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2015 Trip Chronicles: Contents
Fish Creek backpack 7/4
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This was expected to be the most important backpacking trip of my 2015 summer, and two of my bros J and M were along. We would be hiking out of the Coldwater Creek Trailhead of Mammoth Lakes at 9240 feet in Inyo National Forest into the John Muir Wilderness, going over Duck Pass at 10740 feet into the Fish Creek drainage. I had obtained a reserved permit from recreation dot gov for a Saturday, July 4 start and would be coming out 9 days later on Sunday, July 12. And per my usual style, it was elaborately planned in detail. However, such trips always have lots of options depending on conditions, and in this case, stormy weather put us into those options from the start. Link to online topographic map of:
Coldwater Creek Trailhead to Duck Pass
My description that follows will purposely be only vaguely informative as to where we traveled, where we camped, times of day, and descriptions of imagery, as has been the case with other features on my website. For aesthetic photographic landscape locations, I am a strong advocate for photographers exploring on their own in remote areas, including wilderness areas, to find otherwise unknown subjects instead of having precise information like GPS coordinates, detailed map directions, or detailed guiding information that makes it too easy for those who have made little effort to find where to set down their tripods. That said, I find nothing wrong with providing such information for locations as popular icons and other front country destinations that have long been common knowledge in the public domain. However, as an expert in many landscape areas of California, going forward at this unique technological knee in human history for the sake of our spirit of adventure and exploratory enjoyment, I have drawn that line in the sand. In any case, a few in the audience will readily be able to identify locations of some of the images, and I would hope they share my silence much like the brotherhood of fishermen with closed lips that have knowledge of uncommon backcountry lakes with large trout that require strenuous effort to reach .
The first day hiking did not go as planned. M had problems with the altitude, so I adjusted to a very slow, tedious pace, and more importantly, the weather had me abandoning planned photography at the east end of Duck Lake. Instead, we would move further along the route than planned with a hope of picking up what I missed on the return leg. Starting in the evening, we night hiked up the trail. The beautiful dusk image above, looking north northwest, was photographed by brother J. By the wee hours, we had stopped for a short period of sleep before continuing on towards the pass at daybreak Saturday, July 4, 2015. Saturday was totally cloudy pretty much all day except for a few short periods of sun poking through cumulus buildups between afternoon thunderstorms.
My carrying weight was just 63 pounds, or down about 5 pounds from 2014. Whenever J is along, I also bring along my fishing gear that adds 2 or 3 pounds. That first day, both J and I grabbed some of M's gear to help move along the trail. The above image is from a bit north of Duck Pass on the headwall, with Barney Lake below and the pumice cone that is Mammoth Mountain in the distance. One can also see Skelton and Arrowhead lakes down in the green forest mid-frame. Note the trail through talus frame right. These areas above the trailhead are quite scenic and have good fishing for pan-sized eastern brook trout. Thus, they are fine destinations for short overnight backpacking trips as long as one bothers to move well away from the heavily traveled trail. And the image below on the right is in the talus on the north side of Duck Pass. I briefly stop a great deal while carrying heavy loads, as every waist-high rock or log has my name.
Finally reaching the pass at 3.6 miles by late morning was a relief because I had feared getting caught in thunderstorms moving north on the south side of the pass that we could not see from the view-blocked north side. The cloudy skies south looked much less threatening, so we would then enjoy 1.7 miles of easy, unrushed downhill to the PCT/JMT junction at the west end of the large lake. By midday there were fair numbers of groups on the trail, with most day hikers passing us. On the far south side of huge Duck Lake, we noticed a group had illegally set up their tent right at the water's edge. Reaching the lake outlet at 4.9 miles, I found the scenery more interesting than expected, and J noted he would be happy to camp in the area during our return leg. There were other advantages to doing so. Thus, we agreed to do so instead of laboring all the way over to the east shores. I could more readily take care of my interests there on a one-day solo trip. Actually, the whole Duck Lake basin looked more aesthetic than what I had gleaned from Google Earth and the few images on Google Images. So the basin will be in my future base camping plans.
