The Sierra summer backpacking season is coming to a close which means I am home again and can focus on the thousands of photos taken, hundreds of miles hiked and…
Just north of China Lake Naval Weapons Center is a tiny little wilderness area called the Coso Range Wilderness. It's small, around 50,0o0 acres, with limited access (4WD desert road/old…
I wanted to keep up with my recent trend of long wildflower hikes on the weekend so I took advantage of Saturday's perfect hiking weather to hit a classic East…
One of the biggest headaches when planning a longer hike is figuring out the car/parking/shuttle arrangements. Generally, these kind of hikes start and end hundreds of miles apart and it can be a nightmare arranging transportation. The High Sierra Trail is no exception. With the beginning and ending trailheads on opposite sides of a mountain range with no through roads, shuttling between the two is 10x the distance of the hike itself. We were prepared for this and had scheduled shuttle days, and although we weren’t looking forward to that part, we accepted it as a necessary evil in order to have the best trail experience possible.
Donohue Pass is the first pass you have to climb when going the north to south direction along the JMT, so it has the reputation of being a tough one.…
Once a year, Henry Coe State Park opens up the gate to the remote and less-traveled east side of the park, including Orestimba Wilderness. This Backcountry Weekend allows people to…
You heard me – Zzyzx. Pronounced Zi-Zix. The last entry when all geographic place names are listed alphabetically. Anyone who has driven the I-15 stretch from LA to Vegas knows that mysterious, middle-of-nowhere offramp to ‘Zzyzx’. It finally tempted us and this time we took the exit to explore all that Zzyzx has to offer.
But first we had unfinished business in Afton Canyon. Since we couldn’t pass the Mojave River in our truck when approaching from the west, we hopped back on I-15 and took the exit to the east end. This time we were easily able to get into the canyon where we checked out a few ‘Mojave Sites of Mystery’ – and old mine site with unique stacked rock walls and a buried railcar, supposedly left there after a derailment on the nearby tracks. I’d love to learn more if anyone is familiar with either of these sites.
After wrapping up our Afton exploration it was time to check out Zzyzx. Heading south from the freeway, the road dead ends after a while at the former site of the Zzyzx Mineral and Heath Spa, now the Desert Studies Center. There’s a surprisingly large pool with a fountain and lots of ducks, some nice facilities, and a view across the dry Soda Lake. As an extra bonus we spotted several sheep in the nearby rocky mountainside.
Dave and I spent the weekend at Pinnacles National Monument. The park recently acquired a large parcel of new land and this land includes the old campground that used to be just outside the East entrance. The land needs a lot work since it has missed out on the preservation done within the park, and we were happy to be a part of a volunteer crew that contributed a few hours to the park through a Geocaching CITO event.
There were two tasks that our group contributed to: the first was to pull out invasive horehound plants from the old ranch lands that are now part of the park. Thousands of plants were cleaned out by the crew – great job! The second task was to build a fence and work on trail re-vegitation in the campground. There was a big open meadow that had been stomped down by people over the years. We built a rustic wooden fence around it while others mulched up the old trails to prepare for re-vegitation. It was hard but fun work. It was quite interesting to learn about the park’s expansion, and also get some education about the park’s condor program (we watched them soaring far above us near a roost on a ridge).
After our eventful day in Zion National Park we drove the short distance to Bryce Canyon National Park. Arriving after dark, we didn’t get to enjoy the scenery until the next morning. We got up early and were in the park just around sunrise, which we enjoyed from Sunset Point. Sunrise at Bryce is amazing, and I would recommend to any one who visits to get out of bed early to experience it.
Bryce Canyon (which isn’t a canyon, but there is no geologic name to describe exactly what it is), is an exposed feature of the red Utah landscape. It was once a sea floor and many processes combined to make the hoodoos what they are today. What’s left are spires and formations that look like they were taken straight out of a Dr Seuss book. Half of the fun of wandering among the hoodoos is to see figures and pictures in their shapes. In one day we saw kissing camels, the Swedish Chef, Queen Elizabeth, the Road Runner, and many others (I seemed to be seeing a lot of Muppets, but maybe that’s just me).