Yosemite/Hoover Wilderness Trip Report: Part 3

Up and moving by 6:45 on day 3. I was expecting this to be my most difficult day: something like 6 miles of off-trail hiking, according to the Topo! route. Back when I first planned this trip, I thought I'd camp near Rock Island Lake; on closer inspection, I decided the camping didn't look great there (too exposed, no shade) and it made for a long hike out, so I'd be better off pressing on to Snow Lake. So I had what looked like a long day ahead of me.

The ramp out of Slide Canyon (visible on the topo as a diagonal notch running roughly north) is choked with talus and willow in the lower reaches; fortunately, there are low-angle slabs to the east of it so you can bypass that section. Aim for a prominent rust-stained cliff, which happens to be the exact point where the talus and willow end. Once you're on the (surprisingly broad) ramp, it's easy going: just follow it up.

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The stream shown on the map actually drops into the canyon sooner than the map shows; you'll start hearing it when you're halfway up or more. When the terrain started to open out, I bore left, skirting the southern edge of the big meadow at the top. This area is just magical: wide-open alpine meadowlands surrounded by classic Yosemite outcrops, and (once you're on the broad saddle) great views down Crazy Mule Gulch.



You make your way through this beautiful and easy terrain toward the obvious knob to your west. Easy slopes lead up to the best crossing of this ridgelet, at a forested notch immediately north of the knob. From here you descend a short ramp and then a short sandy slope into the gully to the west. Follow up the gully a little ways, then zigzag west to the top of Suicide Ridge, following the plethora of low-angle ramps that lead you up and west. At a broad flat atop the ridge, I angled northish through a nice granite alley and emerged to my first view of Rock Island Lake.



Which is really an extraordinary lake: a mile or so long, nestled in a vast meadowy valley, a landscape so open and inviting you can almost picture living there.

Zigzag ramps lead quickly down to the gentle slopes nearest the lake. I followed the lakeshore north and crossed the inlet stream just a little ways past the north end, with the aim of cutting directly west to the western slopes of the valley and the most direct shot up to the next pass. This was not a bad plan, but the turf is pretty hummocky in places; it might have been slightly easier crossing the valley a upstream a ways. Once across, though, it's an easy, gentle angle right up to the pass.

From the pass, my goal was to traverse over to Rock Island Pass while losing as little elevation as necessary to avoid the most difficult terrain. A series of benches lead inexorably lower, but as long as you keep heading northish as you drop you should be fine. The slopes gentle out some after a while, and at this point you want to stay level or gain elevation. I came out right in the big meadow, and hooked up with the trail about 100 yards before the pass.

Just a short hop down the trail and I was at Snow Lake. Which I reached at...a few minutes after 11 am. The whole route went so smoothly that it wound up seeming like the easiest day rather than the hardest.



I took a cursory look around for campsites here. Not finding much, and being less than thrilled by the stiff wind blowing steadily through Rock Island Pass, and in light of how early it still was, I decided to continue on to Crown Lake.



Where I found a secluded campsite well away from the group of eight who were my nearest neighbors.

That night the wind never stopped. There's white noise, and then there's white noise: the sound of a nearby stream can be wonderfully relaxing, but the sound of the wind unsettles me and puts me on edge. It was not a restful night.

Nevertheless, I was up and on the trail by 6:36 am. Not much worth telling about the rest of the trip, beyond my supreme annoyance at the trail builders. Three crossings of Robinson Creek in a quarter mile? Those ridiculous switchbacks up and then down before Barney Lake? What on earth were they thinking?

Oh, and one more thing. In the last flat tedious section of trail, approaching the campground, as I was wanting nothing so much as to be at my car already, I stopped to talk with a couple who were hiking in. I asked where they were going, and the man said Rock Island Lake. So I described my route, and it turned out that they were thinking about doing that same stretch between the lake and Slide Canyon (except possibly in reverse). They were iffy, because they weren't sure about the ramp up from the canyon. I described in detail what I had done and what landmarks to look for, and told them what a sweet route that ramp really is, and enthused over Rock Island Lake and environs. And when we parted I felt a whole lot better: here, in the most tedious part of the whole journey, they had given me the opportunity to relive the most enjoyable part of it all.

Part 1
Part 2

Yosemite/Hoover Wilderness Trip Report: Part 2

Next morning I was up and on the trail before 7 am. My goal today was Slide Canyon a couple miles below the slide, at the base of the ramp I needed to follow over toward Rock Island Lake.

I had a short scramble down a loose sandy chute into the eastern gully, where I picked up another use trail that nicely avoided the worst of the big-block talus choking the upper gully. This trail continues to Ice Lake, conveniently leading above the cliffs on the eastern side, before petering out near the south end of the lake.