We took a couple-hour lunch break at the Duck Lake Trail and PCT Trail junction, then continued on a route towards a destination. Later we could see a dark thunderstorm to the south over the whole Silver Divide moving north in our direction. Our packs had rain covers on, and we were wearing rain jackets but not rain pants. Generally through Wednesday, clouds would be moving from the south and south-southeast. That is a typical monsoon flow when high pressure is to the east over the Four Corners region of the Great Basin. With the main dark clouds now bearing down on us and sprinkling, changing to moderate rain, moving downhill, I pushed the other two ahead as much as they could bear. We finally were close to where I hoped to camp on the north side of Purple Lake, about a dense tall lodgepole pine grove I'd sized up on Google Earth when heavy rain with small hail caught us tramping through a wet, marshy meadow. While crossing a step across a stream, J stepped on a green surface that was plants floating atop water that drowned one of his boots up into his pant leg. And so did I as I stepped into a narrow stream knee-deep.
We reached the grove and immediately moved about, finding the driest areas below densest branches and canopies. It continued to rain rather heavily for about a half hour, then waned. After that first storm passed, J and I quickly set up our tents and gear, while M, with just a bivy sack, was content to defer that till later. The two of us made dinner then retired into our tents for a nap. One of the most powerful lightning storms I've experienced in the last couple of decades moved over us, with many bright and frequent bolts cracking loud thunder from ink-black clouds while rain and BB-pellet-sized hail pummeled our tent flies.
Fortunately, we were at maybe the safest place in the zone. Quite appropriate since it was, after all, the Fourth of July! After that waned, M hiked out to survey our mosquitoey area, and by late afternoon some sun began poking through the cumulus buildups. So I also did some exploring about the area. I told the other two I would be getting up at dawn to get a jump on areas I wanted to photograph. J and M could enjoy dawdling about in the morning, having breakfast before breaking camp, then meet me at an easily identified location. All of us were glad to get a long night of sleep and rest.
After a good night of solid sleep, I woke at dim dawn Sunday morning, July 5, 2015, well refreshed. Packing up quickly in the dim dawn light, aided by my headlamp, I was ready to move out by 5:30am. A chore I can crank through quickly given an adult lifetime doing so. The others had, of course, been awakened by my racket and would be getting up themselves not long after I left, then slowly breaking camp. I was initially wearing a rain jacket and pants because all vegetation was quite wet, but as I moved beyond the meadows into a duff understory lodgepole forest to begin climbing, I packed that away lest evaporation from sweat start condensing on the rain pant inner surface, then soak into my Levi jeans. Moving along at a strong pace up canyon walls, breathing strongly, I reached my destination in a bit over an hour and set up my camera gear.
My Sony A6000 APS-C 24-megapixel mirrorless body went atop a Nodal Ninja III MK II panoramic head that was atop a Manfrotto MH054M0 magnesium ballhead and Induro CT113 carbon fiber tripod. For most of the images below, I used a Sigma 30mm f2.8 DN lens. Skies were nicely sunny this morning, but I did not expect that to last, as there was obviously still a monsoon flow above. The third subject worked is the pond at page top, a 15,000 by 6000 pixel 5x1 panoramic stitch of horizontal frames processed from 32 individual shots, or enough to make a sharp 50 by 20 inch print. The exceptionally beautiful pond few obviously ever visit had turf shores on its south end and a section of shore with rusty metamorphic rock that added nice color. If one looks at the enlarged vertical slice view, the center slice shows a patch of red heather at the base of the tall tree at center and brighter red a bit right of some great red paintbrush. The thought of camping about this pond sometime in the future is a delightful notion. As is common, an up-canyon breeze soon increased, so that was the last subject I was able to capture a decent water reflection of.
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There were a lot of possible subjects in the zone we would be base camping at the next couple of nights. Even though my strategy was to focus on morning lake reflections, now, given the stiff breeze, that was not going to happen this morning. It was, however, worthwhile for me to ramble about to various places I'd studied on the topographic map so that I could be more efficient the following two mornings. Often periods of morning calm are brief, so a landscape photographer needs to work quickly, moving with the speed of an endurance athlete from location to location. The mountain landscape photography I've performed for decades requires a strong body with innate superior balance skills in the style of the late Galen Rowell.
As hoped in setting a trip date, these elevations of High Sierra timberline country now in the first week of July during this very droughty year were near what would be peak blooming for most wildflower species, or about 4 weeks earlier than normal. A common indication one has arrived at peak is that turfy areas have a wonderfully vibrant green that, in the intense sunlight at these high elevations, glows strongly. Visit a few weeks early, and such turf would be like the image lower down this page, with pink-hued alpine laurel in the foreground and still-dormant grasses. A few weeks later, those grasses quickly show yellow and eventually become brown. Thus, the window is just a few short weeks. The image above is one of the areas I traveled through. In the foreground are great red paintbrush, Brewer's lupine, dirty socks, and red heather. Further up the stream, one can see a small lake. Higher up on the background peak at the left edge of the frame, the visible snow is not from the previous winter but rather decades-old snow now shrinking to a smaller amount than during any historic time.
