Had a great time this weekend at the Con. The trail was very clean and we still picked up some trash, but not too bad. The Toyota Rubithon was this last weekend, and about 200 plus rigs on the event. they started early in the week so by the time we got to the Springs (were most people stayed) there was surprisingly little to no traffic. There are new bathroom stalls along the trail what is great. You can definitely enjoy teh trail in 5 days, we did day and night runs, played on the sluices and Soup Bowl spots, and had a great time. You can go for incredible hikes and swim by the damn by Buck Island by and Spider lake. The Springs are great as well.
As far as some good (but somewhat outdated) list and description of trails and helpful maps, check out californiajeeper.com http://californiajeeper.com/trail-review.htm (it is not a competing forum), and has some great info that may help. We are expecting to have Deer Valley open till the meadow water crossing (about half way in the trail). Slickrock is fully open and it is a blast (we went a couple weekends ago).
As mentioned, the Jamboree is packed and mainly a big traffic jam, so I would avoid that unless you are into that stuff. Fordyce is a more challenging trail and check dreamflows for the PGE release cycles, I believe they are not releasing much until after August now. (http://www.dreamflows.com/graphs/mon.063.php)
The suggestions above are great, my order of preference Fordyce, Barret, Deer Valley, Slickrock.
As far as some good (but somewhat outdated) list and description of trails and helpful maps, check out californiajeeper.com http://californiajeeper.com/trail-review.htm (it is not a competing forum), and has some great info that may help. We are expecting to have Deer Valley open till the meadow water crossing (about half way in the trail). Slickrock is fully open and it is a blast (we went a couple weekends ago).
As mentioned, the Jamboree is packed and mainly a big traffic jam, so I would avoid that unless you are into that stuff. Fordyce is a more challenging trail and check dreamflows for the PGE release cycles, I believe they are not releasing much until after August now. (http://www.dreamflows.com/graphs/mon.063.php)
The suggestions above are great, my order of preference Fordyce, Barret, Deer Valley, Slickrock.