This could be cabin life anywhere, especially if your cabin is part of a community of cabins.
We often take walks to the bridge in the evening to enjoy the views, the light and one another’s company. My guess is that many cabin communities have gathering places and times in their own areas.
Sometimes we hike with neighbors and friends. Hiking is a main focus of Mineral King; not all cabin communities that I’ve visited have the kind of trails we have. Probably nowhere else has trails like Mineral King!
We talk to people who are wondering about trails, pointing out good places to go. The Park employees are often new and don’t have the depth of knowledge of the area that the locals do.
On Independence Day, we raised a flag together (and I read part of the Declaration of Independence to my hiking friends while at the Wildflower Cafe.) Flying a flag is a tradition when one’s cabin is occupied. There are a couple of cabins that don’t bother, and there are a couple that fly a California flag rather than the Stars and Stripes. (WHY??)
We share dinners, happy hours, extra bacon, kindling, marmot wisdom, and knitting knowledge. (There’s more, but I probably already have over-shared.)
Here is the classic view from the bridge of the Crowley Family cabin and Farewell Gap.
Glad you asked! The junction of the Farewell Gap and Franklin Lake trails is the best wildflower area in all of Mineral King, and its peak is always right around July 4. Well, okay, probably July 1, but July 4 is a significant day, and who actually knows the specific peak from year to year? It is 4 miles to the junction, and we often time the hike to eat lunch there; hence, “Wildflower Cafe”.
I finally remembered a dime, AND I had someone hold it for me so that I had both hands free to wrestle with the phone.
unknownFelwortBlue-eyed grassunknownBaby’s breath
Instead of chitchatting, I will just bombard you with photos.
weird-colored Indian paintbrushFranklin Creek
Photos never do this hike justice. It certainly was a different sort of visit to the junction than last year’s exciting excursion.
I have a wise friend who is both diplomatic and honest. She told me that a few of my paintings didn’t reflect my usual care, or perhaps she said they weren’t up to my usual standards— “lacking in detail and clarity”. (There were a couple of paragraphs so I’m summarizing here.)
I blamed the old scanner, but then decided to retouch the paintings after studying them in person. I can always add more detail to a painting! The difficulty is in knowing when to stop. Most painters say that they don’t stop soon enough; I say most painters need to keep going.
Sawtooth #68
Here are the old scanner and new scanner versions, both before retouching.
The scan was poor, and the painting could use more detail. Some people paint blurry, but I’m not in that club. Not on purpose, anyway.
Here is the do-over and the scan on the new scanner. Still doesn’t look as good as it does in person. You’ll have to trust me on this.
Maybe it’s more evident if I put old and new side-by-side.
The color and detail still aren’t accurate, but it is better.
Sawtooth #69
It was definitely time to replace the old scanner.
Three progress photos for you.
Let’s do a side-by-side before-and-after of this one. And again, the color isn’t coming through very well, so trust on your part is required here.
Thank you, my honest, diplomatic, and wise friend!
Today we will continue and complete our White Chief hike in photos. I always thought it was a short hike, but maybe someone moved White Chief, just like Franklin Falls got moved. My phone, masquerading as a camera, also told me that I went 7.5 miles and climbed the equivalent of 43 floors. Yes, indeed, it is a steep one.
That dark spot is a mining tunnel. There are natural caves up there too.
The clouds were building up back toward Mineral King, and although it was still sunny in White Chief, the wind was downright chilly. So, I headed back.
Tomorrow I’ll tell you a couple of pieces of cabin life.
Trail Guy and our friend K went to White Chief, and came back raving about the flowers. Two days later I went to White Chief and came back raving about the flowers. Our photos are intermingled on my laptop, so I’ll just post some many in today’s post and many more in tomorrow’s, keeping the chitchat minimal.
Super clear day, heading up the right (west) side of the valley.
The ferns along the trail are tall despite only being the end of June.
Spring Creek is running strong—thankful for that footbridge!
thimbleberrycollomiapenstemon
Entering White Chief, like a painting that sold earlier this summer, except the stream is dry now.
Pride of the Mountains was stunning!
The color clash was amusing to me. . . color combinations acceptable in nature would be weird in someone’s wardrobe.
Whorled penstemmon was profuse.
morning glorysulphur flowerunknown
Come back tomorrow for more. The whole thing was stunning, and neither the camera nor the iPhone 14 do it justice.
Behind and around our cabin is what firefighters call a “jackpot”. This is a conglomerate, a tangle, a giant mess of downed trees and limbs. Let’s not think too hard about their nomenclature.
I’ve been raking, dragging, cutting and organizing this in incremental sessions throughout the past 2 years. It is gradually decreasing, gradually getting cleaned up. Of course Trail Guy also works on this, approaching it a bit differently than me.
