High Sierra Topix

I can squeeze one last trip in this year the week of Oct. 5-11. I'm thinking OV due to it's proximity. How is the trail, backcountry camping and fishing? Robinson Lake? Flower Lake? Gilbert Lake? What is the easiest to get out of in case of severe weather? Any info will be appreciated. Thanks, lf

The trail to Kearsarge Pass is one of the easier East side entries... Moderate 5 miles and well maintained.

I've always liked Matlock and Slim lakes on the way up for the views (abundant camping too).

Unfortunately I can't give you too much info on the fishing, but I'm pretty sure the lakes on on the East side of the pass are HEAVILY fished, due to the relatively short hike and moderate elevation gain... I wouldn't expect great fishing, but then again, I'm not one to fish, so take my logic with a grain of salt.

Since you have the time, a trip to the 60 lakes basin might be worth it...

Any of the lakes on the East side of the pass would be easy to get out of, as the trail is well developed and is really close to all of the lakes. Other side of the pass is a bit trickier, since you can't camp at the lakes immediately on the West side of the pass, so your closest base camp option would be Charlotte Lake, which is another 2 miles from the pass...

Hope that helps!

Hi ahughes03,

Welcome to HST! Thanks for helping a fellow HST member with that info.

Is there no camping at Kearsarge lake? If you wanted a nice easy hike, you could go to Kearsarge lakes (unless you aren't allowed to camp there) or down into vidette meadow. I would be cautious of going over both kearsarge and glen pass to the Rae lakes or 60 lakes. Both Kearsarge lakes and vidette would be easy to get out in a hurry and pretty easy to get to. The fishing at bullfrog was pretty good with lots in the 10 " range. Kearsarge lakes were plentiful but smaller.

Yes you can camp at Kearsage Lakes. However you are not allowed to use the bear boxes (they are padlocked), presumably due to too much food being cached for JMT hikers.

Littlefish,

Tim is correct, you can camp at Kearsarge, the camping prohibition is for Bullfrog Lake.

I don't fish myself, but I know that some of the "Sixty Lakes" (if you were to venture that far) have had nets installed to help the Frog population recover.

Dave

Sorry, I didn't know we were referring to bear boxes. Yes , I remember the kearsarge ones and I believe the Rae lakes boxes being locked. I spent a day in the 60 lakes basin last year and several of the upper 60 lakes were netted. The other lakes had only 6 to 8" fish. Dragon lake was significantly better for scenery and fishing.

Fishing in Heart Lake. A little off-trail to get there. Nice camps at outlet of Kearsarge Lake 3321 that are more out of the crowds. Bear boxes were locked last year. I had pretty good luck fishing Kearsarge Lakes.