High Sierra Topix

There we were, settled in comfortably at idyllic Rutherford Lake high on the approach to Fernandez Pass, and resting after a brief rainshower had encouraged us to race up the last half-mile of the trail and set up our tent.

After the sprinkles had disappeared, I set to rigging my fly rod, while my wife napped peacefully in the tent--a scene of domestic bliss in the Sierra.

Suddenly, loud voices rang out from across the lake. I looked up to see two cowboys, complete with hats, chaps, boot and spurs, come tromping over the granite along the lake shore. They were hootin' and hollerin' as if they had ridden into Virginia City after weeks on the trail.

"How's fishin?'" one yelled out to P from fifty yards away.

"I don't know," I responded quietly, "I haven't started yet."

The quiet voice, as much as the answer, seemed to put a damper on their noise level.

They clambered over the rocks on the ridge east of the lake, and I could hear the spurs jingle and boots thump long after they disappeared from view.

I went down to the lake and began floating casts over the dark, quiet waters of the lake.

A few minutes later, the thump and jingle boys were back...clomping right through our campsite and back to their horses--which they had tied up in the muddy flats only fifteen feet from the waters of the lake.

"That's was a nice little hike," he heard one of them say to the other, from across the water.

And then they were gone, riding their horses down towards the Fernandez Pass Trail.

Sure was quiet when they left. Peaceful.

So...how was the fishin'?

Hah!

You can read about that trip in the Fishing section of this website!

Nice story...brings back a lot of fine memories.
Have also experienced the pleasure of that instantaneous contented silence after everybody vacates the area. Maybe that is why usually go solo, but something magic seems inevitable when, at a high country lake, and everybody else finally goes away. For some reason the senses immediately become more alive. (Anybody who solos knows exactly what I mean.) Sometimes, the silence is deafening.

As posted earlier at Saddlebag this summer, one Sunday evening and the last ferry collected all the day hikers, leaving me the only one in sight at the far end. Nothing like being the only one at a spectacular lake...this time, that is when a bald eagle came by and paid me a visit.