My morning was well spent, and though I did, in fact, work as insurance a few frames with lakes my primary subjects, Monday morning visiting the same areas would be nicely calm with superior results. By mid-morning, I had returned to our rendezvous location, and not long after, J and M arrived. We set up tents at an excellent lightning-safe location, well away from water, below large shading whitebark pines about a concave landscape zone, on thick dry duff surfaces no others had used for years. Well, actually, the dried needly, needle-and-twiggy, pine cone duff debris had lots of usual chipmunk and chickaree holes, and we would enjoy watching them scurrying about at all hours, sometimes comically investigating our cooking gear. Fresh, clean water was abundant in the zone, and these remote streams and lakes had pan-sized golden and rainbow trout, keeping J adventurous and excited. Skies clouded up by noon.
We found some wonderful creek cascades with small falls to jump into the refreshing cool waters during early afternoon, then lay about warm, smooth streamside granite while the sun still found holes in clouds. Almost every day we do so in the backcountry unless the weather is especially chilly because we much prefer feeling clean instead of the usual backpacker mindset of trail grubbiness without washing for days. Well, that is I and J, while grubster M would only get in a creek if someone tossed a bottle of beer in. Late afternoon, we explored out to a plateau near our camp with nice views down canyon. Some cumulus showers in the area moved us back towards camp for dinner at the end of our day. By sunset, clouds cleared to the west, allowing long red frequencies of setting sunlight to paint clouds with warm light. We enjoyed a second peaceful night with long hours of sleep.
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The next morning Monday, July 6, 2015 rose at mid-dawn, filled my daypack for a long morning ramble, then quickly moved up canyon to subjects I'd surveyed Sunday morning. The above is a 10,000 by 4000 pixel 2x1 horizontal frame stitch of a wonderful turf pond with an impressive ridge rising up in the distance beyond. And yes, it was again sunny, but calmer, at least at this 7am early time of morning. Were there trout in the pond, the mirroring water surface would not be so perfect. For lake reflections, I much prefer small lakes and ponds versus larger lakes, where far-side elements such as trees, rocks, and flowers are close enough to still render with meaningful size. My A6000 mirrorless body is just small enough to use the small Nodal Ninja 3 MK II panoramic head instead of the usual much heavier DSLR panoramic gear. The head weighs just 17 ounces and is robust enough that I just toss it into my daypack folded without any padding. Its normal lens orientation is the much preferred vertical, though I can orient my Manfrotto ball head using it awkwardly in an unstable, vibration-prone horizontal orientation, as I did above.
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Forty minutes later, worked on yet another beautiful timberline turf pond, above with a nicely curving pond edge, a few foreground alpine shooting star, Dodecatheon jeffreyi, and a complementary rounded, glacial-shaped peaklet beyond, with scattered whitebark pines and touches of red mountain heather against boulders. A 3x1 vertical frame stitch, 8700 by 5200 pixels. Select the enlarged vertical slice view link to see enough detail for the flowers. The world's most beautiful, most luxuriant lawns are not on golf courses in communities of the rich, nor do they require any mowing, while having the most cushiony, soft surface one might imagine. Actually, the turf is usually a complex, old, evolved, intertwined matrix of several species. Black alpine sedge, Carex nigrans, is often the primary grass structural component with alpine laurel, arctic willow, dwarf bilberry, mosses, and fungi. Another beautiful remote zone I'd love to camp at on a future visit. Most visitors pass through such areas quickly, which could easily satisfy this person base camping a couple of days. And if so, we would be sure to climb that little peak in the landscape.
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The next image above is another lakeshore landscape, a 3x1 vertical frame stitch, 8500 by 6250 pixels. The foreground shows pink-hued alpine laurel, Kalmia polofolia, some white heather, and red mountain heather against rocks, then a pond in the midground. Alpine laurel is the earliest turf resident species to bloom each summer. It covers areas of turf like this if one visits while these areas are still soggy from snowmelt. There will usually also be emerging areas showing the two other above heath family species, though turf areas are likely not yet fully greened up.
