Bishop

9/1/08
I drove the big descent down the freeway toward Bishop, past the aqueduct taking Mono Lake water to LA. I wanted to check some of that out, but the desert was too hot for me in midday, and by evening I was typically up in the mountains. I had a productive day in Bishop, California's great eastern metropolis. I brought my car to the Toyota dealer for its 5000-mile maintenance. I ordered checks from a now obsolete bank. I bought some Campergaz which the outdoor store in Mammoth Lakes had told me was no longer available. I bought two rolls of film in for developing, still reluctant to rely on my digital camera. I bought D- batteries. I bought books at an Independent Bookstore. The Indie carried the NYRB but had sold out. Good enough - Bishop would be home base for the next several weeks and I could catch the next edition. I also bought an Orion and a Mary Austen collection that included the Land of Little Rain.

I also shopped for a new tent, as the zippers on both my tents were now broken. I didn't yet have the stomach to pay out the $250 required for a new one and eventually I headed out to camp with my old one. I went to the Horton Creek Campground, a $5 BLM site in the high desert outside Bishop, in what passes for foothills at the base of the Sierra. This proved to be an unexpected delight. The high desert was lovely beyond lovely on this late summer night. My only concern was that a rattlesnake might crawl in with me. I'd heard talk of that and didn't know if it is apocryphal.

I had a terrific night, no snake problem, no problems at all. The morning was lovely too, though I had to clear out by 7:30 as once the sun comes up it gets hot quick. I went back into town and bought a $250 tent. I was just outside the High Sierra on Wednesday of Labor Day weekend without a tent, so I really had no choice.

Bishop is a fairly pleasant little town, though I was disheartened to hear two guys at the library talk aloud about how Obama could never get elected and if by some fluke he did he would quickly be assassinated. When they proceeded to putting «Kennedy and all the rest of them» on a plane and blowing it up I gave them a dirty look. I wanted to ask them if the Klan had fallen on such hard times it had to hold it's meetings at the public library but, well, I'm a chicken. I had out of state plates, Seattle for pete's sake, and I didn't feel like getting vandalized. I mean, I know they're out there but it upsets me nonetheless. The lack of both education and intelligence is appalling.

Highway 168 rises west out of Bishop into the Sierra wall, hitting a junction about 15 miles presenting a choice between South Lake and Lake Sabrina. Both are reservoirs, both have boating docks. Lots of campgrounds. Lots of fishing. Fishermen and women outnumbered hikers significantly nearly everywhere I went. South Lake is the trailhead for South Fork Bishop Creek and Bishop Pass and on into Kings Canyon National Park the hard way. Lake Sabrina is the trailhead for a whole slew of lakes, Blue Lake being the closest and then on to Midnight Lake among others. A third road leads to North Lake and the North Fork Bishop Creek Trail to Loch Leven Lakes and Paiute Pass. These are just three of several trails; these are the three that I did.

Sabrina Campground Given that it was coming on Labor Day weekend, I drove up to Sabrina Campground (9000') to grab a spot for the weekend. From the heat of the desert to the cold of the mountains in about 30 minutes. Nice site, along a tiny creek, with good daytime shade - surrounded by quaking aspen - and decent views. Feel pretty good about it, a little vacation from my day-to-day camping. I figured I would stay there for five nights, $100, and hike like crazy.

Bishop Pass　Hiked to Bishop Pass on Thursday morning.I was eating breakfast at the Trailhead, early, just dawn, still cold, when I heard something and looked high on the rock cliff above me and saw a coyote looking down at me, curious? Then a California Highway Patrol car came rolling in, to a trailhead parking lot early in the morning? This also was a  bit surprising. He was a nice guy, just checking out the parking lot he told me. Only later do I find out this was not routine a routine patrol.

Bishop Pass is reputed to be one of the great ones, but I must have been getting spoiled. A fine hike in for sure, but I'd gone on several better over the past couple of weeks. The pass itself was a pile of rocks surrounded by gray peaks hazy in the early afternoon sun. Of course this is a common problem with routine day hiking: one tends to get to the hike's payoff just when the sun is at its most glaring. So on the return hiks the light was better and I enjoyed myself more. A real hike too, at 12RT/2180/11,980.

