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What would Leonidas do?

This trip, like all of them was planned out to be quite unique. Mr. Gant is a world renowned kayaker, he’s guided trips in Alaska and Baja, he’s rescued oil tankers and towed aircraft carriers, he’s done surgery on sperm whales and midwifed for a turtle pregnant with twins. Long story short, he’s good and he has thousands of dollars in his Kayak and associated gear. So for quite a while now he’s been trying to setup a kayak type trip and to be honest I’ve been stalling. One of my fears is deep water, I’ve spent over a year or so on naval vessels traversing the Pacific and other godless oceans across the world and I’m deathly afraid of deep water. I can swim for hours on end, or I could when I was in better shape as long as it’s in a pool. But I can’t even walk out on a pier without trepidation tearing at my heart.

Well, the plan was to get up to Mono lake on Tuesday, camp on the shore paddle around the tufa formations and then on Wednesday morning paddle out to Pahoa island, camp there for the night and awake on Thursday to paddle back to shore and then drive back down to Socal. For regular readers, you’ll know that’s now quite what happened, the best laid plans of mice and men and all that.

The first challenge was loading three kayaks onto one little bitty Subaru, while it rained. Once that was done and we were on our way we had some beautiful views of snow capped Sierra peaks along the way which made for a great drive up to Mono Lake. Once we got there, the temperatures were fluctuating between the low 40’s and high 30’s. We explored for a bit, setup our tents and then launched our kayaks to explore the southern tufa field. It was great, the water was calm, the sky was red with sunset and the tufa were otherworldly indeed.

So, we got back to shore, bundled up a bit more and then lay down in our tents to snore. God knows what time it was but I awoke to the sound of someone outside my tent scraping it. It was Gant, scraping the snow off of the tent. I fell back asleep and when more broke I looked out the tent to see a few inches of snow covering the ground. The lake was choppy with wind and cold, so we decided to puss out and not make the 4 or so mile crossing to the island.

Instead, we drove around Lee Vining and the lake in general. Jared became a proud card carrying member of the Mono Lake Committee and Gant met a new girlfriend in the visitor’s center there. Then we hiked up to Panum crater and listened to the Earth’s deep volcanic rumblings from the rim. We also found a great cache of obsidian. After all this was done we decided that it was too cold, too windy, too choppy and too risky to chance going to the island in the small kayaks Jared and I had. So, we packed up our camp and headed south.

We got to Bishop and caught the 7pm showing of 300, which was a quite entertaining movie at least. After this we continued south to Independence to take part in the hospitality offered at Ray’s Den, a small motel owned by an old friend. We slept and then continued to drive south the next day, we got to Pyramid lake and paddled there for a few hours which again, despite the deep water was quite fun. I’m still stalling on future kayak trips though.

Album of pictures, located here.

Lets get some pizza.
Another immaculately implemented and executed adventure, or not. The usual three of us had just very vague plans to go out to Death Valley and climb Ubehebe peak, check out the race track and then generally explore and see what else we wanted to do out there. This ambiguity was probably a bad idea for a couple of reasons. Even when we have a firm plan somehow between the three of us we wind up altering the plan based on the zodiac signs and the readings that Gant gets from his Earth Mother Gaia’s tea leaves… So, without a solid plan we were even more screwed, but like always it was a blast.

Day one, we left and made the long haul up to Death Valley. To break up the drive we stopped and climbed around one of the sand dunes. Gant had said that he was making us dinner, and for some reason wouldn’t say what it was and for some other reason I trusted him. Sometime around this point is where the surprise broke and he told us he brought MRE’s. After he told us this, we ate dinner at the little restaurant there in Furnace Creek instead of MRE’s. The restaurant had some staff that I wouldn’t want to meet in a dark alley, but the food wasn’t too bad and not nearly as overpriced as it could have been.

After all this tomfoolery we were still at least 2 hours from the Racetrack which is at the end of a horribly washboarded 30+ mile dirt road. Along the way, we got lightly snowed on, and yes we are in Death Valley again for the first time since the Telescope peak Thundersnowstorm of 06, so snow in DV seems to be par for the course.

Eventually we got to the Racetrack. It was so cold outside that I didn’t really want to setup tent and we kind of decided to sleep (or attempt to as it turned out) in the truck. As I age, I noticed that I’m less able to sleep in a crappy position, seemingly long gone are the days of being able to get a solid sleep while curled up in a ball on the seat of a truck. But, nonetheless it was cold outside so it was carsleeping time.