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The expected breeze eventually showed up, which ended my pond reflection work. I was quite satisfied to get in this one brief morning of perfect conditions with about ideal timberline landscapes that guaranteed a level of photographic success for the trip regardless of what happened in subsequent days. Brother J, escaping from camp, had caught up with me, fishing rod in hand. We rambled some distance, successfully navigating challenging terrain to minimize vertical climbing, then split up as he ventured off to fishing waters while I captured the above breezy lake surface scene. Along the shore, a nice complement of red mountain heather, Phyllodoce breweri, with one shore edge clump of gray-leaved Sierra willow, Salix orestera, added contrast to the blue waters. Upon leaving this zone, I left far more good material than I brought back that queues up yet another magnificent area I can only hope to return to again some summer before I become too old. Oh Lord, please grant me that happy wish to walk in your wonderful gardens through eternity.
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With my gaze away from breeze-disturbed water landscapes, I noticed some nice close-up subjects, including this dense patch above of small-sized common monkeyflower, Mimulus gutatus.
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Nearby the monkeyflower image above was a dense patch of the ubiquitous whorled flowers of Sierra penstemon, Penstemon heterodoxus.
Back at camp before midday, I did some fishing using red dots on a yellow Mepps spinner, quickly catching enough for a pan full to enjoy a trout-and-rice lunch feast. And note that this is my newest MSR WhisperLite stove, as I handed down my old beat-up set to M. See the fish bones lower left? Our standard fish-in-pan process removes bones and fins using a fork and pliers, leaving just meat, which we then mix in pre-cooked Minute Rice. The pan is covered with aluminum foil through a few on-off-on cycles that gradually dries out the flesh. We then dump in the rice, mix, and go through a final cycle.
In the afternoon, I located a nice Coville's columbine subject above. Late afternoon, the three of us investigated some large talus "shelters" a short distance from camp around the far side of the lake. Cumulus rains without lightning snuck up on us, coming over a tall nearby peak, keeping us pinned under talus for a long couple of hours before we were able to escape to camp. As we made dinner, however, clouds waned to the west, providing another dusk sky with nice yet not great color.
Sunrise on our fourth day, Tuesday July 7, 2015 broke and we went to work packing up gear. Before 7am we were on our route out, with early skies mostly sunny once again. As we left the Virginia Lake area, skies showed the same pattern of minor building clouds. It was again breezy by an early 8am. Numbers of other groups were also making their way north or south on the trail as we engaged in frequent hello greetings. We would be on the trail for a fair distance this morning. We reached Tully Hole at 9.5k late morning, with skies now once again showing threatening cumulus buildups that had us concerned about reaching our destination before any rain. We continued upward.<.p>
A couple of hours later, we had reached our destination area, set up our tents and gear promptly, then once again thunderstorms began chasing us inside our tents, where we remained till late afternoon. Well, of course, the trail hiking had been a strenuous effort, so that was, in some sense, welcome. A break in storms came, and J and I used that window to jump in a nearby lake for the day's refreshing dip, cleaning off our trail dust and sweat. Then he managed some fishing while I surveyed shots for the following morning. More showers were in the area that had us move back to our tents, but by sunset skies began clearing, when I shot the modest image above right of Red and White Peak. I'd already spent too much time lounging in my tent both at night and during afternoons, so with a SanDisk Sansa II player in my ears, I enjoyed roaming about a glacial granite landscape in the dark, so I didn't retire until about 11pm that evening.
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Early the next morning Wednesday, July 8, 2015, I rambled off to a primary lake target on the trip, but as the sun rose on the landscape, a growing early breeze limited attempts for lake reflections. I did manage the above large landscape lake reflection with nice clouds early at 7:20am while shadows were still in a foreground cove. An 11500 by 9000 pixel 4x2 vertical stitch panel set using 35 images. M and J joined up, and we climbed up on a ridge, exploring about before returning to camp so J could do some more serious fishing. Again, the monsoon flow cumulus built up late morning and began chasing us back into our tents during the afternoon, pounding us at times with BB pellet-sized hail. By the end of the afternoon, skies began clearing again. In the distance, Red Slate Mountain at 13,170 feet, in the image below right, is coated with hail. By evening, the night sky showed mostly stars. But that wasn't a sign our stormy weather might end, though I noticed clouds were now moving in more from the west.
