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HI MK:
Glad to see u seemed to have snapped out of the funk u related to in an earlier story. (R U bringing Chilly Waters w/u on this trek?)
I snapped out of my post Lakes Basin Death March from last summer... swore I'd had it, was too old for this stuff and all the good places were beyond our capabilities to get to, spend time at, and still keep everthing w/in reason. It took about 3 months and then sitting down and reading other trip tales here; mostly the tales of the Tres Amigos in the Yosemite SE corner got my interest going again. So, thanks to some good advice from GB, The Old Ranger, Markskor, and a few others, we head north Thursday pm for Oakhurst and a hotel room, followed by hitting the Isberg Trail as early Friday as we can after picking up the permit. It's a nine day, 8 nite trek hopefully coming out over Electra after spending time at Red Devil Lake and then up the Lyell fork of the Merced....We'll see.
Mav, if you saw them in the backcountry, good thing you didn't blink as they are gazelles...If we weren't sitting down watching them come up Cartridge Pass, we sure would have missed them. In my next life I want a golf swing like Tiger's and legs like either one in the photo above. If nothing else when my wife comes at me w/a 9 iron I'll at least be able to outrun her.
GB: I love your account of the Pine Creek Pass trail. For me, going down those infernal steps (water bars or whatever euphemism they go by), covered in scree and gravel, was far worse than going up, and I too vowed never to take that trail again. After reading this thread, I'm actually thinking of heading over Granite Bear pass myself, this coming weekend. I'd get there from Piute though, and go over Puppet Pass.
Thanks for the kind words T-A-H, if I'm moving at all it is to keep up with the missus. Seriously- she does not stop- after years of running and so on, her approach is that you adjust your pace, but only stop to rest ligaments and to prevent getting saddle sore. As a result she covers incredible amounts of ground. When we first met I was still old school- stopping a lot, taking off pack and so on. But I have learned how to travel her way and it works, if one can really learn pacing, and spends time to have a pretty comfortable (tho still heavy) pack.
Maverick- if we look familiar maybe it is because we are regulars on COPS- they keep bustin' down the door on our trailer home right when I'm in my dingy white tank-top Seriously- maybe we have passed on the trail. In the last 15 years or so we have come in almost always from east-side trail heads and generally hang out from Reno to Big Pine (we have a lot of friends in Reno as I went to the school of mines there).
Seriously- maybe we have passed on the trail. In the last 15 years or so we have come in almost always from east-side trail heads and generally hang out from Reno to Big Pine (we have a lot of friends in Reno as I went to the school of mines there).