet.

The section everybody remembers is the one the Park Service names on its own maps: the Steep and Narrow, where the trail circles through the rock formations right at the top of the High Peaks. It's a walk rather than a climb, but it's not a walk you'd want to do in a hurry. Leave the dog at home either way: Pinnacles allows pets on its roads and in its campgrounds, but not on a single trail.

Take a flashlight if you're doing the longer loop; the park requires one in the caves, it doesn't just suggest it. Bear Gulch Cave opens only seasonally and closes for short periods in winter when it floods. Note too that the park's east and west entrances don't connect by road, so pick the right one before you drive.

The highest point in the contiguous United States. Unusually for a mountain that high, it's a walk: no rope work and no glacier. Just 10.7 miles each way and rather more than six thousand feet of climbing, from Whitney Portal at 8,360 feet to a summit the Park Service puts at 14,505.

What makes it hard is the length of the day. Most people leave the portal in the dark, grind up the switchbacks above Trail Camp to Trail Crest, then traverse the back side of the crest to the summit plateau. The thin air is the part no amount of gym work fixes; if you've flown in from sea level two days earlier, you'll feel it.

The Whitney Zone comes with its own rules. A permit is required year-round, day hikers included, and between 1 May and 1 November it's rationed: 100 people a day for day use, plus 60 more starting overnight trips on the Mt Whitney Trail. Outside those dates there's no quota and no lottery, just a permit you book up to two weeks ahead — and usually a mountain under snow.

You're also expected to pack out your own solid human waste. The Forest Service hands out pack-out kits at the visitor center and the trailhead, and it isn't optional.