By the time you read this post, this will all seem like distant past.
These photos are from the evening of K and my exciting Mineral King hike. I was pretty beat, but stumbled down to the bridge to see the muddy raging stream and to look up at Farewell Gap, with its sprinklings of hail from the day’s storm.
There was still some hail left the next morning, but the stream had subsided and was clear. (No water photos, so you’ll just have to believe me.)
On the way home, there was one of those alert messages on the radio, saying that there were severe thundershowers in Mineral King (along with a number of other places nearby.) The sky was ominous back toward Mineral King.
Even though it was in the 100s at home, I was quite happy to settle into the air conditioned house. I love air conditioning.
Tomorrow we will look at the Learned List for August.
Just a few days ago I told you about Trail Guy hiking to the Franklin/Farewell junction and lamented my lack of hiking this summer. Last Sunday a friend and I decided to go to the Franklin/Farewell junction, because I really wanted to see it at least one more time in my life. (yes, being a bit dramatic here). I figured I could turn around if my feet started objecting too loudly (or perhaps wear ear plugs?)
The previous day had a terrific storm, but looking toward Farewell seemed clear, so K and I took off, (along with Trail Guy for the first mile or so.)
We saw Western Eupatorium, a flowering shrub I’ve only seen up near Franklin Lake.
We crossed Franklin Creek without trouble; K hopped the rocks and I simply walked through the water, which was shallow and clear, making it easy to see good foot placement.
Shortly after crossing, we felt a few raindrops. No problem: we each had a parka AND a poncho.
Good thing. Thunder, lightning, rain, and hail, but we just marched ourselves onward up the trail with only one break to stand under some trees (yes, risky with lightning) when the hail got too strong.
The white line is hail; the brown line is the very muddy stream.
When we reached the junction, the storm seemed to be letting up, so we stopped for a bit to see if any flowers remained and to eat something. (This was a hike, not a walk, so we carried food and water, and needed ponchos to keep our packs dry.)
Feeling hopeful, but cautious, we cut our break short and headed back down the trail. Two men had just passed us on their way down from Forrester Lake, cutting their backpack trip short by a day because the weather was a bit much.
Not long after heading back down, it all started again, with pouring rain that turned to hail, and steady thunder and lightning. We caught up to the men, sheltering under some trees because the hail was just so strong again. After a little conversation about how our ponchos were fairly ineffective, we headed down again. The trail turned to a flowing stream of mud, making it difficult impossible to see foot placement. I gave up pretending that the combination of parka and poncho were keeping me dry, accepting cold and wet as reality. (Ever get hail in your Crocs? It feels like a pebble, but eventually it melts.)
We took a couple of breaks beneath the few groups of trees, just to assess ourselves and one another. K is tough as nails, resourceful, always cheerful, and game for almost anything as long as it is in Mineral King, making her an excellent hiking partner. So, we mushed ahead and then. . .
. . . Franklin Creek!! Completely uncrossable. Raging, muddy, scary.
I took two photos, then packed my camera into its case (knit and felted by me, of course), then the poncho bag, and then buried it in my pack under the non-effective poncho. No more photos—the hike’s focus became solely about getting home in one piece.
NO MORE PHOTOS
K and I thought about our choices:
Wait for the two men to arrive and cross in a human chain, holding to one another for support. (K did this downstream on Franklin Creek many years prior).
Get comfortable and wait for the stream flow to subside.
Find another way home.
Option one still felt too risky; option two was too unknown and could take hours; option three was the best.
We went back up the trail to where we could bushwhack our way down to the East Fork of the Kaweah, which begins up at Farewell Gap. I guess you could call this “Farewell Creek”, or “Farewell Drainage”. Whatever its real name, we made our way to the stream, which was very muddy but not raging. The challenge was clambering up the bank after crossing, and somehow we made it up the other side without actually falling in, with apologies to the willows and other shrubs that we stomped on.
