TR: Humphrey's Basin & Piute Canyon from North Lake 8/22-8/28/2023

[Love the Sierra]

Hi friends,
So sorry for the tardy TR. since I got back from my second trip, I have been buried in work and family obligations.
Since there have been so many posts about this area this season, I will not discuss the entire trip, but rather fill in gaps that others have not mentioned. @SSSDave, thank you so much for the suggestion of Tomahawk and a big thanks again to all of you with your many good suggestions ahead of the trip!!

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The day we went over Piute Pass and into Humphreys, we encountered over 20 people heading towards Desolation lake. I was SO HAPPY to have the wonderfully beautiful Tomahawk all to myself!! The night was so quiet, it was a silence that I have not experienced in a long, long time. So silent, that my own heartbeat and breathing were annoyingly loud! The granite glistened in the starlight and the lake was just magnificent at night! It was a great place to just sit and watch the lake jumping with fish!! I saw a group of 5 big horn sheep at Tomahawk and, with my new monocular, got a great look at them! I also dismantled an illegal fire ring.

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After exploring around Humphyrey's for a couple of days, we moved on to the Golden Trout lakes, to explore Piute Canyon.

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There was a tremendous amount of water here and all of the creeks, lakes, streams and ponds were overflowing their banks and usual boundaries!! Everything was lush and blooming!! We camped at Lower Golden Trout where I dismantled a few more illegal fire rings.

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We saw and heard so many birds, owls, frogs, toads, tadpoles, fish and more! It was a wonderland of life!!

[Love the Sierra]

We day hiked from Lower golden Trout down Piute Canyon to Hutchinson Meadow. Piute Creek was an amazing site to see!! The forest and flowers were beautiful and though it was a true delight to walk the canyon, I am not going to post more pics of flowers and trees, since there have been so many this season and I promised to only fill in the gaps.

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On the way out, we made easy, short work of Piute Pass so I decided to go check out Muriel Lake.

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We moseyed along the trail, not eager to leave.

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I thoroughly enjoyed the lush garden and gorgeous geology on the way out.

[kpeter]

Some pretty images, but nothing beats your picture with Jasmine Rose! That dog looks incredibly happy to be out! I loved lower Golden Trout lake when I was there, but it was not such a wet year. It looks like quite the watery wonderland.

[balzaccom]

A beautiful area, with lots of options to explore. Thanks for taking us along. There are plenty of small golden trout in that basin!

[giantbrookie]

I'm glad your trip was a success. It is amazing how much things look like a typical July in late August this year, be it the amount of snow, or the flow of Piute Creek.

[Love the Sierra]

Ken, my Jasmine does does love the adventure! Oh boy did we have a fight over not hunting marmots though!!
It was gorgeous out there. I am so glad we got to enjoy all of that water with manageable skeeters!
Tomahawk had none for the first day and a half! Golden Trout had them like an early august, not so bad.

[Love the Sierra]

@GiantBrookie, yes, LOTS of jumping fish.
@Balzaccom (Paul) yes, plenty of places to explore. As a matter of fact, I did not want to make the story too long, but...

Every year, we are losing more and more opportunities to hike the high country of our local Angeles Forest due to heat waves and fires and this year, due to road closures and heat waves. I used to hike good 15-20 mile day hikes between 8000-10,000' every weekend during the summer. This summer, I was hiking between 7,000-9,000' . (The Ventura County mountains are closer to the ocean so much cooler.) In any case, it took its toll, I was EXHAUSTED from the altitude as soon as I got over 10,000'.

I had expected, as before, to hike to Loch Leven the first driving day, up and over the pass and to Tomahawk the next. However, the next day I awoke as exhausted as I had been before I went to sleep the previous day. Spending the night over 10,500' had not helped at all. In addition, we awoke to clouds, lots of them, over Piute Pass.

I packed camp and all so slowly began the hike up. It was excruciatingly slow, but I just could not go any faster, the altitude was just knocking me out. The clouds kept building. I asked hikers coming down what it looked like, they all said much worse on the other side. (Well, of course, the storms come from the West.)

Had I felt well, I would have made it up and over and to Tomahawk by afternoon, with a good chance of beating the storm. However, I was in no shape to race anything, let alone a storm and I did not want to be one of those stories, "She just made a bad choice. She could not go very fast and when their hair began to stand on end, there was no place to shelter. Her poor little dog." At the top of Piute Lake, at the last reasonably sheltered spot, I built the tent and decided to wait and see if it would blow out. We had lunch and and took a nap.

It did not clear out at all. I made camp and decided to explore the remainder of the day. I was on a hunt for flowers and waterfalls. I found plenty of flowers of all varieties. There have been so many flower shots this season, I will not post more. The waterfalls and cascades were amazing. I even found snow icebergs! There were wonders I would have never seen from the trail.

[SSSdave]

Glad to see you found one of those 3 hidden nicely shaded camp spots on that rib that so many miss and then end up tenting at one of those bright sunny shade-less sites near the outlet bay. Although many heading towards Humphreys Basin speed through the lakes east of Piute Pass, one might argue they are more scenic through most of any day versus lakes just west of the pass, due to its impressive deep canyon with Emerson's colorful metamorphic geology. Thus I always stop there on my first day. Additionally, that allows more easily reaching the more distant areas of HB on day 2. Love the sleeping photo of Jasmine. So doggy.

[Love the Sierra]

@sssDave Yes, Loch Leven and Piute Lakes basin is gorgeous!!
I also fell in love with Tomahawk and our camp was ideal from the standpoint of getting water back to camp and the view. It was also easy access to the lake and we walked down to see the stars and mountains reflecting in it at night. It was fun to walk the circumference of that funny shaped lake. We also walked up the peak on the west side of the lake.

[Gazelle]

was just day hiking by Tomahawk lake absolutely beautiful with great views!