When we woke up, for the last time after that horrible night of sleep we wandered the racetrack and climbed the grandstand which is a little rock outcrop out in the middle of the racetrack, which is essentially a dry lake bed. Then we went ahead and climbed Ubehebe Peak. This was a fun little jaunt, with a great view especially the day after a small storm. So the three of us got up to the top and just hung out for a bit, enjoying the views.

When we climbed down we drove out to the Southern end of the Racetrack to see the racers, which are rocks that move on their own across a flat surface (the racetrack) with the addition of a little bit of water and a lot of wind. This was a good trip turning great so far. So, we drove back up that horrible road, passing by Teakettle junction, and Gant’s first sight of Ubehebe Crater since his self inflicted quasi-suicidal climb out of the crater on it’s eastern rim. So, we kept on driving after this and then went out to check out Scotty’s Castle and were in the process of planning what we’d be doing the next day.

We were near the eastern boundary of the park, so we kind of decided to head out into Nevada and get gas, maybe pizza and then come back into the park through a one way canyon. Well, we got to Nevada and got gas but didn’t find any pizza places. However, we did see a sign for a nearby town, Las Vegas which was only 100 miles away or so. Ahhh, why not let’s hit Vegas and get some pizza.

Now keep in mind we got crap sleep the night before, it’s about 6pm now and we are driving to Vegas on a small one lane highway, so we arrive around 8 or 9. We didn’t get any pizza we just ate in a nice sit down restaurant, and since we were camping I ordered hot chocolate. After this hearty meal we hit the casinos. Jared and I sort of lead Gant down the path of gambling. End of the story, Jared was up probably 500 bucks or so at least twice, I was up the same at various points and we both lost all of it, Gant’s ATM card declined him from withdrawing anymore money after repeated trips to replenish his wallet.

So, after all this letdown it’s 3 or 4 am and none of us wanted to get a room for a hundred bucks for just 6 hours of sleep so we drive. This was nuts, no sleep and carsleep the night prior.

Thankfully we made it home safely though broker than we should have after a simple trip to Death Valley.

Again, photos in a seperate album.

Where’s the trail?

Back on track. The first full TDC (Jared’s term, Triple Digit Crew) team event since the August ‘06 HST. This was just a little half day get together, warm up hike type thing. Nothing special, nothing crazy and nothing too far. Jared had an idea about this place called Vasquez rocks (one thing to note all pics on this page are the result of D. Gant’s toils and troubles, not mine. So (c) D. Gant all of them), which if you’ve driven on the 14 near Palmdale or Santa Clarita you know what they are. Lots of movies are/have been filmed there due to their proximity to LA and their unique looks.

So, the three of us meet up at Marie Callendar’s and have breakfast, Jared pays for it. HV donates some old lightbar equipment to the po’ folk out at Ventura or wherever Gant is working this month and we generally talk about the year and our vacation timeframes trying to plan out some long range trips. Unfortunately, Gant had already planned all his vacations to coincide with NASCAR events. The way he put it was if the NASCAR event in question for each of his vacation spots was cancelled he might participate in some kind of excursion to the outdoors. I can leave the good reader here to draw their own conclusions I am sure.

Onto the miniventure. After bravely paying for breakfast, Jared then volunteered to drive us to the trailhead. So off we went. We parked and started hiking. The odd thing was, there was no trailhead. Just a large parking area and a bunch of Junipers. Off we rambled in a random direction at the Mercy of J$. Eventually we found a trail, not quite the Pacific Crest Trail that we were hoping for, but a trail nonetheless so we followed it for a couple miles until realizing that it wouldn’t branch us up with the PCT. So we turned back and tried again until we found this sign, pointing us in the right direction.

As the day wore on, we hiked on. Frolicking through an uncomfortably long tunnel that runs under the 14 freeway. You see the reason why Jared and Gant were skipping through the tunnel so excitedly is that Justin Timberlake has a house that’s visible from the other side. I bet you thought it was because they’re gay. Nope, that’s not why, they were just excited to see Justin’s house I guess.

Anyway, after that excitement we were following the trail back to the car trying to get out of the parking lot which closed promptly at 5pm when someone took a wrong turn taking us off the trail. This wrong turn led us to a stupid fucking arroyo which was stuffed with stinging nettles, poison oak (though we didn’t know that at the time) and yucca plants. So, through the nettles and yuccas we climbed and onto the car in time to make it out before the gates closed and the truck was stuck inside until the next day.

