A 15 day attempt to give the SHR a whirl got morphed into a 8 day trip in the southern Sierra due to covid. I joined locals Craig and Adan, guys I have enjoyed several trips with over the years, for a an exploration of the some of the southern Sierra’s.
I flew in on a Friday afternoon and we were out the door the next morning at 5-ish, heading for Lone Pine to pick up walk up permits for our adventure. Arriving at the interagency facility as it opened and only seeing one vehicle in the parking lot with thought this was a slam dunk. No slam dunk, not close. They completely changed walk up permits, as in you don’t walk up anymore. After a half day of phone calls, using the internet with our phones and finally a drive back to Lone Pine to have our permits printed and signed, we were on our way.
We left a vehicle at the Shepherd Pass trailhead (our exit) and headed up to our entry point, Kearsarge trailhead. It was after 1:00 PM, but we had packs (heavy packs laden with 8 days (12-ish lbs) of food, 4 pounds of water and a 2.5 lb bear canister) on and moving for Kearsarge Pass. Kearsarge Pass is just under 12,000′ and gains close to 3000′ in 5 miles. With little to no shade, oxygen getting less and less and our heavy packs- it was a bit of grind.
With evening at hand we dropped into the Kearsarge Lake chain and found a nice spot for our first night.
The next morning we were up early as we had another big pass to climb Glen Pass along with another climb through Rae Col for our next destination- 60 Lakes Basin.
Bullfrog Lake the lowest lake in the Kearsarge chain.
Glen Pass was steep and tough, but we made it in decent time. Looking into the Rae Lakes basin, of note are the unnamed lakes on the left- this is where we depart the trail for Rae Col.
We took our lunch at the lakes and planned our route to the col, things went pretty smoothly and soon we were at the Rae Col, heading down into the 60 Lake Basin.
Everyone was itching to get our Tenkara rods out, but not a single fish rising or cruising the shore could be see. Craig said that state was eradicating some stocked lakes to help a threatened species of frog (this was confirmed the next day at a lake that had gill net nets deployed). So went for a swim instead claiming islands as our own
The next morning we headed up another drainage to get up and over 60 Lakes Col, entering the Gardiner Basin.
Some climbing and scrambling eventually got us up to the col.
The Three Amigos- Let’s Ride!
Dropping off this col was very difficult, time consuming and tedious. When I finally made it to the bottom Craig and Adan were out of sight, lost in the large talus. I did see a pine marten, presumably hunting the numerous pika that inhabit this granite maze.
I finally caught with the guys and found just a wee bit of shade to eat lunch.
I took us awhile to make it around the big lake as it was also strewn with a myriad of different sized granite as well.
There is a route shown on some maps (no semblance of a trail, just a dotted route); at the outlet to the large large it showed climbing to the east and then slowly angling for the lakes below. Craig and Adan and looked it over and said we could go straight down- hmmm. Who am I to argue :)
When we made it down to the lakes, I spied a decent sized trout cruising the shoreline. We decided to knock off a little early and call it a day. Everyone broke out their tenkara rods and not much time everyone had caught 2-3 eating sized golden trout.
We brought stuff for fish tacos and Craig brought a small fry pan. Despite a few culinary errors be me, we got it done.
We enjoyed the evening, rehashing our first couple of days out and what was left in store.
part two coming up