Then what? We knew that there was an old “trail” (just a route, because the trail is not visible in most places) up that side of the canyon to Farewell Gap. When we were on the trail, I led; when we were off trail, K led. I did my best to keep up, and she was very kind in waiting when she saw I was struggling—she is quite tall compared to me, and used to this sort of scramble-hiking, whereas I usually avoid this off-trail stuff.
We went over wet grass, through scratchy shrubs, over fallen logs, through a bear sleeping area (he wasn’t home), through some soggy little drainages, and over a zillion slippery branches, one of which knocked me to the ground, but only one, so there.
THOUGHTS, EXPRESSED AND NOT EXPRESSED
If anyone had shown me a video of the day’s hike, I would have said, “I’ll pass—just leave me here by the wood stove with my knitting.”
I know this is wacko, but I’m kind of having fun!
Unless one of us gets dementia, we’d NEVER forget this day. (We’ve been friends for 40 years, and this was definitely a memory maker.)
Trail Guy would hate this!
ONWARD
We knew we’d have to cross White Chief Creek, and because K was familiar with that side of the canyon, she knew that it flattens out where it enters the East Fork, which was also a raging muddy force of wetness. After crossing White Chief, we continued down canyon, aiming to connect with the trail which the pack station used to use for crossing the East Fork.
Just as we hoped, K led us directly to that trail, which she referred to as “Davis Camp”, and we huffed and puffed our way up to the real trail, the one that leads to White Chief, where we had considered going. I pushed for the Franklin/Farewell junction, since I’ve been to White Chief twice this summer.
MEANWHILE, BACK AT THE RANCH
(WHERE did that saying come from??) Trail Guy was getting mighty worried. He went to a neighbor to apprise him of the situation, and together they began discussing a plan, correctly thinking that the Franklin crossing would be impossible.
While they were formulating a plan, we made it home. Trail Guy asked what I would have done if the situation was in the reverse. I said that I would have assumed he’d know to cross the East Fork and bushwhack his way home on the other side of the canyon, just as K and I did. He said that was exactly what he would have done, validating K and my decision making.
In thinking over the situation, K was the perfect partner for the adventure. Her cool head, optimistic attitude, knowledge of the area, stamina, and general toughness were just the right combination.
Meanwhile, we will never know how those two men made it across Franklin Creek.
Oh yeah. This is supposed to be a business blog. Have a look at a couple of oil paintings of Franklin Creek (both sold, but I can paint either scene again.)
Looking downstream, not too far below the Franklin Lake dam.
I was in Gilroy. Trail Guy hiked anyway. I’m glad that my feet aren’t sidelining him. It has been a couple of years since I made it to the Franklin/Farewell junction, a place we refer to as the Wildflower Cafe, since it is a nice destination for lunch, particularly in early July when the wildflowers are at their peak there.
Never mind. Let’s just enjoy Trail Guy’s photos, hmmm?
He crossed Franklin Creek without any trouble. (I would have waded in my Crocs—he rock-hops.) There is still decent water flow, considering it is August.
Explorer’s Gentian is my favorite wildflower. Trail Guy likes it too, although Leopard lilies are his favorite.
See? Leopard lilies. Some people call them “tiger lilies”, but they have spots, not stripes.
The peak on the left is Vandever, the one that lives on the right side of Farewell Gap. (Don’t be confused here.)
The Bigelow Sneezeweed were abundant. That’s my favorite yellow flower.
That’s Timber Gap in the distance, and Trail Guy was higher than Timber Gap because you can see a ridge beyond.
This is such an odd view—all those overlapping mini canyons with Farewell Gap in the distance.
Really and truly, I am glad that Trail Guy can still hike. In the seventeen years I’ve been blogging, he has been Road Guy, Ski Guy, and now Trail Guy; I don’t want to rename him as Deck Guy.
Posted by Deck Chick (AKA Central California Artist)
When I first worked at the Silver City Store (4 miles below Mineral King) in 1985, at the end of the summer my car stereo fell out whenever I drove uphill because the rough road vibrated the screws loose. (1977 Honda Accord, my first car, because I know you care about such things.)
