High Sierra Topix

Jimr wrote:Once you hit oak forest, it's just a slippery trail buried to the shin with oak leaves and often obscured. One person on the board described it as a whole lot of hell for a little bit of heaven.

How much hell it is really depends on how well you avoid the masses of poison oak near the bottom of the trail.

Poison Oak? Oh yeah, I slid right through that stuff, no problem. Until I started breaking out all over.

No massive rattlesnakes everywhere? Wow, that was a good trip.

No massive rattlesnakes everywhere? Wow, that was a good trip.

Been there twice, once in July another in Aug, saw a couple on the first trip, none on the second. Even though Tehipite Dome is beautiful, personally I would not go down if I could not get past Crown Creek, some of the highlights are beyond that point.

AlmostThere wrote:No massive rattlesnakes everywhere? Wow, that was a good trip.

Been there twice and never saw a rattlesnake, though I know that's unusual. On the other hand, a couple years ago I did a dayhike up Bubbs Creek and saw five of them (though fortunately I only startled two).

I spent 5 days there and didn't see any rattlers, but I did see 4 bears and almost stepped on a beehive.

We saw more than 2 rattlers a day on a 4-day stay in the Valley during a heat spell in late June. Lots of raptor activity might explain the very dark coloring they all have so I avoided stepping on Sugar Pine deadfall while walking. I've caught fish with large talon gashes and once found a recently deceased Northern Goshawk on the trail near Blue Canyon Falls.



On the trail back to Wishon I couldn't stop watching for them even tho chances of encounters were more normal.