At 2am Thursday July 9, 2015 I woke up and the dark skies were starry. However, an hour later, at 3pm awoke again, and the skies were suddenly mostly cloudy. About a half hour later, we could hear thunder in the distance, with lightning flashing. Thus began one of the most violent thunderstorm events I've experienced in the Sierra during my lifetime. By 4pm the storm was right on top of us, with major lightning flashing every few seconds and the monstrous, scary sound of strikes blasting the ground of nearby terrain, with short delays till thunder. At first, outside the lightning, it was just minor rain splattering on our tents with some strong frontal downdrafts, but then all hell broke loose as the main towering cloud apparently moved in atop us.
The hail was easily the worst I've ever endured. To avoid lightning, I squirmed to keep my body atop my short length Therm-a-Rest NeoAir within my Marmot Pinnacle down bag inside my Big Agnes UL1 that was atop a cheap blue plastic tarp. At one point, I turned on my flashlight, lifted up the vestibule a wee bit, and was looking at about an inch-deep depth of grape to cherry-sized hail. The top of my sleeping bag was wet from a cloud of mist being beaten into the air from the underside of my rain fly from the hail bombardment. The underside of the fly was wet from forming condensation as the air temperature had dropped into the high 30s and precipitation changed to wet snow. This creature was scared. The lightning eased up first, while waves of hail continued, which then changed minute by minute to mostly heavy rain, then back to smaller hail. Once the lightning waned, I was quick to get out a spare cotton T-shirt and wipe up dampness inside the tent. Somehow water was pooling a bit at the lower end of the UL1 inside, so I dealt with that. Water had managed to drip down the sides of the tent, then between my ground sheet and the tent tub floor, so I suspected it had found a pinhole to wick up through.
As dawn broke, lying in my bag, escape scenarios to lower elevations were running through my mind. When it got light enough to see outside, I noticed the areas outside were a solid white, and wet, sleety snow was falling. The temperature was probably about 35F degrees, or unusually low for July in the Sierra at the 10k-plus elevation we were at. The weather was so unusually cold that we had no idea if it would actually stay cold and snow more. A foot of snow at these elevations within its awkward terrain could be life-threatening. As soon as the light rains stopped, we moved into action, coming up with a game plan. Waited a short while to see if the rains would return, and when we could see a lighter section of clouds moving in, we sprang into action. It was critical we pack up and move down far enough into the canyon before rains resumed. If rains resumed while we were exposed with gear lying all about unprotected, packing up, it could be a hypothermic disaster. If another lightning storm moved in while we were moving over the first exposed third of a mile on a ridge, we could get fried. Hail and snow on the ground were rapidly melting into slushy boot-top-deep ponds. Duff surfaces were water-soaked and mushy. We rapidly pushed gear into our packs, including wet gear like tent and ground sheet. The image on the left is by J.
We moved out and got about a mile down our route when darker clouds moved back in with cold rains. J and I were, of course, wearing rain gear with pack rain covers on our packs. M only had a now-wet, old, and leaky jacket. The cold rain pinned us down for over an hour, and that caused us to become chilled just standing while also getting dripped on by now saturated dense tree canopy spots. We would have to move along, rain or not. With these new bouts of heavy rain, it was wise proof that we had left. When the rain became only moderate, we stumbled ahead, reaching Tully Hole by mid-morning. On the way down, we noticed some higher peaks looked like snow cones. There we surveyed the possible unpleasant locations we might set up camps at if strong storms moved back in. My 2012 Gore-Tex boots were no longer waterproof after walking through all the slush and water, and wool socks were thoroughly soaked.
About an hour later, conditions lightened up so we reorganized gear and started climbing the PCT/JMT up the 900 feet towards Virginia Lake. Numerous thru-hiking groups from Virginia Lake were moving south down the trail into Fish Creek, obviously eager to escape those higher areas. Of course, thru-trail hikers often have minimal storm gear. By the time we reached the summit plateau at about 10.3k, it was snowing in the mid 30Fs however, snow was only accumulating on vegetation.
We made our way around to the south side of the large lake, locating a very nice area to set up at. Once again, it was far away from the busy areas near the trail. Beside us was a tall, joint crack wall about 80 feet high and a few hundred yards long. Trees were well spaced across the landscape with well-drained, deep, dry sandy soil, and there were no signs of flowing water, indicating that even during the big storm it simply all soaked in, thus quite lightning safe. About then, the snow stopped, and the skies lightened up with the sun almost poking through the clouds. We strung up rope as we had already done several times during the trip and hung up anything that needed drying. I also spread items like food from within my Garcia canister over the now sun-warming granite boulders. In the image above, my UL1 tent is a bit right of center near the top, and items hanging on my rope are a bit left of some small trees.