The road is much much worse now. Driving down the other morning, I took some photos in the construction zone. I didn’t take any photos in the unpaved upper areas because those sections require 2 hands on the wheel, 2 eyes on the road, and 2 halves of one’s brain fully engaged in crawling through the hogwallows, washboard, potholes, and deep ruts, some created by springs, some by run-off.
The plan is that the road will have 145 new culverts and be repaired after fall of 2027. This means 2 more years of road construction. The company is very accommodating, pleasant, and communicative. We can do this.
P.S. At the beginning of the summer, Trail Guy told me to NOT drive Fernando (’96 Accord with 255,000 miles and a wearing-out exhaust system) on the MK Road. Then I sold Fernando (sob) and got Mom’s Car (yep, that’s the name). Trail Guy told me to NOT drive Mom’s Car on the MK Road. So, I hitchhike with neighbors up the hill if I go on a different day from Trail Guy and then ride down in the Botmobile with him. However, no one was going up when I did, so I took The Good Pickup, AKA known as “my truck” (although it is a pick-‘em-up, not a real truck.) And I don’t consider a vehicle to be mine unless I have a hairbrush and gloves in the glove apartment (because gloves are supposed to live there.)
Trail Guy and I accompanied Laile, who is an archaeologist/historian (I think those are her titles) to show her something we found. She cleared up a mystery about a rock platform that we always thought was a cabin foundation. Nope, it was a ride-by bar! George Thurman and his wife Hattie had a bar for miners riding past, who could hold out their cup and get it filled with whiskey without dismounting. (I think it was for miners but now I have forgotten the years. I am NOT a historian.)
We headed up the trail.
Thurman’s Bar! (Calm yourself – they weren’t open and I don’t drink alcohol anyway.)
Laile explained that the grass-covered log with some metal spikes used to be a dam on the creek, which obviously has changed course.
It was so beautiful out in that meadow.
Working
I spent some time caulking and painting our windows. Look at the extreme difference between wet and dry paint. It was alarming at first stroke, but then as it dried, everything was okay. There is more to be done, but things are looking better.
Hanging Out
We hung out with our very dear annual neighbors, the Sawtooth Six (now there are only five, but the name remains, and we miss Ted something fierce).
Yeah, I said I don’t drink alcohol, but other people do. The “little” bottles are normal sized; the huge one looks like a joke. (This opinion almost got me banned from the neighbors’ deck.)
It is a tradition to hang out on the bridge in the evenings.
The Olipop can won the competition to become a tripod.
I left early one morning because I have actual work to do (as you might have read on yesterday’s blog post.)
Farewell, Farewell. (The weird darker spots in the sky are because I borrowed Trail Guy’s camera. Mine was temporarily missing, because I have too many homes, too many buildings, too many vehicles, and too many briefcases and totebags. This contributes to me being a loser in the true sense of the word.)
The road is under construction, and the schedule keeps changing.
The two men on Sequoia’s hazard tree crew came to do some work on the most recent red fir dropped by our place.
We always stop by the dumpster on the way down. Trail Guy rearranges the bags of trash so we can get the most mileage out of the dumpster, which is for cabin folks who live far away and don’t want to haul their trash back to LA or the Bay Area or the Fresno airport. It is a very fine service for our cabin neighbors, and I wish someone else would do it.
We waited for the pilot car for about 20 minutes, parked in the shade of course. Other people like to snuggle right up to the flagger, not minding the sun. They probably have A/C in their vehicles.
I just looked around, took a few photos, read my book, and waited until the uphill traffic came through.
There are so many shiny culverts along the road. Sometimes when we look ahead, we think a car is coming because of the metallic gleam.
The oaks providing shade were full of mistletoe.
Down in the heat and the dust, it is hard to imagine that we were just here:
It is always worth the drive, even without A/C in the old Botmobile.
This first one isn’t odd. I’m just warming up here. It is a plant called Coulter’s Fleabane, which I misidentified in Mineral King Wildflowers as snowberry. Maybe. Still trying to figure it out.
