Reality Check: Glacier Divide Aug. '12
Posted: Fri Feb 01, 2013 11:58 pm
August 2012. Sorry for the long TR, and first a big thanks to cgundersen for terrific beta and supporting words prior to our trip.
This trip was a bit of an important and humbling heads-up for me and my wife. It was the first time we had to make a strategic retreat because of injury/lack of physical ability. I am reasonably active and 60 years old but for the last year had not worked-out except ww kayaking, my wife is 55 and a true athlete, but in June had an injury that impacted her knee.
Our plan was to go over Piute Pass, up to Honeymoon Lake, over to Ramona Lake then around the northwest side of Glacier Divide, and contour high above Evolution Basin and come out Lamarck Col. It didn’t seem especially ambitious at the time….
Our first day was over Piute Pass, then up to Lower Honeymoon Lake. I had not been that way in decades and didn’t find the use trail to LHL for sometime. It is not where the sign is by the horse camp, and I cussed a blue streak until I found it. Then it was up to the lake just in time for a spectacular thunder storm with pounding rain. That was a solid day, but during the night my wife complained about her knee and frankly I was pretty wiped.
Next day over the hump to Ramona Lake, and oddly I felt kinda weak and a bit shaky, so we called it a day even though we had not gone all that far. I was surprised by two things at Ramona: 1) someone has built stone furniture and a ginormous fire ring with stacked firewood, despite the fact it is obviously a ‘no fires’ location, and 2) Someone had taken stones and built a large peace sign with a big cairn in the center.
The next day we headed out around the northwest corner of Glacier Divide which has a ducked trail in places. We were heading for Lake 10907, and found a nice ‘sneak route’ down the steep eastern cliffs. What a great spot! But again we found a veritable living room of rock furniture around a large fire ring with stacked firewood, and again a large stone peace sign. This was something of an outrage frankly. But more importantly, my wife’s knee was really bothering her and I couldn’t seem to shake my sense of constant fatigue. It was clear that we would need a day without packs.
Next day we hiked (sans packs) up from Lake 10907 to the higher string of lakes to the south that lead up to the crossing of Glacier Divide before dropping down to Lake 11236. The weather was broken with thunder and some rain. We dropped down to Lake 11236 and then turned around and headed back to our camp at Lake 10907. When we got back it became clear that there was no way we could continue. My wife’s knee was painful even without a load and I was feeling beat. So we had to reverse our route back over Piute.
That evening I went over to the peace sign and found a small plastic container in the middle. Inside a found a pair of women’s thong panties from Fredrick’s of Hollywood and on pink paper a note that read,
“Anything you can do I can do better, I can do anything better than you…I am woman hear me roar. The Pink Panty Possy Mountaineer Club (no boys allowed!)”
Written on the back of this dated Aug. 10, 2009, read,
“We have visited this lake and named it Mystery Lake in 2005. The Dad’s and Daughter’s Backcountry Builders and Climbers”
Welcome to the wilderness! I guess the Dad’s and Daughters figure that basic rules about fires and leave no trace are for others…same for PPPMC.
The next day we went back to Ramona and while taking a break I went over to the peace sign there and found another plastic container with yep, a pair of thong panties and more words from the PPPMC. But this time the Dad’s and Daughters dinging them for not leaving more firewood. Good grief, is there no end to the idiocy?
But then things took a serious turn. Leaving Ramona Lake I saw a guy kind of sitting on a sleeping bag in an odd spot right along the shore. Something didn’t look right. I dropped my pack and went over to chat. He was about my age and we exchanged a few words and he asked me if I had seen a party of three younger men with a certain description. I said no, and then he started to cry vigorously and became very distressed and sorrowful. He said that they were his sons and a friend, and they became separated somewhere between Piute Creek and Ramona Lake. He said they were not especially experienced and given that it had rained every night, and that they were a day (or two?) overdue, he was fearful that they had a terrible accident. I did all I could to console him, and promised that we would hasten along and try to alert the authorities as best we could. I offered him food but he said he had plenty.
By the time we got to Lower Honeymoon it had started raining hard again. We searched around the lake for some time but didn’t see anybody or even traces. Dropping down to Piute Ck. we walked in rain gear as far the last place where the Piute trail runs by the creek, as I knew there was no reliable water higher up. It poured all night.
Next day we were up and out early, hoping to get back to Bishop early enough to alert a ranger if we didn’t see one. We spoke to everyone we passed going up to and over Piute Pass, but no one had seen anybody matching the description of the men we were given. We filed a report, but never heard how things worked out.
