Into the Sierras - At Last

A week ago, I stood with a backpack at 11,800 feet on Kearsarge Pass, looking out into the Sierras. Ever since I moved to California, this is where I’ve wanted to be. Now that I’m teaching again, I’m still enjoying the afterglow. I wasn’t sure I could carry a pack that high.

It wasn’t the first time we’d tried this trip. About three years ago, Rhiannon and I had planned a September hike over Kearsarge Pass. I’d done part of the trail that summer, and it seemed a good route – a high starting point (9,100 feet), a nicely graded trail, a relatively short hike. But we awoke that morning to fog, rain, snow, and hail. We loaded our backpacks, stared up at the snowy rocks disappearing into the mist – and drove east to Death Valley.

This time we had sunshine. The trail went up and up from Onion Valley, past five lakes, but even the last switchbacks weren’t as bad as I’d expected. All those high country hikes have paid off. The slopes looked barren, but flowers hid between the rocks, including such new ones as the Sierra primrose. I kept stopping for pictures. Rhiannon waited. Other hikers stopped to chat – the high country is a friendly place. One hiker said he was a geologist in Antarctica.

And finally – the pass. Layers and layers of ridges and valleys, disappearing into a smoky haze from fires to the south. (The next two days were clear.) We rested for a long time, eating sausage and crackers, taking pictures, comparing notes with others. Eventually we hiked down to Kearsarge Lakes, with soup and freeze-dried chicken and rice for dinner. For morning, we planned an easy day of exploration.

After a slow meander past Bullfrog Lake, we headed up toward Glen Pass. I wasn’t sure I’d make it – at 11,900+ feet, it was even higher than Kearsarge – but it wouldn’t matter. By the time we reached the first little lake below the pass, it was three o’clock. I sent Rhiannon ahead with the camera – maybe I’d explore the upper lake and head slowly down while she took pictures from the top.

But soon I had second thoughts. When else would I be near Glen Pass? When else would I be fit enough to climb it? On the map, the second lake looked significantly closer to the pass. And beyond the lake were the final switchbacks.

With a sudden renewal of energy, I started up the trail. The second lake, like the first, was surrounded by barren rocks, but shooting stars and rosy sedum grew tall along the stream. Above the lake was the ridge. Through binoculars, I could just see a tiny Rhiannon silhouetted on top, taking pictures. I gave the family shout – “Aaah-oo-waaah!” She looked around, saw my whole body waving, and waved back. “I – might – come – up!” I shouted. She waved again.

Despite the switchbacks, the grade was gentle. My legs and lungs held out. I yawned, just a little, but wasn’t tempted to sleep – no snores this time. And up near the top, almost hidden under a boulder, was a blue flower I’d seen only in pictures – sky pilot, in the phlox family, said to grow at higher elevations than any other plant in the Sierras.

As I reached the ridge, Rhiannon and a young man from Montana cheered. The Rae Lakes lay scattered across a valley far below us. Rhiannon said the skinny one should be for lap-swimming.

Eventually we started down the switchbacks, trading the camera back and forth so we’d both be in the pictures. By the time we reached our camp, it was nearly dark, and a tiny crescent moon glowed in the west. I was exhausted – it had been a ten-mile day.


Friday morning, the trail up the west side of Kearsarge Pass was a lot steeper than the eastern one. I found more sky pilot, a bit faded, just below the ridge. Strangers congratulated us as we reached the top.

We hated to leave. On the way down toward Onion Valley, we stopped for rests, stopped for flowers, stopped for photographs – no hurry for the real world.

The hiking books describe this trail as “easy” and “short,” at least by Sierra standards. Well, yes – that’s why I chose it. But for me? As I said when I started this Blog, I’m short and round and out of shape – though less unfit now than earlier. In four months, I’ll be sixty. Maybe this is an easy hike for some people, but for me, it was a big deal.

I’m still studying the guidebooks. They make more sense now; I know those places. I’ve been there – into the Sierras. And even though it’s time for other things, I’m already thinking about the next trip.

Jefferson Park: The 20th Anniversary Mother–Daughter Backpacking Trip

It’s been several weeks since I last wrote. Blogging takes time. I can live life, or I can write about it. Lately, I’ve been living it.