The cottonwood was prolific, abundant, and fascinating. Very soft to the touch, but elusive when one tried to gather it.
Once again, I failed to put a dime or a quarter in my pocket so that you can appreciate the teensy size of these daisies.
What is this? We don’t know, so I sent the photos to the local historian.
What is this on the trail??
Oh, just a little changing booth for a bride. Check out those heels on the bridesmaid. That’s an unusual sight in Mineral King, especially on a trail.
These dressed up gentlemen were receiving instructions. I think they were waiting for the bride, rumored to be an hour late.
And there are the guests, waiting for the action to begin. We didn’t bushwack down to investigate.
Let’s just end with a calming, more usual type of sight. These are penstemon, but the name escapes me at the moment. Besides, since discovering that snowberry is really Coulter’s Fleabane, I’ve lost confidence in my flower identifying abilities.
White Chief is our favorite destination in Mineral King. Most people want to go to a lake, and they are welcome to struggle to Eagle up that lousy trail. We’ll wave goodbye as they turn that direction, and then head up the steeper but shorter trail to White Chief. It’s hard to calculate the distance, because sometimes we are happy to just break into the canyon, which Trail Guy calls a “dry lake”. You can go as far as all the way to the head of the canyon, which might be 4 miles one way. Just guessing. . .
Is that a white blooming bush ahead?
Nope, just bright sunlight hitting glossy leaves.
We shouted this back to our friends who turned back at the junction (the kids were just taking a morning constitutional while wearing pajamas).
I saw a new flower in the middle part of the canyon, where the trail crosses over the creek. It was very hard to photograph, and the best I could do is this, barely adequate for identifying. However, I concluded that it is Little Elephant Head, very similar, as one would suspect, to Elephant Head. Weird.
The flowers were terrific as we approached the place where the trail crosses the creek.
This might make a good cover photo if I publish a second edition of Mineral King Wildflowers. No promises.
We crossed the creek, and tomorrow I’ll continue this topic.
This time of year I spend lots of time in Mineral King, AKA The Land of No Electricity or Internet (unless you have StarLink, which we do not). So, my posts might be a bit erratic. Today’s post is simply photos from a walk down the road to Cold Springs Campground (now open after several summers of closure) and back up the Nature Trail.
Fireweed is prolific along the road above the Ranger Station.
Yeppers, aspen along the Nature Trail.
Sharon, my most regular commenter, named this Iron Falls.
You can count on seeing Indian Paintbrush along the Nature Trail near Iron Falls.
Walking on rip-rap is the worst part of the trail.
Sawtooth is the signature peak in Mineral King, although it can be deadly. RIP, Drew.
Tomorrow we’ll go to White Chief again.
In case you were wondering, I am working a little bit. I stop by the Silver City Store to check inventory and sometimes I hand out business cards to people I meet along the trails. (Hi Walt and Steve and the other guy from Hanford—hope Steve made it home without any more altitude discomfort.)
Sometimes I need to leave Mineral King for the peacefulness of Three Rivers. MK is a very social place, and although I have decent social skills (please allow me this illusion), I am an introvert who needs a copious amount of solitude.
The hazard tree crew has been working in our neighborhood.
I love the evening light coming through to the corn lily and grasses. It is especially nice when these folks are present and have their flag flying. I’ve drawn that a couple of times.
I called the drawings “Dawn’s Early Light”, because most people won’t be familiar with the direction of the cabin or the lay of the land. The first one was done long ago when my web designer put watermarks on my art (as if anyone would want to steal it, or as if we could prevent such a catastrophic occurrence.) I think I used the same photo for both drawings.
There was no time for hiking, but Hiking Buddy and I took what we shall refer to as two different “morning constitutional walks”.
First one: Timber Gap/Monarch junction
On the way up
On the way back
Second one: White Chief/Eagle/Mosquito junction
Heading up
Heading back (Timber Gap in the distance)
July and August are busy in Mineral King, particularly among the cabin folks.