All in all just a fun little jaunt, would have been even better had we stayed on trail and avoided that arroyo. Good to be back in the swing of things. I believe that Feb has some Death Valley activity on the schedule for us. As long as there’s no poison oak I’ll be happy as a pair of hetero sexual males skipping through a tunnel looking for Justin Timberlake’s house.

Here are some basics, after the big HST trip:

I weigh: 172.8 lbs. Loss of 3 or 4 pounds, and I’ve been eating like an ethiopian kid at a buffet since I got back

My pack weighs: 36 lbs. It dropped about 22 pounds of weight during the trip

Total tickets recieved by Josh during the drive to the portal: 2

Total Accidents Josh was in during the drive to the portal: 1 (that’s my very first ever accident, by the way)

Total repair bill for Josh’s truck after it broke down on the way home: $2700

Yeah, the trip started off rough with an accident and then two tickets and it ended rough with my truck dying on I5 less than an hour from home, but the trip itself which took place between all that nonsense was pure High Sierra magic.

I sometimes lament the fact that I was born when I was. Too late to get in on the good worldwide exploration that took place between the 1600’s and 1900’s and seemingly too early for any exploration of other planets. Sure there are unclimbed faces and peaks around the world, but the majority of them are in inhospitable places like Iran or Antarctica. Neither of which will I likely ever get a stamp on my passport from.

What is new under the sun? Where can I be the first to see an untouched expanse of earth, where can I be the only one to have reached the top of a peak? What is left to explore, it seems that all we are doing now is refining our exploration. All I’m doing is following in the footsteps of those greats who came before me.

How to end this story?

It was successful. It was a learning experience and a remembering experience.

The good:

Weather never even looked menacing,

No one forgot anything,

Good company,

Sierra Nevada is stunningly beautiful,

The trip was great overall, basically everything was good, except for the following minor quibbles.

The not so good:

Lunches, taco and prepackaged meats need some work to be edible.

Weight is not only an immediate issue, as in it’s heavy on my back now, but a cumulative one. It breaks you down over time, my pack should have been lighter, which is easy and hard all at once. Easy to drop 9 pounds of camera gear, but hard not to bring it to places like this.

We need to either have a definate plan and stick with it or none at all and play it all by ear. Every morning, afternoon and evening we’d replan everything for the following days.

Need more class 3 experience so we are all more comfortable cruising up and down climbs.

Afterwards:

My truck never made it back to Gorman, it died on I5 near Bakersfield, but it got us all safely to where we needed to split up before it died. It has been a good truck (here it is on the highest point you can drive any vehicle in California… and likely in the entire US, White Mt). and I look forward to many more adventures with it. My feet have mainly healed up, but I’m still voraciously hungry all the time. So far no signs of Giardia from any of us, so that’s a good thing. I didn’t filter or treat my water when we were in the remotest areas, so I was kinda worrying, but I’m past the gestation period by now I think.

Good job to everyone who went, thanks for your time and see you guys on the next one.

Thank god, I can see the truck! Day 7

We all woke up pretty early and got moving with no breakfast in order to get going quickly. We had a ton of mileage and work to do today. We would be breaching 14,000 feet and be above that for miles, then we’d have to lose about 6,000 feet of elevation and hike about 11 more miles. It was going to be a long day and it started nice and early. We were all ready for this last monster of a day, Gant, Jared, Josh, Jared even managed the strength to smile.

So, this is the steepest part of the trip, the jaunt up to Kgap was tough, because we had full packs, but this one is just plain mean. It’s at a much higher elevation so your lungs are straining, it’s steeper so your muscles are begging for more oxygen and despite this it’s still the most beautiful place in California. So, by now you know the deal; stunning alpine lakes, gorgeous granite monoliths, and views to all of eternity it seemed like. So, for the last time we went up and up and up.