Much has changed since I wrote last month. I kept hiking (and teaching). I finally reached Franklin Lake – a twelve-mile day. Another twelve-mile day took me to Pear Lake. Was I ready, finally, to carry a pack without getting totally wiped out?

This summer, it’s been twenty years since the first mother–daughter backpacking trip, when Rhiannon was ten years old. To honor this anniversary, she suggested we return to Jefferson Park.

On that first trip, we went in from Woodpecker Ridge to the south. The parking is high, and the side trail joins the Pacific Crest Trail for an easy hike north along the western flank of Mt. Jefferson.

We both remember that trip well – camping at a tiny lake, crossing a roaring river, and camping in mosquitoes and snow.

But what we mainly remember is the hike out. After a night or two, we continued north up Park Ridge, where we looked back down from 7,000 feet to the lakes and meadows of the “park” where we’d just camped. But to the north, where my mother was to meet us at Breitenbush Lake, a giant snowfield stretched for three miles, with only a single set of footprints showing the way.

We followed the footprints.

Several hours later, we reached Breitenbush Lake just in time to see the last car pull out of the campground. And there we sat down to wait. And wait….

Meanwhile, my mother – with her own mother, aged eighty-five, and Emily, who’d just turned six – was following a rocky track that became worse at every bend. Stopping near Ollalie Lake, she sought advice. “What kind of rig are you driving?” she was asked. She climbed back into her little Camry and continued on.

By the time the car arrived, we were cooking up the last of our camping food and preparing for a long night in the campground.

You might think that after a trip like that – the bugs, the snow, the long wait – we would have been discouraged. But no… we’ve backpacked every summer since then. Seven days across the Oregon Wallowas was the longest trip. A couple miles along Idaho’s Snake River (at 95-plus degrees) was one of the shortest. Sometimes the two of us go alone; other trips, we have company. Often we’re limited by time, or by my lack of fitness. But always, we do it.

This time we chose the Park Ridge route – it’s the most challenging way into Jefferson Park, but also the prettiest. Though it was early August, the trail still had long stretches of snow. We started up at 4 p.m. on Tuesday, hiking past tiny lakes and scarlet-colored paintbrush, through snowfields and swarms of mosquitoes.

We didn’t meet many people that day – just a few through-hikers, including a man who’d left the Mexican border on April 22nd. Though I’ve always wanted to do that whole trip, hiking six miles to Jefferson Park was enough of a challenge for now.

By evening, we were on top of the ridge, with Mt. Jefferson shining pink, and the sun somehow still lighting up the meadows and lakes of Jefferson Park beneath it.

The light faded during the downhill stretch. We could see Russell Lake below us, so I told Rhiannon to go find a campsite. I followed at my usual slow place. The trail seemed to go on and on. And on.

I tried a shout, the family contact call we’d used for finding each other in the African rain forest – Aaah-oo-waaah! No answer.

Finally I stopped, dropped the pack, and dug out the map, my glasses, and a head lamp. (I like head lamps: wherever you look, it’s light.)

Surprise – I’d missed the turn-off to the lake. I tried another shout and headed back the way I’d come.

After a while, I heard Rhiannon give our call. I gave the “I hear you” response – Oooh-oo. At our camp in the trees, I put up my tent while Rhiannon heated water for freeze-dried chicken with rice. We sat under the stars till nearly midnight. The Milky Way seemed to erupt from Mt. Jefferson, flowing north toward the ridge.

We spent Wednesday exploring meadows, photographing flowers, circling lakes, swimming in the reflection of Mt. Jefferson. Jefferson Park is a mosaic of patchy forest and green meadows where melting snow creates countless tiny pools. The pools mirror pieces of mountain and breed millions of mosquitoes. It’s one of my favorite places in the world.

Thursday we hiked out over the ridge, glissading down across the snow – Rhiannon quickly, while I followed more slowly.

I’m grateful to have a daughter who’s been so patient with me, all these years. And the promise of summer backpacking inspires me to push myself beforehand and travel long distances to wherever she’s working – Idaho, Wyoming, Colorado, Washington.

“You should be able to do this till you’re seventy,” Rhiannon tells me. Well, maybe. We’ll see.