At the lake I ran into a couple who were just starting to stir (one still sleeping, the other starting the stove), so I stopped and chatted for a bit; this was the last person I saw until I was back on the Robinson Creek Trail.

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Ice Lake Pass was a narrow gully with a long snowfield; the snow was still hard and icy that early in the morning, so I stayed on the dry slopes to the west. This opened onto a gorgeous meadowy mini-valley. Tons of flowers here: Brewer's Lupine, Lemmon's Paintbrush, Elephant Heads, Monkeyflower, red Paintbrush, among others. This area is a cross-country dream: a gentle stepped descent from meadow to meadow, with glimpses of Matterhorn Peak appearing to your left. Bear generally right and downstream and you can't really go wrong.



Picked up the trail a little below the largest meadow, and followed it down the switchbacks to the long traverse east. Left the trail near the low point of the traverse, and angled down to an easy crossing of Piute Creek a little above the confluence with the unnamed creek from the north. Easy, gentle descent in here, with the biggest obstacle being down trees (but not so many of them that you can't wind around them). Came out in the meadow above the Slide.



The Slide is the product of a massive rockfall hundreds of years ago--a rockfall so huge that it covers the width of the canyon and extends a ways up the other side. I had read somewhere that there was a use trail leading above on the east side of the canyon, so I angled left and a little up in search of it. Turns out there is a faint sort of an intermittent use trail; if you lose it at any point, just head uphill and you'll probably run into it (it did seem to go higher than was strictly necessary to avoid the talus maze).

Once back down on the canyon floor, it's easy meadow-and-slab walking--just a cross-country dream. Some ways down (maybe 3/4 mile or so) the vegetation started getting thicker and dewier, so I crossed Piute Creek to the drier and more open west side; this worked well generally, although I did have to go uphill a short ways to avoid a steep streambank in one spot.

I had been slightly concerned about identifying the right ramp from below (in MacClure's account, he makes it sound like it was nearly invisible), but I needn't have worried: it's unmistakeable, especially if you use the granite spur across the canyon as a marker. I pitched camp in a gravelly patch at the very base of the slabs I would follow up to MacClure's ramp.

Mosquitoes came out in the early evening; this was the one place where there were enough to be bothersome. I took a stroll up the slabs around sunset to enjoy the late sun on Sawtooth Ridge, then--as it was getting dark--retired to my tent to read a while before bed.



Part 1
Part 3

Sunday Sierrablogging

Winnemucca Lake near Carson Pass, Mokelumne Wilderness.

Yosemite/Hoover Wilderness Trip Report: Part 1

Did my first-ever trip into Yosemite's north boundary country a couple weeks ago: a 4-day trip in via Little Slide Canyon, down Slide Canyon, over to Rock Island Lake, and out via Snow Lake and the Robinson Creek Trail. Great area, and a really cool route.

I drove up Saturday morning, arriving at Bridgeport by noon. I headed straight to Buckeye Campground to secure a spot (turned out there were plenty, and it never did fill up--on a Saturday in August), then turned around and headed for the ranger station to grab a permit (again, no problem). Then up to Twin Lakes and Mono Village Resort to check out trailhead logistics (you have to pay $10 to park for up to a week), which turned out to be a very good thing because the entry station doesn't open until [i]8:00 am[/i] (by which time, of course, half the day is gone). Back to Buckeye for an evening bottle of Brother Thelonius and a (relatively) good night's sleep.

Next day I was packed and parked and on the 'trail' (the first 1/4 mile or so goes right through the campground) by 7:09 am. The first stretch of trail is easy, flat or gentle rise, first through forest then breaking out into sagebrush slopes with nice views of the whole valley.
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My first challenge: catching the best route into Little Slide Canyon. As it happens, Secor's directions are pretty solid, with one slight recent wrinkle: the Hoover Wilderness expansion last year moved the wilderness entry sign out to about 1 mile (or slightly more) before the LSC turnoff (instead of 1/4 mile after). I figured this out, so it wasn't a problem. The 'table-shaped' rock isn't quite as table-shaped as Secor thinks, IMO, but it's still recognizable from that description, at the edge of a small grove of a half dozen or so pine trees. Once you're there, the 'faint use trail' is actually pretty distinct (thanks to Secor, I assume), and remains distinct much of the way up the canyon.

From the table rock, the use trail cuts over to an easy snag crossing of Robinson Creek (as Secor says). Across the creek, it immediately starts climbing south and west up the slopes east of LSC. After gaining ~600' the trail turns the corner into the canyon, and shortly thereafter you start to get some good up-canyon views. Early morning shade kept it nice and cool all through this part.



The trail traverses over to the creek and crosses it, then climbs steeply through an open rocky/talus-y section (prominent cliffs on the other side of the stream) to an idyllic subalpine bench. Slogging up this steep stuff, I set my eye on a prominent lone tree at the top of the cliffs with the promise to myself that as soon as I got there I would take a nice long break.

