A Sierra Crossing
SFGate’s Tom Stienstra reports on his Sierra Crossing – an east-to-west pack trip across the southern Sierra from Horseshoe Meadow to Mineral King.
We proposed an expedition into the heart of this landscape: a 70-mile crossing of the Sierra Nevada from east to west, as the first pioneers and trailblazers would have seen it. We would start at the flank of Mount Whitney in the eastern Sierra, hike up the Sierra Crest and down canyons to the Kern River, and then trek up and over the Great Western Divide and down to Mineral King at the foot of the western Sierra.
Of interest to me, Stienstra began his trip at the same trailhead where I began my early August trip this year, Horseshoe Meadow. He covered quite a bit of ground that I’ve been across at one point or another during my backpacking “career” – the PCT trail between Crabtree Meadow (east of Mt. Whitney) and Wallace Creek (where I camped last week), the descent to Junction Meadow on the Kern River and south before exiting to Mineral King over the Great Western Divide. A lot of memories there – I was on parts of his route last week; I was last on other portions several decades ago.
(A quick summary of my trip, with more to come later: We started at Horseshoe Meadow on August 5 and crossed 12,000+’ New Army Pass the next day. From Soldier Lake we took a cross-country route into Miter Basin where we stayed at Blue Sky Lake before following the cross-country route over 12,600′ class 2 Crabtree Pass to Upper Crabtree Lake. We rejoined civilization at the JMT at Crabtree Meadow, then heading north into the upper Kern and camping at Wallace Creek and Tyndall Creek before exiting east over 12,000′ Shepard Pass on August 11.)
Giving Equal Time to Black and White
To follow up on my recent post about late-July Sierra Nevada photographs, here is a black and white photo from the same trip.
Banner Peak, Thousand Island Lake. Sierra Nevada, California. July 27, 2007. © Copyright G Dan Mitchell.
Photos from Late-July Pack Trip
During the latter part of July I spent about a week in the eastern Sierra, first near Tuolumne Meadows and Mono Lake and then on a 6-day pack trip with my brother and his family, during which we explored the areas around Ediza and Thousand Island Lakes in the Ansel Adams wilderness area.
Mounts Ritter and Banner, Ediza Lake. Sierra Nevada, California. July 25, 2007. © Copyright G Dan Mitchell.
I think I have pretty much posted the best of the photographs from that trip now – if you are interested, take a look at the following links:
- G Dan Mitchell | Photography – This is my photoblog where I post daily photographs. A new photo from the trip will continue to appear there daily until about August 14. (Go there and subscribe to the RSS news feed if you want to get automatic updates.)
- My Gallery web site where my photographs are archived. All of the trip photographs that will eventually appear on the blog site are already posted here – take a look at the Sierra Nevada and Mono Lake portions of the Landscape section of the site.
- I have also posted many of the photos at a couple of other external photo sites: my Flickr Gallery and my Photo.net gallery. (In the latter case, you’ll need to search a bit since the photos are distributed among the Sierra Nevada, Mono Lake, and Yosemite galleries.)
Enjoy!
4WheelBob in the News
From Tom Mangan at a href=”http://tommangan.net/twoheeldrive/”>Two-Heel Drive (Click on Tom’s link for the full story):
4WheelBob profiled in the Contra Costa Times. Ned MacKay, who writes a weekly column about the East Bay parks, mentions Herr Coomber.
… “I don’t go anywhere in a hurry,” Coomber says, “But I do get there.”
The article mentions Bob’s gearing for his latest White Mountain summit attempt in a couple weeks, which [Tom is] planning to attend and record for posterity. More at this thread at backpacker.com. [Two-Heel Drive]
Clair Tappaan Lodge – In the Black?
Paul McHugh reports on recent developments at the Sierra Club’s venerable Sierra Nevada lodge (“The spirit of John Muir survives“):
A boxer who refuses to stay down often becomes a crowd favorite, even if he doesn’t walk off with the belt. Maybe that’s why Clair Tappaan Lodge shows small but steady gains in popularity.
This picturesque inn, nestled in the forest near Donner Pass, has been annually threatened with sale by its Sierra Club owners for the best part of a decade. Each time, fans of the place and its mission have rallied and fought their way back up off the canvas…
I have only visited the venerable Clare Tappaan once – back in the days when we took our then-young children cross-country skiing in the Tahoe area. One time we stopped at the Lodge and skied some easy nearby terrain, wandering through the facility afterwards. I enjoyed its funky, rambling character and wanted to stay some time… but I never have gotten around to it.
Recent Pack Trip – What I Learned (part 3)
Layover days are a good thing.
Actually, I already knew this. I just need to be reminded from time to time. When I first started backpacking the idea of staying in one place for two nights just seemed absurd, and I never did this. We moved every day to a new camp site.
On last week’s trip I accompanied my brother and his wife and three sons on their first Sierra Nevada pack trip. Our original plan had been way too aggressive – a 6-day trip into the Pioneer Basin over 12,000′ Mono Pass. We might have made it, but someone would probably have suffered from altitude sickness and the whole thing would have been quite a grind, especially for first-timers. So we wisely revised out plans months ago and came up with a trip that had us staying in one place as long as three nights.
When you move from one spot to the next every day you do see a lot of country, but you don’t get to know the country you see very well. (You can get to know it this way if you come back again many times, but that is a different topic.) However, if you set up camp and stay in one place for a few days you discover things you would otherwise overlook. My brother and his gang made two forays into the area right below Ritter and Banner Peaks on this trip, enjoying the wildflowers and racing back to escape an incoming hail storm. I managed to explore the area near Iceberg and Catherine Lakes. On the last days of the trip I had time to amble to the far end of Thousand Island Lake.
It takes time to get to know a particular landscape. Staying put in that landscape for a day or two can help.