Eventually, we were done with the up and were sitting pretty on top of Mt Whitney. Time for the ridiculous hero poses, which I think were well deserved after a week long trip to the top, so get ready. Since I am putting this stupid story together, screw the alphabetical order, I’m going first. Josh(I miss those dark blue skies) 1(what a doosh, seriously), 2,(one handed pushup, whatsup!?) , Gant 1 I’m not sure what happened, if he forgot or if I screwed up somehow but I don’t have a picture of Gant’s historical Vitamin Water hero pose. Jared, 1, 2. Group hardcore, with Gant celebrating Brokeback Mountain’s emmy win with a W symbol. Group smiles, with all of us absorbing too much UV light into our sensitive little eyes because Gant doesn’t like to wear sunglasses for pictures.

After almost three hours on top for me, the other two had about 1.5 hours up top, we were ready to get to the truck and finish the last 11 miles or so. Down we hiked, Gant and I made a valiant attempt on Mt Muir, but were rebuffed. We’ll be back for that one with a better description of the route, or maybe someone to guide us, like Gant’s future self who we happened to run into on the trail later that day.

Again, down we hiked, past the needles, through snow and through switchback after switchback. The people that summit Whitney from the portal, which is 95% of them I’d guess, are just sick in the head. That’s a slog on a scale that only a masochist would enjoy.

We left trailcamp around 3:30 from what I remember. I didn’t break until I saw the most welcome sight mine eyes have looked upon (my big stupid red truck),which was a little after 6:00.

Thus ended the trip, Gant, Jared and Josh had successfully traversed the Sierra Nevada from West to East. Traveling 90+ miles and gaining over 20,000 feet over seven days.

After shots, contrasted to before shots:

Gant (Contrast),

Jared(Contrast),

Josh (Contrast).

Raggedy men, Day 6.

We didn’t leave our tents until about 9. We didn’t leave our campsite until around 11. This is horrendously late for those not used to backpacking. We didn’t have nearly enough water for everyone to get to the first creek. We were already fighting some mild dehydration problems and not having enough water for the first couple hours of hiking was going to hurt. As a group we were pretty well worn out and down. We decided to bypass the optional trip we had setup to get into the Wallace lake basin and just go for broke, to try to get to the truck by day 7. If that was to have a chance of happening, we had to take our blistered, bruised and battered feet another ten or eleven miles to Guitar Lake today.

At least we were back in the granite majesty of the Sierra range. If you’ve never been to the Sierra Nevada, I urge you to at least go to the town of Big Pine and drive west on the street between the only two gas stations. That road turns into glacier lodge road and get you into the area of the Palisades, if that doesn’t turn your heart into a soft, supple mess then you truly deserve the city that you live in.

By this time my camera batteries are low, my feet are too tired to take me anywhere but the trail and my eyes aren’t seeing the shots anymore, so my pictures get fewer and fewer, but the area is no less than magnificent still. Creeks, meadows and the backside of the highest mountain in the continental US.

Well, you should have no doubt that despite our diminished physical capacity, due to sleep deprivation, elevation and nutritional degradation we made the mileage and hit Guitar lake by sundown. It was an ungodly cold camp there on the shore of that little lake.

Day 6 was over.

Mileage Slogging, Day 5

We awoke, kinda early and tried to get moving as we had alot of mileage to cover, just under sixteen to be exact. At least our packs were getting lighter, and all of our scented gear finally fit into the bear canisters, which was nice. After a quick and tiring game of catch with the Aerobie, we set off. We had to drop down into the Kern canyon, losing 2600 feet of elevation which is a great way to rupture your fragile feet. After that, we had to travel up the Kern canyon 9 miles and find somewhere to camp.

By this point, Jared looked more muslim than man with his overgrowth of a beard.

So, we hiked and began to run into more people than we’d been seeing the last bunch of days and got more oxygen than we’d been used to as well with the drop in elevation, unfortunately this also meant more heat. I’m a colder weather person, and adding 40 something pounds to haul makes me appreciate the chilly high elevation air even more. The Kern canyon is neat in its own way. You’ll see not many better examples of a glacially carved valley than that, lots of creeks and streams and even hot springs feeding the mighty Kern River.

At the bottom of the canyon, I knew my feet had blistered. I think the others had the same problem, that’s a steep drop. I can’t imagine climbing up that with a pack, you got to be nuts to try that kind of tomfoolery. Also at the bottom was this weird little gate with a sign that said, “Close this gate to protect wilderness”. I’m still not quite sure what to make of that gate.

Now that we were in the bottom of this canyon, water crossings came up every mile or so it seemed like. From immense to fast moving to the more mundane ones.

For this next picture, keep in mind that we are hundreds of miles from any urban centers. Your balloons travel a looong way when they go, so try to keep them in check.