Which, having gained about 2/3 of the day's elevation, I did.

Now, the wildflowers had been getting steadily better and better as I climbed--from dried-up lupine and mule ear husks down along the main trail, to slightly-past-their-prime mint climbing up the shoulder, to a variety of blooms once I turned into the shade of the canyon, to the subalpine zone where it was still prime wildflower season. The late spring was definitely paying off for me just as I hoped it would.

After resting a while, I started back up the trail--a little less distinct here, fading out in places, with fewer ducks than before. Generally, though, if you follow Secor's description you'll end up in pretty much the right place. Once past the cliffs, you veer left, cross the stream, and head up the east fork a ways. Somewhere in this section I started to think I heard voices, then after a little bit I was sure of it; and then I spotted the climbers on their way up The Incredible Hulk.

It gets a little trickier here: to get to Maltby Lake, you want to veer off to the right up one of the ravines crisscrossing the granite mass separating the two canyon branches. I'm not sure just how to identify the right one, but after losing and then finding the trail a couple times I got to exactly where I was supposed to be: where the trail drops to the Maltby Lake outlet stream and ascends the gully to the lake.

Just one problem: a high-angle corniced snowfield/bridge filling the gully. I took some time looking at this, and looking for alternate possibilities in the immediate vicinity (they all deadended), and looking at the snowbridge again, and thinking maybe and maybe not, and in the end I decided I just couldn't chance it.



So I backtracked a ways to see if I could find another route through and over the granite maze keeping me away from my destination. What I found was a nice sandy flat with a tremendous view of the whole canyon and, up front and center, the Incredible Hulk. I dropped my pack and rested a bit, then explored a bit more to see if there was a reasonable way over to Maltby. Not finding anything promising, I had my campsite.

I spent the rest of the afternoon reading and watching the climbers descend--the last of them racing against the thunderstorm that had been building up all day.




(See the orange rock in the first pic? It's visible to the left of the vertical shadows in the second; the three climbers are visible as a speck to the right of that.)

It started raining a little before 5 pm, so I ducked into my tent; by 6:30 it had stopped, but a brisk freezing wind kept it kind of unpleasant to stay outside, so I wound up having cheese & crackers for dinner and retiring early.

Part 2
Part 3

Wednesday Wildflowerblogging

White Hawkweed (Hieracium albiflorum) in Butterfly Valley Botanical Preserve, Plumas National Forest.

Sunday Sierrablogging

Early morning at Lake 10,200, LeConte Divide, John Muir Wilderness.

Friday Random 10

Iggy Pop - The Passenger
XTC - Helicopter
Sleater-Kinney - God Is a Number
Kurtis Blow - Hard Times
Psychedelic Furs - Mack the Knife
Space Cossacks - Hava Nagila
Destroy All Monsters - You're Gonna Die
Les Breastfeeders - J'pourrais pas vivre avec toi
Buick MacKane - Loose
Ramones - Punishment Fit the Crime

What are y'all listening to this morning? Bonus video below the fold...
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Wednesday Wildflowerblogging

Elephant Heads (Pedicularis groenlandica), Piute Creek headwaters, Yosemite National Park.

Sunday Sierrablogging

Ice Lake at the head of Little Slide Canyon, Hoover Wilderness.

How Tom Bates Saved Beer

The last day or two there's been a story going around about how Jimmy Carter saved beer. Chait's citing to a post by E. D. Kain, the new guy at Balloon Juice, who in turn points to a post (from March) by Rob Carlson. Carlson includes an impressive graph (which Kain reposts) showing the explosive growth in the number of breweries in the US after 1979. The cause of that growth:

In 1979, Carter deregulated the beer industry, opening the market back up to craft brewers.

Which makes a pretty convincing case for Carter. There's just one problem: it didn't happen.

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The bill in question (passed in 1978, taking effect in 1979) legalized homebrewing "for personal or family use and not for sale". There was no deregulation of the beer industry. The 'deregulation' applied to personal, not commercial behavior.

Now, legalizing homebrew was certainly a good thing, and it was certainly a factor in the development of the craft beer industry. This piece by Greg Beato (in Reason), arguing that it was a primary cause, quotes Charlie Papazian as saying that "over 90 percent of small brewers I talk to today have roots in home brewing"--so, fair to say it was a significant factor. Carter deserves credit (along with Senator Cranston, who pushed the bill in the Senate).

Still, the Beato piece reads a little like

1. Legalize homebrewing
2. ???
3. Craft beer explosion!

The intermediate step, which goes unnoted by Carlson ("as far as I can tell nothing else substantive changed about the market") and thus by Kain and Chait, is the legalization of brewpubs in individual states. Washington passed its law in 1982, and that same year Bert Grant opened his brewpub in Yakima--the first brewpub in the US since Prohibition. California's brewpub law also passed in 1982 (sponsored by Assemblyman Tom Bates), and Oregon's passed in 1983. Over the course of the 1980s, various other states followed suit.