Back at the campground that evening a woman from the next site came over to the creek by my site to wash her feet. I was reading in my chair and had to assure her she wasn't intruding, as the creekside was public domain. Then a younger woman came by - 30 maybe - at first I thought mother and daughter but later learned they were coworkers at the California EPA. They were out to hike for the weekend as well; most of the other campers were fishing.  The younger one came and sat right at my side and we looked at my hiking book. As it happened, she was leaving California to move to Seattle. I joined them a little later at their table and they had an argument over whether Mexico was too dangerous to visit.

Sabrina Basin
Following my disappointment with Bishop Pass, I was delighted with Sabrina Basin the next day. Better flora, better rocks, better terrain, better views. All to my tastes of course. I do have to wonder how much of this was simply the light on a given location. At Sabrina Basin the light-scattered clouds make both visibility and hiking more pleasant than a bald sun. Midnight Lake was a bit of an anticlimax. I don't know why I didn't choose Drunken Sailor Lake instead. Funny though, the return from Midnight Lake was drudgery. If there is ever a next time I think I'd try a loop hike. Sun angle really did have something to do with it. Plus some smoke was coming in from over the pass. My return was in close proximity to a highly "productive" horse, the worst I've ever experienced.

Mountain Mahogony

After these two considerable hikes, I took Saturday off and drove into Bishop and pumped more money into the local economy. A storm rose in the mountains and I got back to the campground in time for a squall. I cooked spaghetti in a rain break. The rain eventually stopped but winds remained strong wind, the air cooled considerably. This dramatic change of circumstances sent me to my tent by 7:30PM. The wind remained extraordinary all night and continued into the morning, even as the sky had mostly cleared.  I managed breakfast and then hunkered down in my tent, hoping it wouldn‘t blow away. I thought that when the sun came up the wind would die down but if anything it got worse. I have to admit I felt good about getting some "real" weather even though I also hoped it would stop soon and that it wouldn’t rain.

The sun didn't come over the ridge and shine on my site until 9:00AM. I wondered if it would have any effect on the wind. Isn't it supposed to - warm air, cool air, and all that? It never happened though, so in the sun and the wind I packed up my tent, drove back to Bishop and read in the city park. It was pretty damn windy down there too. Sunday of Labor Day weekend and I started to wonder where I was - reading will do that to me. I could have been anywhere, and found myself wishing I was in Eastern Washington, able at any moment to get in my car and drive to my apartment, even if thatt meant going to work the next day. I was thinking that that's all I had reallyt needed: a two month vacation. I was even feeling nostalgic for West Orange, my home town. This could almost be Colgate Park. A nice desultory single-A ballgame would be good. I finished Marilynne Robinson's Home, tears in my eyes, the ending a powerful reverie of loss.

I left Bishop and drove out to a county park, fewer people, more alienating, but closer to that night’s BLM campground. It remained windy but I enjoyed myself reading the Sunday LA Times, and its off-the-chart movie coverage. I made a list of about six films I wanted to go see, though I hadn't been to a movie in years. LA will do that to you.

Paiute Pass (11RT/2173'/11,423)
Labor Day was beautiful and I drove back into the mountains and hiked past the Paiute Crags, Lock the Leven Lakes and Paiute Lake toward Paiute Pass. Mt Emerson was to the north of the trail.  The map claims this basin has glaciers. I say it does not. Paiute Pass opens up into the enormous  Humphreys Basin, headwaters of Paiute Creek. Major multi-colored peak - Humphreys Peak. Good hike. Funny though, I figured out a good thing to do at the top even though I failed to do it today. That is typical of me when hiking in the Cascades. I make a mental note of something to do the next time I do a hike, which could be the following summer or three summers later. Its how I innovate my hikes. Here though - when will I ever be on Pauite Pass again? Then again, this innovation would have been pretty easy. Spring and Manning would have noted it as an option in their trail book.

Humphreys Basin

Humphreys Peak

Paiute Crags

Back to Horton Creek CG, same as the night before. $5 and I liked it there. I didn't actually feel well and took taken a couple of Ibuprofin, first time for that all summer.