Last spring The North Face sportswear design team along with athletes Peter Croft, and Hilaree O’Neill were diverted from an original plan of hiking the northern Lost Coast of California due to a temporary closure to the southern portion, a 25 mile loop with little information available, and plenty of Poison Oak.  The first day was a smooth 9 miles of trail through the inland mountains ending with spirits high and blisters at bay at a beautiful black sand beach .  The following day we explored a spur trail, tried to navigate a beach return at high tide but eventually retraced our steps back to camp where we packed up and moved southward leaving just 6 or 7 miles for the last day.  This second night a few blisters appeared on three of us which began the debate about best hiking shoes, which lead to socks, and finally to a lengthy Sportswear discussion where the designers broke out their notebooks and added ideas to  hiking shorts, pants, and shirts which were incorporated into Spring 15.  The final day surprised us with an overgrown trail which descended and gained thousands of vertical feet through patches of Poison Oak and just a couple springs.  The scenery and flowers made us feel like we were in Hawaii and the group charged on with most everyone feeling slightly uncomfortable at some point throughout the day.  The 50 miles of the Lost Coast are absolutely beautiful and we’ll go back again for the northern or southern hikes.