This removed huge barriers to entry for small brewers in those states. Brewers could be viable with smaller volumes than would be necessary to make bottling and distribution profitable; they could also avoid the complex, nonsensical, and often corrupt system of beer distribution in their state. Brewpubs could also experiment with very small seasonal or specialty batches--thus, over time, building a market for much more diversity. The impact of brewpub legalization can be seen if you track where the craft brew market developed when (Washington, Oregon, and California were much more diverse much earlier than the rest of the country), and is summed up in one figure: of 1,500 breweries in the United States today, 2/3 are brewpubs.

So, in fact, Kain's broader conclusion (that smart, limited, targeted deregulation of a market can lead to much greater diversity) is supported by the history. It's the specifics of that history that needed correction.

Friday Random 10

Essential Logic - Moontown
Combustible Edison - The Corner Table
Iggy Pop - Neighborhood Threat
Afghan Whigs - If I Were Going
Wire - Practice Makes Perfect
Wax Tailor - Hypnosis Theme
Ramones - Can't Get You Out of My Mind
Minutemen - My Heart and the Real World
Gary Numan - The Crazies
Talking Heads - Heaven

What are y'all listening to this morning afternoon?

Wednesday Wildflowerblogging

Salt Marsh Dodder (Cuscuta salina), a parasite, growing on Pickleweed (Salicornia virginica) at Indian Beach, Tomales Bay State Park.

(Yes, I know it's a day late; that's why this post is priced at a 14.28% discount.)

Monday Movie Review: Inception

Inception (2010) 7/10
Cobb (Leonardo DiCaprio) leads a team of dream extractors, who use cutting edge medical technology to manipulate shared dreams. The team is hired to attempt "inception"—creating, rather than extracting, an idea. But Cobb is haunted in dreams by the presence of his late wife (Marion Cotillard), endangering the team. Written & directed by Christopher Nolan.

There is no question that Inception is a would-have-could-have-should-have movie. It screams from unrealized potential. At the same time, it's smart, beautiful, and enjoyable. Arthur and I have been talking about it for a week, and that's a lot of engagement for one movie.

What Inception does right is commit fully to its concept. Yes, it's exposition-heavy, but it grips its dream reality with two hands and doesn't let go. This is a smart, well-made movie by a master of movie logistics. It doesn't falter in its delivery of Chris Nolan's theme, the theme of all of his films: A haunted man struggling with the unreality of a life transfixed by grief. Whether that haunted man is struggling with memory loss or insomnia, whether he's Batman or a magician, Nolan's motif is pretty clear, if not always successful.
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There are some very clever moments in delivering the film. Joseph Gordon-Levitt, left to improvise in a Things Go Wrong scene, comes up with some very creative stuff, and it's a pleasure to watch.

Inception has a great cast, although I have to say that Ellen Page as Ariadne seems like she's in a different movie from the DiCaprio, Ken Watanabe, Deelap Rao, et al. It also has one bravura scene; Ariadne learning how to explore, construct, and manipulate dreams. It's a visual masterpiece, and if the rest of the movie had that sense of creative excitement, there would be "10/10" at the top of this post.

Ariadne is a lot of what's wrong with this film. Not that I dislike the actor (I don't), but she's a non-character with no personality of her own. She exists solely to ask obvious questions, and here, Nolan's distrust of the audience is an irritant. It's not enough to depict grief, we need Ariadne there to say "That's grief you're experiencing!" And this happens not once or three times, but often.

I had certainly heard, before I saw the movie, that Inception was heavy on exposition. I don't mind all the explaining of their pseudo-technology (I cut my teeth on Star Trek, after all), but the exposition about every thought and feeling was simply heavy-handed. Dreams, after all, are mysterious, but there are no mysteries in Inception until the final one. Audiences groan aloud at the ending (which I am not giving away); in my theater, there was definitely a loud groan/gasp; it was hard to tell by the sound whether it was a positive or negative reaction. Perhaps the reason there is such intense reaction to the ending is that nothing in the preceding film led one to expect it. Oh, sure, we expected a plot element to twist at the end, but the film was simply not mysterious. It was not (for the most part) dream-like. It handled its plot exposition in a way that made dreams just one more bank or casino to break into and out of. It's a heist movie.

And I do like heist movies, I like heist crews, I like heist plotting. It had an old-fashioned feel that way. But in truth, there were about 10 minutes of truly twisty, dream-logic visuals, and almost all of them were in the previews. The rest of the movie could have easily been Ocean's 14.


(Cross-posted. Or is it?)

Sunday Sierrablogging

Big Pine Creek basin, Inyo National Forest.