Here we are in front of the otherworldly Lake Aloha, a shallow giant puddle dotted with tiny granite islands. We passed five lakes during our trip - there are seven within eight miles of the Glen Alpine trailhead! - and spent most of the time not hiking or tending to camp swimming in the frigid water.
Boo got to work on his favorite hobby, retrieving and chewing sticks close to the lakeshore. This poor dog has never worked this hard in his life. It's hard to be a black dog under a Sierra sun, a picky eater when pickins are slim, and a light sleeper when the ground is cold and hard (though he tried to alleviate this last issue by waiting until I appeared to be asleep and then crawling on top of my sleeping bag (with me still inside)). Next time I will probably not (1) take a black dog (2) on backpacking trips (3) in places named "Desolation" anything (it is so called because there are no trees, hence no shade, in this stretch of the Sierras). I'm also thinking about getting Boo a little sleeping bag because he didn't seem to sleep at all the two nights we were out - we've been home 26 hours and he has slept for 25.5 hours of that time.
Me trying to stay warm after an afternoon dip in Gilmore Lake, also choking down the world's driest, grossest food (drywall-esque lavash bread with peanut butter and honey).
Ruth and Olivia on top of Mt. Tallac, 9700 feet. Tahoe, which is apparently larger than Hong Kong, is behind them. We did a day hike to the top of Tallac on our last day, and managed to get lost on the poorly marked trail and bushwacked back to Gilmore Lake. Leave Some TraceTM!
The top of Tallac, looking out toward Tahoe. Apparently there were big wildfires right by Fallen Leaf Lake, which is where we were, but we didn't see anything, even from here.
Me and Olivia in Gilmore. Cropped out of the bottom right side of this photo is a little black dog in a dirty orange bandana barking his head off at us. Each time we would go further than fifteen feet out into the water he would panic and bark and whine as if telling us we were about to drown, and wouldn't stop until we'd returned to shore.
Desolation is also so called because the trails are just jagged pieces of gravel, not the soft fluffy duff this east coast trooper is used to. Boo wore these cheap red booties to protect his paws, which I also waxed with Paw Wax for further toughening, but he had worn through both sides of all four boots by the end of the second day. He would also lose these boots at a rate of one per hour, sending us running back along the trail to find it, and therefore effectively doubling the distance that we hiked every day. I kept thinking that the human analogy to these boots would be Chuck Taylors, and that I wouldn't want to be trampling over granite gravel with just a piece of canvas between me and the rocks. Boo's paws were in pretty rough shape by the end of the trip, so next time we go I'll buy the heavy duty dog boots for him.
Clyde Lake, our first day's campsite. It is at the south end of Rockbound Valley, a scree scramble that goes on for three miles.
Olivia resting her bones.
Olivia and me during the first mile of the hike. I thought I might try to do ultralight backpacking but decided that I didn't have the money to make that possible. Our packs ended up being about 35 lbs. per person, including food and water (I also carried all of Boo's kibbles, snacks, and leashes), which is not so bad considering that the longer trips I've been on have been with 40+ lb. bags. My new 60 liter (3700 cubic inch) REI bag, which replaced the heavy green 5,000 cubic inch monstrosity that I used for nine years, was just about filled to capacity - I don't think I can do a solo trip of longer than three days with it, and definitely not something that requires a bear cannister, at least until I figure out how to design the parasol/poncho/tent/hiking pole contraption that I know is possible.
Ruth at day's end on Gilmore Lake. There were more people at this place than anywhere else we'd seen all weekend, but then again it was Saturday and this is the closest camping spot to the trailhead, and even then there weren't that many people. To the right of this picture is the world's dustiest campsite, where I pitched my tarp in a dust bowl and woke up with a dust mustache and dust caked on my gums.
Okay, that's it for now. Three days is a great length for a backpacking trip because it's long enough so that you have to concentrate on all the distracting backpacking tasks and triumphs (like successfully shitting) so you forget about your ordinary life, but short enough that you can get right back to your ordinary life when your free time ends on Sunday night. I can't wait to do this again and am open to suggestions for autumn weekend trips accessible by public transportation out of New York. Any takers?
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