A handsaw rather than a chainsaw gives me a lot of upper-body exercise and makes some firewood to share with neighbors. My pace is laughable to Trail Guy, but I consider myself to be a rather productive tortoise.
Then I thought about swinging an axe to bust through a pretty stout limb, something I have only done once before in my life (a Three Rivers neighbor’s tree blew down in a storm, blocking her driveway, and no one with a chainsaw was available so I bravely marched down to her house in the rain with my trusty axe and got it into pieces that we could drag away.)
This piece required a lot of whaling, slamming, swinging, and wondering if I would be able to git-‘er-dun. When I got it this far, I asked Trail Guy for some input, guessing he’d bust through in 10 swings. He swung 15 times (yes, I counted), handed the axe back and told me to use a sharper one instead.
So I swapped axes, and went after it again, this time busting through with a shout of victory. The sharper axe was more effective.
I’ve asked Trail Guy to teach me how to sharpen an axe this summer, (mis)quoting Abraham Lincoln about spending an hour sharpening an axe and an hour chopping wood instead of spending 2 hours chopping wood.
Thus we conclude another look at my quirky cabin life. Perhaps next time I will be able to persuade Trail Guy to fire up his chainsaw, but most likely he will be working on neighbors’ stoves/water heaters/toilets/faucets/refrigerators. There has been way too much of that so far this summer. I helped with a water heater, and took photos and measured for a stove and another water heater to be replaced… I’m good for more than just some axe-swingin’.
Walking in Mineral King (Not a hike because we didn’t take packs)
Instead of the now normal down-the-road-and-up-the-Nature-Trail walk, or the wussy turning around at Crystal Creek, we went past Crystal to Franklin Creek.
It was a little bit farther this year. Don’t you just hate that?
Looking backLooking ahead
The flowers were most totally excellent.
This was interesting to your wildflower obsessed Central Calif. artist: a purple bush lupine adjacent* to a seldom-seen pink bush lupine.
This is angelica, not to be confused with cow parsnip. Angelica has lacy leaves, sort of visible at the bottom of this photo.
Here is Franklin Creek/Franklin Falls. This is the stream that rose too high for my hiking pal K and I to cross last year in August. You can read about it here: An Exciting Mineral King Hike
Crossing Crystal Creek is way more my speed than dealing with the deeper, steeper, and faster Franklin Creek.
Oh man! I forgot again to put that dime in my pocket for understanding sizes of little flowers!
The Indian paintbrush were spectacular, particularly interspersed with the grayish green sage.
An Advertisement Because This is Supposed to be a Business Blog
This painting is sold, but I can paint it again for you.
*”Adjacent” is “everyone’s” new favorite word. Podcasters and bloggers love to attach it to other words, like this: “This blog about art is Mineral King adjacent”.
With my new-to-me iPhone 14 in hand, I walked down the Mineral King Road to Cold Springs Campground (STILL CLOSED—CALL YOUR CONGRESSMAN OR SOMETHING!) and back up the Nature Trail. This is about 2-1/2 miles total.
Let’s look at the flowers I found along the road. I actually did this route on two consecutive days and was very surprised by how many flowers vanished and new ones appeared in just 24 hours.
From left to right: mariposa lily—a ruffled variety I’ve never seen before; angelica (not to be confused with cow parsnip because angelica has lacy leaves); buckthorn
This view at the top of Endurance Grade always grabs me. Endurance Hill. Coral Hill. Whatevs. It photographs much better with the phone than it ever did with the camera, as much as it pains me to admit.
Most people prefer the view of Sawtooth. Sawtooth isn’t my favorite, but I paint it over and over because most people like it—they haven’t been medivacked off it*.
I love penstemon, particularly this variety. The color just slays me. Maybe I should learn the actual variety name.
A little past the ranger station, we cross the neglected bridge into the closed (WHY?) Cold Springs Campground. (It’s kind of fun to flick off the flaking paint. No, I am NOT telling you to do that! Why would I tell you to do that? Do you think I’m immature or something?)
Here are some yellow flowers on the other side of the bridge: seepspring monkey flower and false lily of the valley.
At the upper end of the closed (WHY?) Cold Springs campground is where the trail begins. It used to have lots of interesting and helpful signs along the trail. The Park removed them all with the plan of upgrading them, but it has been about 10 years so I don’t think it is a priority. (The Park will say, “Hiring freezes! Understaffed!” to which I have many opinions which I will keep to myself in order to keep the tone of my blog elevated.)
At least the beginning of the trail has a nice sign.
This is a Jeffrey pine, which used to have a sign explaining how to tell the difference between Jeffrey and Ponderosa pines and inviting you to sniff the tree, because Jeffreys smell a tad like vanilla.
Aspens are thick along the trail.
Can you see the trail? It’s definitely overgrown. Last week we saw a trail crew guy and I asked if I could prune it for them. He actually said, “If you want to!”
