Tioga Pass

Mine Creek -  September 28, 2016 - Inyo National Forest - Hoover Wilderness Area 

Yosemite National Park encompasses the upper watersheds of two rivers draining the west slopes of the Sierra Nevada. The Merced River drains the park's southeast mountains before flowing famously through Yosemite Valley. The Tuolumne River, less famous though far from obscure, drains the more northern peaks through Tuolumne Meadows before cutting a canyon down to Hetch Hetchy Reservoir, the infamous water source for the city of San Francisco.

Highway 120, better known as the Tioga Pass Road, follows the Tuolumne River through Tuolumne Meadows to Tioga Pass. At 9943 feet, this is the highest highway pass in the Sierras and is also the border between Yosemite and Inyo National Forest. The pass itself is barely perceptible, the road dropping only slightly as it heads east into national forest land. This high country just outside Yosemite is one of my favorite parts of the Sierra Nevada, or any other mountain range for that matter.

I arrived rather late in the season for such a high altitude. Nighttime lows were forecast to drop into the low 30s or upper 20s. The days were lovely though so I took one of the last sites available at Junction Campground (9600') in order to get in one hike. On my last visit, eight years earlier, I hiked into what is known as 20 Lakes Basin. Actually I hiked there twice. This time I headed up Mine Creek, the next drainage over to the west.

The hike starts straight out of the campground, always nice. The trail is signed “Bennettville”, as the first mile leads to the sparse remains of a nineteenth-century mining town, the attraction for most people. But beyond Bennettville the trail heads quickly and easily out of the trees and in no time emerges into an extraordinary basin of lakes, the imposing granite of Mount Conness, White Mountain, and North Peak luring from the distance. I immediately thought and not for the first time how easy Sierra hikers can have it compared to those in the Cascades. I know there is plenty of tough hiking in the Sierras, but quick jaunts to landscapes like this are far from uncommon.

Bennettville

Mine Creek

Shell Lake

The weather was spectacular. Lush grass surrounded Shell Lake. Some autumn tints flashed in the hills and bits of snow prevailed on the higher slopes. Mine Creek is a narrow little treat, running free of impoundment. It is a tributary of Lee Vining Creek, though, so its waters go on to produce electricity at the power station in Lee Vining Canyon before being diverted, most of it anyway, to the Los Angeles Aqueduct for the long ride to that city's water supply.

I met a couple of people heading up the trail with fishing poles, saying the creek held a lot of trout. I soon saw what they meant and was indeed taken, both by their numbers and their size. There were buckets of them and they were tiny, hardly fish at all. They were so close to the bank and to each other that I figured it would be more efficient to just dip a net and scoop some out. You'd need a few of them if you were looking for dinner. I don't know if that would be sporting or even legal; I never did take up fishing.

  

It was lake after lake - Shell Lake, Fantail Lake, Finger Lake, Spuller Lake - I lost track.

Eventually the trail gave out along with the Mine Creek watershed. I did a little climbing and looked down on more lakes - Maul, Green Treble - lying at the base of the Conness-Black granite wall. I could also see Saddlebag Lake to the east, its small dam, the red rock imposing above its banks. I saw that I could come into this basin from that direction as well. Prospects for future visits!

Saddlebag Dam (got to look close)

It was easy pickings down into a wetlands area still quite wet in late September. I figured this was good news for our drought-stricken Californians, though I don't really know what would be considered normal. Maybe this should still have been snow.

At this point I wasn't really trying to get anywhere. It was now a hike to wander and absorb. I circled around another lake or two, then began climbing back up toward the Mine Creek divide. I was surprised to find myself short of breath and rather exhausted, just from strolling around some easy meadows. It dawned on me that I had been over 10,000 feet the entire day, in the sun the whole time, and that elevation and exposure had taken their toll. So much for my Cascadian condescension.

I found some shade and rested a bit, looking back over the lakes toward the way I came in, with the Tioga Pass peaks and Mount Dana in the background. By this time the beautiful day was showing some cracks; it was getting downright cloudy. I started my dawdle back in a light sprinkle, taking time to look more closely at the rocks. Somehow it had become more autumnal over the course of the day. Goodbye to Bennettville and back to the tent for a cold night.

Bennettville

Tuolumne Meadows and River - September 29 and 30, 2016 - Yosemite National Park

To gain a modicum of warmth I moved to Yosemite's Porcupine Flat campground - 1,500 feet lower than Junction - and spent the next couple of days kicking around the Tuolumne Meadows and river. Tuolumne Meadows really is strolling unless you choose to climb one of the many domes distant or near. Wandering the river in its late season sluggishness, with Lembert Dome the obvious focal point, Dana and Gibbs peaks in the background. Conifer saplings revealed that Tuolumne Meadows, like all meadows, is temporary.

Lembert Dome

Lembert Dome, Dana Peak, Mount Gibbs

Tuolumne River, Lembert Dome

Conifers on the march

The next day I set out on the Glen Aulin Trail following the Tuolumne River downstream.The first several miles are a mostly flat stretch of pulverized granite, and I found it a bit enervating. I have trouble with flat trails. I finally got to one exciting stretch of trail etched into a granite cliff, but saw the next leg was a descent to the waterfalls that are the essence of the hike and decided this was not the day for that. I just didn't have it in me. So I retreated to a lovely spot where the river pools up before plunging down a narrows. It must be quite tumultuous in high water, but this was low water so I got to play around with the patterns on the river bed.

Tuolumne River

Tuolumne River

Tuolumne River Bed

Glen Aulin Trail 

I was enjoying a late breakfast at the campground when out of the bush popped a park ranger. First she chided me for wandering too far from my picnic cooler. You're supposed to keep within arm's length of them and try sometime to prepare dinner that way. Then she told me a storm was coming in, snow and wind, possibly closing the road. I would have to pick up and drop down lower, down into Lee Vining Canyon. I might still get snowed on but at least I wouldn't be stranded in Yosemite.