Advice needed: I should cancel Evol. Vly,-Goddard, right?

[jillsocean]

Hi,
Looking for help accepting the obvious - I should cancel a trip with two friends to Florence-Evolution-Goddard Canyon Loop, Tuesday (8/6)-Sun(8/12) due to smoke, right? It looked _okay_ yesterday, but today looks awful. One friend is flying in from Seattle. First 6-night trip in a very long time so I am very disappointed. Any backup suggestions? We are looking at last-minute plane tickets to Seattle. Thanks - first post but I've learned so much from you all on this forum.
Jill

[maverick]

Hi Jill,
Welcome to HST!

Not to keep you from visiting such a beautiful section of the Sierra, but with the current conditions, it might be prudent to reschedule your trip for another time, that area has so much beauty to offer, but with limited visibility, even only on some days, just takes away from such a special trip, which really deserves to be seen in much more ideal conditions, especially when travelling in from another state.

You might seriously consider going to either the Alpine Lakes Wilderness or Cascades NP in Washington State instead, but do check wildfire/smoke status in those areas too, there is a pretty big fire right accross the border in Canada.

[windknot]

I haven't been keeping a close watch on fires yet but have you considered moving your trip further south/north in case that might help you evade the smoke? I have a trip in northern KCNP tentatively planned for late August (flying in from Seattle for this one) and if smoke makes this unlikely then I plan to either shift the trip further north to Emigrant or further south to the Whitney area.

[jillsocean]

Thank you both for your input. We are sleeping on it, but odds are we will postpone. Windknot, on Friday and Saturday, it was bad everywhere, as shown Maverick's post here: http://www.highsierratopix.com/communit ... 40#p138748

Even Lake Tahoe was socked in by smoke today.

[TurboHike]

Jill, the winds shifted recently, areas in the Eastern Sierra that were very smokey yesterday are now much clearer. Here are a few webcam shots from this morning:

http://bishopweather.com/

https://www.wunderground.com/webcams/burall/1/show.html

http://www.whitneyzone.com/webcam/whitney.jpg

http://www.whitneyzone.com/webcam/will/willi.jpg

Yesterday when I looked, there were no mountains visible! Of course if the winds shift again it might be smokey again.

Here is where I found those webcams (go here for updates or to see more):

https://www.sierranevadawebcams.com/eas ... rra-nevada

cheers,

TurboHike

[balzaccom]

There is now a large fire on Highway 108 towards Sonora Pass...mandatory evacuation of Clark Fork, Dardanelles, and Kennedy Meadows:

https://inciweb.nwcg.gov/incident/6092/

[jillsocean]

Thank you for these links! We are going to proceed ahead, with caution. May move further south. Thanks again.

[maverick]

Hi Jill,

Monitor this site and check these links:
Make sure to update the dates at the top of this first link, it is currrenly set for 8/5.
https://tools.airfire.org/websky/v1/run ... 00/#viewer
https://www.windy.com/?800h,37.462,-121.185,7

[AlmostThere]

I just returned from Dinkey Wilderness, some miles west of Goddard and south of Florence Lake. Despite terrible air quality at Shaver Lake on the drive up it was hazy and then clear in Dinkey. I do not think predictions can be made... There was a fire near Shaver and it was still tolerable.

Never seen Dinkey so deserted.... We sawed trees in solitude and spent an exceptionally quiet night at the first lake.

[astrogerly]

I'd say give it a whirl, but I'm a bit biased as I LOVE Evolution (and the Sierra). The smoke will vary from day to day, but it will usually be clear in the mornings. We did Lamarck - Muir/Evo - Piute over a four day span during the early stages of the Rough Fire (before it started raining ash in LeConte, etc). We couldn't really cancel our trip (well, we technically could) because my now husband planned to propose to me in Evolution. We did modify our trip - cut out two days (planned for 6 nights) - but even with smoke at times it was worth it. We'd been to Evolution before and it was interesting to see how different it could be when you had to look at it with a new perspective (when the smoke limited the distant views). I did a little trip report which has a link to photos... "Mini-Evolution TR"... and it shows the contrast you might experience from morning to afternoon/evening.