Recent Pack Trip – What I Learned (part 2)
Glaciers are shrinking in the Sierra Nevada.
Over decades of backpacking in the Sierra, I’ve watched the conditions change from year to year. But this year I saw something that I had not noticed in the past. I spent several days in sight of glaciers above Ediza Lake in the Ansel Adams wilderness area, so I had time to observe these glaciers and their surroundings.
The first thing I noticed was that the lower ends of the glaciers were completely free of seasonal snow – and this at a very early point in the summer season. Darker, hard glacial ice was exposed instead. In addition, the ends of several of the glaciers had visibly pulled back, leaving exposed rock between the end of the glacier itself and a small vestigial snow field lower on the mountain.
Whether due to global climate change or to California’s low 2007 snow pack (or a relationship between the two) I cannot say, but the change is definitely there and definitely visible.
Recent Pack Trip – What I Learned (part 1)
After nearly 40 years of backpacking (starting at the age of 1 month? or not? ;-) you’d think that there wouldn’t be a lot more for me to learn about the techniques of this endeavor. However, after nearly every trip, and certainly after every season, I do discover new things – about the places I visit, the techniques I use, the weather and climate, and my equipment.
So, what did I learn on last week’s 6-day trip into the Ansel Adams wilderness? Well, my pack weight has been increasing once again as my ability to carry heavy weights decreases. Yes, I’m getting older. (Sorry to say, but so are you!)
Some years ago my equipment underwent what seemed at the time like a major change. “Back in the day” many internal frame packs weighed around 7 pounds what with heavy materials and thick padding that was then thought necessary. But eventually people began to wonder whether this was really necessary, and we saw a first wave of weight reduction in equipment. I caught this first wave, and I ended up with an excellent Mountainsmith Auspex pack and quite a bit of other relatively lighter gear.
However, I have since developed a two-fold problem. First, the amount of gear and the weight of said gear has steadily crept up. Although my pack hasn’t gotten any larger, the load has become denser. Partly I have tended to err on the side of having a bit too much extra stuff. While carrying a bit extra, say, sun screen won’t add much weight… carrying a bit of extra sunscreen, insect repellant, toothpaste, first aid gear, repair equipment, water, stove fuel, food, and clothing will. It is time for me to reduce that margin a bit – I’m carrying too much stuff “just in case.”
The other factor is photography. While I reduced the weight of some of my backpacking equipment, I have more than compensated by adding photography gear. I now carry what I regard as minimal (for my approach to photography) kit of Canon 5D, 17-40mm and 24-105mm lenses, small tripod, a filter, extra batteries. The weight is likely in the 12 pound range. Sigh.
For my remaining summer/fall 2007 trips I will make a few more changes. Unless really bad weather threatens I’m going to use my new and quite light eVent bivy and a 7 ounce SilTarp instead of a tent, and I’m leaving the ground cloth at home. I’m going to try out one of the very small MSR canister stoves. Realizing that I never actually wear all of the clothing I carry, I will make a few reductions there. I returned from the 6-day trip with too much leftover lunch/snack food, so there is room for some reductions in food weight. I’m going to go through my first-aid and repair kits, which have ballooned over the past couple years, and cut them back down to size. I’ll leave the book at home. I’ll repackage things like sunscreen and bug repellant into smaller containers.
And, with luck, maybe I can get the pack weight down to what it was before I added the camera gear…
Back from the Sierra
I’m back from about 8 days in the Sierra… and slowly working to catch up on email, blog posts, and the rest of the stuff that has gone on the in the world while I was away – along with starting work on the hundreds of photographs I brought back. A few have started to make their way to the web – at my photography web site and gallery with more to come soon.
A quick overview of the trip: On Saturday 7/21 I drove to Yosemite and actually managed to snag an unreserved camp site at Tuolumne on a Saturday! I photographed sunset from the top of Lembert Dome that evening. I had a lazy morning and midday in Tuolumne on Sunday before departing for Mammoth Lakes, where I met my brother and his family. The two of us got up before dawn on Monday to photograph sunrise at Mono Lake, after which we returned to Mammoth to rejoin his family for breakfast and a midday start to a 6-day pack trip into the Lake Ediza and Thousand Island Lake area. I came out yesterday and drove home last night.
Subscribe
-
Archives
- April 2012 (1)
- January 2011 (1)
- September 2010 (2)
- August 2010 (1)
- July 2010 (4)
- June 2010 (6)
- May 2010 (11)
- April 2010 (4)
- March 2010 (1)
- February 2010 (1)
- January 2010 (5)
- October 2009 (4)
-
Categories
- Abstract
- Black and White
- Castle Rock
- Commentary
- Death Valley
- Desert
- Environment
- Equipment
- Events
- Gear Reviews
- Green World
- History
- Mission Peak
- Mono Lake
- Mount Shasta Area
- News
- Ocean
- Owens Valley
- Pacific Northwest
- People
- Photography
- Places
- Point Lobos
- Quicksilver
- Quicksilver Historical
- Quotable
- Random
- San Francisco Bay Area
- Santa Teresa
- Sierra Nevada
- Site News
- Technique
- Trails
- Trips
- Uncategorized
- White Mountains
- Wildlife
- Yosemite
-
RSS
Entries RSS
Comments RSS
Dan's Outside 
Where is Dan?
It has been a crazy month – and posting has suffered a bit here.
I’ve been on two week-long pack trips during August, first in the Minarets area and then in the Mt. Whitney area. After returning from the second trip I was called out of town on short notice and spent almost a week in the midwest and then the Seattle area.
Things should settle down a bit now, and I’m hopeful that I’ll be able to post on a more regular basis – including a report on those pack trips.
Share this:
August 22, 2007 Posted by gdanmitchell | Commentary | Comments Off on Where is Dan?