Blog Reader and Top Commenter Sharon calls this “Iron Falls”.
I finally remembered to put a dime in my pocket so that you can see the scale of wildflowers. I didn’t take into account how: A. difficult it is to photograph the 2 side-by-side with only 2 hands; B. to keep my hideous thumbnail out of the photo (yea for cropping); C. to make the phone focus on the blossom instead of the leaves; D. to actually see the screen. Maybe you are supposed to tap the bloom on the screen, but already being shorthanded, this is beyond my capability.
The little footbridge got rebuilt last summer, or maybe the one before. It all runs together.
More Sawtooth
And just in case you are into Sawtooth (Hi, Kathy Wolfe!), here it is one more time, peeking around the ridge, before the phone battery died**.
OIL PAINTINGS OF SAWTOOTH
WAIT! THIS IS A BUSINESS WEBSITE! Here are some oil paintings of Sawtooth available this summer at the Silver City Store (unless they have sold already.)
Sawtooth #67, 8×10”, oil on wrapped canvas, $165
Sawtooth # 68, 6×6”, oil on wrapped canvas, $75
Sawtooth #69, 8×8”, oil on wrapped canvas, $145
*It was 50 years last week so you’d think I’d be over it. I am, but it still isn’t my favorite. So there.
**This is the biggest disadvantage of using a phone instead of a camera. I also bought a charger, but it only works when it feels like it. The frustrations of tech are endless.
The Crystal Creek crossing is about 1 mile from the parking lot at the end of the road in Mineral King. It is relatively flat and easy. We don’t even pretend that it is a hike and it barely passes for exercise. But recently I’ve been thinking that as one ages, one’s body produces and contains progressively more discomfort. Since to hike is to be uncomfortable, one becomes less inclined to add to the discomfort by forcing oneself out onto trails of great steepness and altitude gain. (I AM SICK RIGHT NIGH UNTO DEATH OF THIS STUPID PERIPHERAL NEUROPATHY!)
Ahem. Excuse me for shouting. Let’s take a nice little gentle walk to Crystal Creek.
First, we cross the bridge and admire the classic view of Farewell Gap and the Crowley Family cabin.
Then we head up the road on the left side of the creek which leads to the pack station. The road turns into a trail after the pack station, SO DON’T BRING YOUR DOG.
There were a ton of flowers, and I experimented with the iPhone 14 as a camera with mixed results. All but one of these are dandelions, which are a wildflower in MIneral King, but a weed in your yard. The other is one of many unknowns in my personal wildflower index.
The trail passes through the green tunnel.*
Hey, a non-yellow flower! I’ve always thought these are whorled penstemon, but many books are calling them “small flowered penstemon”. I think “whorled” has a specific botanical definition, but I’m ignorant of it.
Here is the wide and shallow Crystal Creek. (That is kind of like Facebook, but it might be much wider and even more shallow.)
The views back down the trail:
Yea! More colors!
This summer is showing promise of being a terrific one for wildflowers. Everything seems to be about 2 weeks earlier than normal.
Tomorrow: The Nature Trail
*Remember this painting? I feel compelled to show you because this blog is supposed to be a business venture. Yes, it is the yellow tunnel here. Thank you, Captain Obvious.
While I am advertising, this painting might still be for sale at the Silver City Store.
Timber Gap with Bigelow Sneezeweed, 8×8”, oil on wrapped canvas, $145
I misled you yesterday when saying we’d visit my short wussy walks in Mineral King. Instead today’s topic is Cabin Life: what in the world does one do in a place with no electricity, internet, or phones?
These are the photographical items on the agenda:
Enjoy the views.
2. Help people hold down their porches.
3. Go exploring for things not noticed before, like these 5 trees growing off one downed tree.
4. Split wood (I’m downright scary with an axe.)
5. Test out a new method to oil the cabin. Looks as if nothing happened here; should have taken an “After” picture.
6. Dig through books trying to identify wildflowers.
7. Clean up messes from dropped trees. This is a giant long project.
8. Examine plants that are growing, with cautious victory dances that some transplanting may have FINALLY taken hold.
9. Spy on kids climbing The Big Rock, thinking how cool it is that kids still know how to play without screens (and then discover that they were inventing a way to get a tablet to the top of the rock.)
Non-photographical activities
We also listen to a lot of country music and try to guess the singers, read, and I knit. Trail Guy naps when he isn’t fixing things at other people’s cabins. (“Hey Mike, could you look at my fridge/oven/toilet/faucet/shower/water heater?” This is endless.) We hang out with neighbors, help strangers figure out appropriate hikes or walks, visit with people that we can’t avoid, and sometimes we hide from all the social activities.
And of course, we hike and walk. Hiking is when you carry a pack with water and lunch; walking is when you don’t have to carry all that stuff (but you can if you want—I rarely do.)
