I completed the loop July 22, 2014. I'll do a prologue as Part 1 and describe the rest of the loop in Part 2.
PART 1
I had never hiked anywhere in the Eastern Sierra south of Bishop Pass area besides Langley from Horeshoe Meadows. I had nearly a week to work with and thunderstorms were forecast as more likely to be severe the farther north one went. We made it to Tioga Pass late Monday night. After sleeping in, we managed to walk the dogs and start adjusting to altitude by doing a family hike from Saddlebag Lake to Greenstone Lake.
- Starting young!
- Greenstone Lake with Conness and North Peak
As we drove from Saddlebag Lake to Lee Vining, the downpours began, so we drove south through thunderstorms with an eye on forecasts. It looked like using Horseshoe Meadows-Langley as an additional warm up hike and adventure for the dogs was a safe bet and then staying south of Big Pine would likely give us the best weather the following days.
- Langley stands waiting for us on route through Cottonwood Lakes to Old Army Pass
The obvious choice to be able to stay in a different high altitude campground and away from the Whitney zoo was Onion Valley; I finally would have an opportunity to check it out. The campground was pleasant and the host, James, was the best we've experienced.
My feet were a bit sore from the dayhikes of the previous two days, but my six year old daughter wanted to go on a hike, so we started up the Kearsarge Pass trail. We soon came upon the sign for Golden Trout Lakes and my daughter was adamant that she wanted to go up that trail. We both ended up pleased with the opportunity for adventure.
- The easier route is across the stream by this point, but this way is more fun! Seriously, the area is steep, rugged, and riddled with unmaintained use trails through rockslides, but it is easy class 2 if one crosses the creek before this point.
- An exciting opportunity to use the Steripen for some fresh drinking water.
- The first lake (farthest southeast)
- Gould Pass is up there above Golden Trout Lake. One could circle around the lake on its right side and pick a way straight up the gully to the low spot on the ridge,...
- ...but one could also approach it from up this chute and then traverse right. I would consider pushing a bit higher than necessary to tag Gould.
We noticed a lone hiker scrambling WSW up from the south side of the lake toward Mt. Gould.
- Unnecessary, fun scrambling. Catch up to that guy, we must!
We followed, eventually catching him when he started to wonder exactly where he was and if continuing upward was possible to do safely.
- Start up this slope, but stay right if planning to traverse to Gould Pass or to summit Gould.
Alex was out taking full advantage of relocating to Independence for his job at Manzanar. I checked my map while he checked a fancy app he had downloaded. I can relate to the challenge of correctly identifying peaks that stand among crowded terrain, so the recently purchased peak-finding app sounded great to me. However, I was more confident about my old fashioned assessment of where we were in relation to Gould's summit than what Alex indicated. The rough cross country terrain we were climbing isn't the kind of slope most folks intentionally seek out. Alex claimed it was a once in a lifetime experience for him. I now wonder if it grew on him afterward (or not). I assured him we would quickly reach the ridge overlooking the east side of Kearsarge Pass, with the possibility of dislodging loose rocks onto each other as the only real danger. We took care not to do that, negotiated a slightly less than class 3 move, and were relaxing atop the ridge in a few minutes.
- The GTL basin
I couldn't talk either companion into heading for Gould, but did get some father-daughter pics and a side trip to Kearsarge Pass as consolation. Despite her refusal to catch the full peakbagging bug, I had trouble keeping up with my daughter as she bounded down to the trailhead.
- University Peak looms above us after our plunge step traverse down to Kearsarge Pass from our unorthodox spot for a ridge crossing.
The next day, I waited out some thunderstorms before hiking University Pass, University Peak, Center Basin, Bubbs Creek, Vidette Meadow, and Kearsarge Pass.
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To be continued...