Eventually, the day ended, many blisters and miles later. We setup a little fire ring, found some bear poop and a bear cave right next to our site, but decided to chance it. I slept very well that night, knowing that we were getting back into the highlands now.

Thus ended day 5, about 16 miles down and a very, very tired crew.

A most beautiful failure, Day 3

Day 3 was supposed to be the first of a few days off trail. It was kind of a rest day, with only a small amount of mileage and not much elevation gain. There would be time to attempt a peak or just relax and give the feet some time off with the schedule that we had for that day. We didn’t start early or fast. We woke up and listened to Jared talk about how he could climb the Kaweah range with just one hand.

After that inspiring speech from Jared we got started. We were headed north to try to get a closer look at our options to get to where we wanted to go. Basically there were two choices; either pants pass (hard) or lion rock/lion lake pass (longer but easier). So we left the trail, which was headed south to the chagoopa plateau and tried our luck to the north to the land of glory and adventure.

The first obstacle to cross was a large talus field. Next was a large snowfield. Once we got to the top there, it was time for a break. As we looked around, we all came to the conclusion that it would be a good idea to drop our packs somewhere and make an attempt on Lawson peak for some reason. I’d never even heard of Lawson before that morning when I noticed it on the map and saw it on the horizon. It’s nothing special, but it looked doable, so we had a new plan for the day. It’s the far left peak in this picture, the center right one is Black Kaweah again.

So, yeah, lets go bag a peak. Either way, it was going to be nice to take 50 pounds off my back and just hike for a while, instead of hauling the weight around. So, we crossed the outlet of lake 10,725, which is just mind-numbingly spectacular both to the north and the south.

We dropped our packs in some random meadowy area and started moving up to Lawson. We should have paid more attention to where we left our packs; but that wouldn’t be a problem until much later in the day. Up we went, cruising without the crushing weight of those packs it was really nice. The route started off pretty easy being just a big boulder hop. It got a bit tricky; we had some sections of easy, but unexpected class 3 climbing, above yet another gorgeous alpine lake. This continued up for quite a bit as we were off trail trying to take a shortcut from what I remember (Later in the day, on the descent I took this overview picture of the route we took. The red line is the general path Jared and I took, Gant was a bit lower and then angled up more steeply at the end).

Looking back to the West, produced the usual spectacular views that after three days you don’t grow accustomed to but you do come to expect. Eventually after all this climbing and straining we stopped in various places and ate some food. Gant did so in the shadow of Black Kaweah(*nice pic, but large). It kind of looks like a Condor, wings spread and warming itself in the afternoon sun from here. Jared seemed more interested in posing for the camera, since he’d already talked trash on the BK and was starting to feel hypoxic.

Feeling refreshed after a lunchbreak, we rushed up what was left of our ascent, but unfortunately I didn’t read the map as well as I could have and… well, to put it bluntly, I lead us up to the wrong peak, which I have named false Lawson. It was Jared’s new personal high point, as in he’d never been to that elevation before and wasn’t feeling any ill effects, so that was a great thing, he was just slightly new to the hypoxic feeling which is the fun part of elevation. For those that’ haven’t experienced it, it’s like a mild buzz. Gant wasn’t that thrilled and I was quite down as well, you can see the real Lawson over my head there.

Since we were already running out of daylight, we began our descent as the moon rose over Pyramid Pinnacle 1 2. Jared was trying to explain to us how to get back, but Gant and I had more faith in the map. What we were trying to do was decide what to do for the rest of the trip, since we had essentially lost a day with this attempt on Lawson that took much longer than expected. We decided to think it about it more, as the shadows were getting long and the air was growing chilly.

We had decided earlier in the day to take the longer, more circuitous route back, because none of us wanted to climb down what we had climbed up in the light, let alone now that the sun was down. This longer route went well for the most part, except when we came to one lake’s outlet and couldn’t find any way across it. It was too cold and dark to cross in the running water, we needed some sort of bridge or path, but there was none. So, we built a rock bridge. This took the three of us about fifteen minutes, picking up big rocks, throwing them into the cold running water, splashing the others when possible with the rocks and then eventually getting across and moving on to where we thought we had left our packs. By now we needed to turn on our headlamps and don all of our layers of clothing, 11,000 feet is cold at night.