The take home for me was that I can no longer take my stamina and fitness as a given, and that we need to heed injuries (my wife’s) and have a back-up plan that isn’t as demanding. And maybe pack lighter, gawd forbid!
This trip was a bit of an important and humbling heads-up for me and my wife. It was the first time we had to make a strategic retreat because of injury/lack of physical ability. I am reasonably active and 60 years old but for the last year had not worked-out except ww kayaking, my wife is 55 and a true athlete, but in June had an injury that impacted her knee.
Our plan was to go over Piute Pass, up to Honeymoon Lake, over to Ramona Lake then around the northwest side of Glacier Divide, and contour high above Evolution Basin and come out Lamarck Col. It didn’t seem especially ambitious at the time….
Our first day was over Piute Pass, then up to Lower Honeymoon Lake. I had not been that way in decades and didn’t find the use trail to LHL for sometime. It is not where the sign is by the horse camp, and I cussed a blue streak until I found it. Then it was up to the lake just in time for a spectacular thunder storm with pounding rain. That was a solid day, but during the night my wife complained about her knee and frankly I was pretty wiped.
Next day over the hump to Ramona Lake, and oddly I felt kinda weak and a bit shaky, so we called it a day even though we had not gone all that far. I was surprised by two things at Ramona: 1) someone has built stone furniture and a ginormous fire ring with stacked firewood, despite the fact it is obviously a ‘no fires’ location, and 2) Someone had taken stones and built a large peace sign with a big cairn in the center.
The next day we headed out around the northwest corner of Glacier Divide which has a ducked trail in places. We were heading for Lake 10907, and found a nice ‘sneak route’ down the steep eastern cliffs. What a great spot! But again we found a veritable living room of rock furniture around a large fire ring with stacked firewood, and again a large stone peace sign. This was something of an outrage frankly. But more importantly, my wife’s knee was really bothering her and I couldn’t seem to shake my sense of constant fatigue. It was clear that we would need a day without packs.
Next day we hiked (sans packs) up from Lake 10907 to the higher string of lakes to the south that lead up to the crossing of Glacier Divide before dropping down to Lake 11236. The weather was broken with thunder and some rain. We dropped down to Lake 11236 and then turned around and headed back to our camp at Lake 10907. When we got back it became clear that there was no way we could continue. My wife’s knee was painful even without a load and I was feeling beat. So we had to reverse our route back over Piute.
That evening I went over to the peace sign and found a small plastic container in the middle. Inside a found a pair of women’s thong panties from Fredrick’s of Hollywood and on pink paper a note that read,
“Anything you can do I can do better, I can do anything better than you…I am woman hear me roar. The Pink Panty Possy Mountaineer Club (no boys allowed!)”
Written on the back of this dated Aug. 10, 2009, read,
“We have visited this lake and named it Mystery Lake in 2005. The Dad’s and Daughter’s Backcountry Builders and Climbers”
Welcome to the wilderness! I guess the Dad’s and Daughters figure that basic rules about fires and leave no trace are for others…same for PPPMC.
The next day we went back to Ramona and while taking a break I went over to the peace sign there and found another plastic container with yep, a pair of thong panties and more words from the PPPMC. But this time the Dad’s and Daughters dinging them for not leaving more firewood. Good grief, is there no end to the idiocy?
But then things took a serious turn. Leaving Ramona Lake I saw a guy kind of sitting on a sleeping bag in an odd spot right along the shore. Something didn’t look right. I dropped my pack and went over to chat. He was about my age and we exchanged a few words and he asked me if I had seen a party of three younger men with a certain description. I said no, and then he started to cry vigorously and became very distressed and sorrowful. He said that they were his sons and a friend, and they became separated somewhere between Piute Creek and Ramona Lake. He said they were not especially experienced and given that it had rained every night, and that they were a day (or two?) overdue, he was fearful that they had a terrible accident. I did all I could to console him, and promised that we would hasten along and try to alert the authorities as best we could. I offered him food but he said he had plenty.
By the time we got to Lower Honeymoon it had started raining hard again. We searched around the lake for some time but didn’t see anybody or even traces. Dropping down to Piute Ck. we walked in rain gear as far the last place where the Piute trail runs by the creek, as I knew there was no reliable water higher up. It poured all night.
Next day we were up and out early, hoping to get back to Bishop early enough to alert a ranger if we didn’t see one. We spoke to everyone we passed going up to and over Piute Pass, but no one had seen anybody matching the description of the men we were given. We filed a report, but never heard how things worked out.
The take home for me was that I can no longer take my stamina and fitness as a given, and that we need to heed injuries (my wife’s) and have a back-up plan that isn’t as demanding. And maybe pack lighter, gawd forbid!