Within a couple of hours, we had cooked lunches and dried much of our gear. It was still mostly cloudy out, but the storm of that morning was not going to return, with temperatures rising into the 40Fs. We were feeling immensely relieved, now making plans to enjoy the rest of Thursday afternoon and the remaining few days of our trip. It was rather obvious that if the rain had not let up, we would have had a miserable, cold, wet time stuck down at Tully Hole. A sobering reality none of us will forget in the future when planning gear for long Sierra trips. In the afternoon we had time to start exploring the area, which was quite different from other areas we had visited thus far in the trip. During the night, skies remained fully cloudy and temperatures unseasonably cool.
Sunrise Friday July 10, 2015 also showed fully cloudy skies. We planned to enjoy the morning around the lake, then leave north on the PCT/JMT trail late morning in order to reach the Duck Lake outlet area where we would spend a last night, before hiking out on Saturday a day early. With flat light everywhere, I explored and took informational shots of subjects I might work on a future trip. J fished a considerable area of the shoreline. M climbed up to a saddle on the north shore where it was possible to route around towards the trail. Late morning, we leisurely packed up, took the below group image with packs on at our camp spot with the tall joint crack wall, then headed out along the lake's south shore in order to meet the PCT/JMT.
It was just a couple hundred feet up to reach the pass atop a saddle on the ridge between the Virginia Lake and Purple Lake drainages and then about 600 feet down to the outlet of Purple Lake. An impressively steep face was just west of the pass, with a huge zone of metamorphic geology talus below. Then from Purple Lake was a 250-foot climb up to a traverse northward around the Fish Creek canyon to the Duck Lake creek drainage. It was a long way for our sore bodies, weary of our heavy loads, so by the last mile we were all aching in various ways. I stopped a lot, including some time to work this colorful, lush metasedimentary willow seep near the PCT/JMT junction with the Duck Pass Trail. Abundant great red paintbrush, Castilleja miniata, with common monkeyflower and a list of other species. Of course, the still mostly cloudy sky diffuse light was exactly what that kind of subject required. Such seeps, given continued water supplies, usually peak shortly after the majority of other mid-summer species.
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Later in the afternoon we dragged into a nicely pleasant pristine camp area no others seemed to have used in recent years, with a nearby water supply we didn't need to bother filtering. The area was just 30 feet above the trail on a bench, and that is often all it takes to leave behind 98% of groups who rarely ever hike up above trails to locate their camps. We made camp, filled up containers with wonderfully fresh, clean water, made dinner, ate a lot of extra food we would otherwise have to hike out with, explored a wee bit, then retired; mission accomplished.
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Saturday morning, July 11, 2015 was our last day in the wilderness, but we would first spend a full morning enjoying the west end of the huge lake. J went off fishing while I worked on some local modest landscapes. Scattered clouds were looming over the nearby peak just south, causing moving shadows in my frame, a limitation when focus stacking. In the image above, a close-up image of one of the Sierra's most prolific species, mountain pride penstemon, Penstemon newberryi, taken in shadows.
By 10am we were all back at camp packing gear up a last time. As we reached the outlet, I took the image above of the north shore of Duck Lake from its outlet, a bit to the left. Duck Pass is the low saddle one mile north. And the image below, shot by J is this person taking a quick image of areas above Duck Lake I plan to climb up to on a future trip. My camera daypack was strapped to the top at that time. The blue tube is an inverted plastic Lay's Stax potato chip tube covering the top of my Fenwick multi-section rod. I wear the cheap foam Home Depot knee pads almost all waking hours. Although over decades I have most often packed cameras and tripod away onto my pack when on a trail or route, I have also often hand-carried cameras atop tripods including my larger 4x5 view camera rig, whenever I expect to work en route. Terrain has to get rather difficult before I bother to stop and stow such gear.
By the time we reached the trailhead at midday, J's feet were mighty sore given his too-worn boots, and stated he would not put his feet on another trail before buying a new pair haha. M, who had not been on a trail in years, kept talking about a list of gear that would make his next adventure on trails with us much better. And I was weary of the pain of my weighty pack pressing against a sore area about my left kidney. We left the quite busy scene of groups arriving back at the trailhead from day hikes and a few just starting up the trail. These trips are always memorable adventures. However, this trip was much more so as a survival challenge that we will be talking about for the rest of our lives.
NEXT: Page 11 WF Carson River ; HNA Lee Vining Creek
2015 Trip Chronicles: Contents