This was a terrifically long day, time wise, mileage wise, elevation gain/loss, the disappointment of expending all that effort and getting to the wrong peak. I was beat and we couldn’t find our packs. I was done mentally and physically and this day just kept on going. It was around 9:40 pm when Jared finally started whistling and flashing his strobe light like he was at a gay German disco. We setup our tents and I passed out solid.

Thus ended day three, so far every day had been more beautiful than the last.

Breaching the Kgap, Day 2

Day two began like most do, with a nice little sunrise, though the woods around us were so deep we didn’t get much of a show. We had the first of our many days of oatmeal and raisins for breakfast. After breakfast we packed up and still not all our food fit into our mandatory bear canisters, hopefully we’d run into no bears, and no rangers.

The hike started off downhill to Lone Pine Creek, unfortunately that meant all the more uphill later in the day. It was quite spectacular though, we were still in the lush low elevations with green and granite. On the way down we saw a Mountain King Snake, which was a neat first for me. The other two I was hiking with seem to be low level herpestologists (intentional misspelling) and knew quite a bit about snakes, which I gladly made fun of.

When we finally hit the bottom, we saw our first bridge enabled creek crossing, as well as one of the previous attempts at bridging the creek. LP creek itself was a powerhouse; loud, fast, strong and impressive to watch from 30 or 40 feet above it as it raced below the bridge. At this point, everything in front of us was uphill, very uphill. We were at about 7,500 feet and the goal for the day, Kgap is at about 10,700. So we had our work cut out for us.

So we began the uphill. Along the way passing massive monoliths and un-named waterfalls like you pass parked cars on a city block. Eventually, even the mighty Gant was tired and needed a break. We found ourselves a nice pool to stop at, bandaged our feet, rinsed off in some of the most refreshing water you can imagine and just had fun (picture is confusing, I think Gant has a gun, Jared has a guitar and I have an attitude).

After that, we hiked on. Passing the inspiring and intimidating Angel Wings. Someday, I’ll be back to tackle that one, I can’t ignore that kind of challenge, but I just don’t have the skills or experience for it yet. Anyway back on track, fast forward an hour or so and we find ourselves at another one of the highlights of the trip, the incomparable Hamilton Lake. We all Gant, Jared, Josh (side note, faster shutter speed for action shots, can you tell I’m not a sportsphoto guy?) jumped into this glacial beauty, after which Jared needed more bandages for his feet and Gant needed a nap (side note2, I love having the camera, it allows me to dictate the story, how it happened and who did what, no matter what was really going on).

The only unpleasant aspect to this lake was Jared threatening to get into the lake in the buck, which was doubly funny when some random old guy showed up and jumped into the lake in his tighty blue underwear, complete with holes. To top it off, after that display he got naked to dry off, not ten feet away from us while we were relaxing on a rock eating some lunch.

After this beautiful little spot comes one of the biggest and steepest uphills of the entire trip. At the top is the Kgap and hopefully a nice campsite. So we crossed the outlet of Hamilton lake and began the ascent. It was quite a nice uphill, most of the way we got to look down on Hamilton lake, (we swam right near the big rock slabs on the right side) and one of the waterfalls that feed it. It’s a bit difficult to describe just how imposing this granite scenery and the view overall is up there. This small section of the map is called Valhalla and it truly is inspiring, this was another one of my favorite little sections of the trip, which is why our break here was so long I think. This little area is apparently also problematic for the trail as well. Way back in the 30’s they built a bridge across it, but two years later nature said no and took it down, here’s all that remains of that old bridge. Now there’s a cave to walk through.

Another mile and another thousand feet of gain later we are still hiking. It’s getting to be later in the afternoon, but we are determined to hit the Kgap, despite our numerous lengthy breaks. If you see Jared in the bottom right of this picture, you can follow the trail back about two miles, Hamilton lake is at the bottom of the picture, out of view.

Now that we were really getting up there in elevation, we started to run into snow and that wily Mr Gant can’t not throw snowballs when he sees snow. The other nice thing about getting up there in elevation is that the rarified air lends an air of austerity to the scenery. Precipice lake was mostly frozen over, and the meadows were now nothing but short grasses, but the views were still stunning.

So, when we got to the Kaweah Gap itself, we setup camp and enjoyed a chilly sunset on The Black Kaweah’s western ridge.

Thus ended day two. 9 more miles down, one of the two hardest days on the whole trip done and another beautiful sunset.