EastAlp is a guide service for California's Eastern Sierra — the brand of Range of Light Expeditions LLC — built on a simple conviction: this landscape deserves better than drive-by tourism.
“The mountains speak, and wise men listen,” the old saying goes — often credited to John Muir, who listened to this range better than anyone. I've spent my life listening too. Nothing stirs the human imagination like high mountains, and the Eastern Sierra is one of the great ranges of the world: more than a hundred peaks above 13,000 feet, rising two vertical miles from the desert floor.
I founded EastAlp because a place this extraordinary deserves to be experienced properly — guided with professional care, interpreted honestly, and protected fiercely. We practice Leave No Trace on every trip, because real ecotourism means the mountains look the same after we've passed through.
— Jon Jahanshahian, Founder
Every lead guide holds current Wilderness First Responder and CPR certification; winter leads carry AIARE avalanche training; climbing days run under certified instructors. We hire as much for storytelling as rope work, keep groups small, and pay guides fairly — it shows in the day you'll have.
We practice and teach Leave No Trace, cap our group sizes below permit maximums, and acknowledge that we live and work in Payahuunadü, the homeland of the Nüümü (Paiute) and Newe (Shoshone) peoples. A portion of proceeds supports local trail and conservation partners.
EastAlp is exactly what it sounds like: the east side of America's alps — the steep, bright wall of the Sierra Nevada above the Owens Valley. Our legal name runs longer: Range of Light Expeditions LLC, borrowed from John Muir, who called this range “the Range of Light” after watching dawn ignite its eastern face. Short name on the truck, long name on the paperwork, same mountains either way.