High Sierra Topix

On July 22, about 3 weeks ago some rather powerful thunderstorms visited the Sierra while we were out on a 9-day backpack. This first image is our two tents up at 10.3k in the Graveyard Lakes basin with the near tent my bro Joe's. Can see my arm sticking up at the Big Agnes UL1 tent door. Rather furious cherry sized hail pounded on us for about 30 seconds then waned quickly to the more usual pea sized for a minute before turning to light rain. Joe had not tucked his plastic ground sheet under his rather old tent so water coming off the sides pooled between the tub floor and the plastic then wicked up inside getting his sleeping bag a bit wet before he noticed. The 6+ pound beast will be his next replacement. We kept getting minor events from about 1pm till 10pm but nothing like was going on a few miles south in the Mono Recesses and Bear Creek. Which was fine because I've never had a better viewing location for watching big storms as was that Sunday.



This tele was during the worst of it about 6pm. That peak in the sun is 11278 southeast of Cold Creek with all the big peaks like Abbot, Gabb, and Recess totally in the black void beyond. Those areas and then Rock Creek areas east of the crest must have really been pounded. Lightning all over the peaks every few seconds with constant rumbling.



Recess Peak and Hilgard as they began to reappear from the darkest storm.



And a bit later as it continues moving into Rock Creek.



Would like a report from anyone on the board that happened to be in those areas. And the more blow by blow details the more interesting.

The below links to a just loaded homepage website feature story on my recent 9-day backpacking trip into the Silver Divide that has over 100 images on 9 pages and includes more on the storms.

http://www.davidsenesac.com/MinnowCr/minnowcr_0.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

I went to your link and checked out your trip report with pictures. You took some really beautiful pics ! Great report, thanks for sharing. I'm definitely going to do a trip there in the future.

I also went to your link. The pictures are wonderful,and the trail report ,great. It makes me want to visit the area next year, also.

Dave, a great trip during a classic monsoon pattern. I am still trying to get my head around the size of your load, and how you can cope. Regardless of the pack weights, the story, images and trout recipes are appreciated.

Great trip report and very nice 4x5 shots! I cant believe you lug that beast out there, but good for you! Thanks for posting.

freestone wrote:I am still trying to get my head around the size of your load, and how you can cope.

...and at 66lbs it was 10lbs lighter than in earlier years. Yikes! My bad knees and flat feet just ache thinking about carrying that kind of weight. But great trip report, and fantastic photos as always, Dave.

Once again, an exceptional report of a total "me too, I wish" kind of trip. Your escapades are an inspiration. Thanks mucho!

Entertaining and fascinating read and, or course, great photos. Years ago, I was doing one of my looking at the map and thinking about possible trips and wondered if the views of the distant peaks would be so marvelous from those lakes. I also especially love the 4x5s. Thank you for posting.

Great TR & photo's Dave. I see the conditions you were referring to in your PM,
mother nature is not always very generous with giving us photographers the light
we need for those fabulous captures. These kind of conditions many times offer only
a small window of opportunity to react, if one is not anticipating it, and lucky
enough to be set up for it, the moment it will be lost forever.
This is one of the many difficult and under appreciated aspects of photography that
many are not aware of, and an intricate part of the artists creative process that
leads up to the capture of what resembles the artists original vision.

I was on my way into Humphrey Basin on Sunday, July 22nd. We did get some excitement. We started at the North Lake trail head at about 10 am and worked our way up the Piute Pass Trail. The sky had some cloud activity going on but in the beginning it didn’t worry us. We were taking it slow, getting use to the elevation, taking in the scenery and working our way up the pass. At times we had rain, nothing real steady some big drops here and there, at one point I encountered some hail, not too big and just for a short period of time. I got up on the pass and then things started to change, thunder was rolling up through the canyon, which was pretty loud, the rain was still light, but I was pelted with some hail that hurt so I did not stay on the pass I continued over to the other side. We had decided, after having a slow time making our way up to the pass, to find a spot to set up camp after the pass near Summit Lake. After I got over the pass and saw there was nothing at Summit Lake, not even a boulder to sit on, I would continue past the lake and see what I could find. My partner was still behind me when I decided to hunt for a suitable spot to set up camp, when I found the spot I waited for my partner on the trail. When we reached our camp spot we started to retrieve our tent and set it up, next thing we knew we were being pelted by hail, not just a little bit but a lot, it was about pea size, we didn’t even have a chance to get the tent out of its bag. We had already put on rain jackets, the pants went on and we huddled under some trees next to some large boulders. The trees helped in slowing most of the hail down, but we did get hit hard by some. This went on for about 3 minutes, and the rain continued, the ground was covered with hail. We managed to get the tent up in the rain and sat in the tent for an hour before the rain stopped enough to finish setting up camp. That night we were rained on several times and hailed on one more time. The next day(Monday July 23)it rained till 11:30 am, the following morning (Tuesday July24), and every morning after that, the skies were clear, we stayed in the area till Thursday. We had a great trip and the hail storm was chocked up to a new experience. Can’t wait to do another trip next year!!!

Patty