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Gardiner Basin 2008 Page Three
"…how serene and balanced everything seemed…"
Morning brought with it renewed optimism and a bit of an appetite on Sam's part, who fired up his stove and made a pot of steaming hot masala chai. After breaking camp, we topped up our water containers and started uphill towards 11,220+ ft. elevation Gardiner Pass. The trail became more sporadic, but that was of little consequence since we could plainly see the pass above us. We climbed up through scattered pines over decomposed granite soil. As we ascended, the views behind us of the Charlotte Creek drainage and Bubbs Creek canyon beyond grew ever more dramatic. Going ever higher, the peaks at the crest of the Kings-Kern divide began to dominate the skyline.
The last few hundred feet of elevation gain towards the pass were fairly steep and became increasingly rocky. You can tell when you're on a steeper slope when you look out and notice you're looking at the tops of even nearby trees, as in the photograph above.
I really enjoy steeper passes, since the view of the other side is revealed so quickly. One moment, you're toiling upwards with nearby rocks, trees, and soil the only thing in your visual field; the next moment, your eye can sweep across many square miles of lakes, forests, mountains, and canyons. Wow!
(Photo by Sam Duran, looking north from Gardiner Pass)
Off with the packs, out with the cameras and SPOT and food! The combination of the thinner air, exertion, and sudden dramatic visual stimulation gives me (and, by appearances, others) quite a powerful rush of pleasurable sensation, intense enough to feel like shouting with joy. And perhaps we did; I don't recall. But I remember smiling so hard my face began to hurt. This is what we came to see!
(Photo by Sam Duran, looking south from Gardiner Pass)
While I sent a SPOT location fix and generally scampered about, Sam took a well-deserved break. I peered down the northern side to reconnoiter our route. Having read somewhere that the best route was to hike 50 or 100 yards east up the crest of the ridge, I was able to quickly find the trace of the old trailbed, and also noticed the scary-looking slot some must have scrambled down, not knowing there was a much easier trail just to the east.
Lengthening our hiking poles, we slowly eased down the steep and rocky northern side of the pass. The trail was in surprisingly good shape, easy to follow, but like most older trails went down quite directly. The old trail builders apparently put a big premium on "quick to build" and far less emphasis on "easy on the knees." Yet considering everything, I could definitely imagine people with (but probably not "on") horses going down or up this trail. A comment from my journal: Coming down the pass on the north side was pretty easy, the sort of gradient and route I'd have no qualms taking novices on. Both Sam and I had a couple of minor slips, alerting us to concentrate on each footfall and pole placement. With only about 500 feet of elevation loss, we were out of the steep boulder field and talus so could look back at the route we'd just traveled, chuckling at how something you've just come down may look quite intimidating even though you know it really wasn't.
A small lake we'd seen from the pass lay waiting, its margin mossy and sprinkled with flowers. The passes and boulder fields are the price of entry; these unspoiled, sparkling, perfect little lakes, gentle forests, and emerald meadows are, to me, the goal and the reward of cross-country hiking in the Sierra.
Journal entry: Many small lakes along this drainage, more than shown on map. Small frogs in a couple of shallower ones, brook trout in the lower larger ones including this one [the northernmost.] Fish seem pretty small.
We walked along the drainage, snapping photos and looking at interesting plants, animals, and geology. Our goal was to make it to the lowermost lake in the drainage, lake 9530, and camp. We arrived there around 3 PM, found a previously-used campsite at the northern end of the lake, set up our tents, and relaxed. Sam took his relaxing a bit more seriously than I did!
The afternoon sunlight was quite special, bringing many details of the lake and surrounding peaks into sharp focus. I marveled at how serene and balanced everything seemed.
With our typical human perception of time, it's natural to perceive such a place as being static: frozen in time. But sitting quietly in the hush, I recalled again how truly dynamic is such a landscape. Those grassy sedges at the water's edge: a month ago they had not yet emerged. The fluidity of the lake's surface: four months ago it had been cold hard ice. The sharp edges of the surrounding peaks: powerful geologic evidence of a landscape in flux, upthrusts of rock carved yearly by ice and wind and rain and snow, shaken and twisted by tectonic movements deep in the crust along the edge of this North American Plate. The logs lying in the water: even now softening, being consumed by unseen legions of living things while also being dissolved by the soft water of the lake. Liquid water, the universal solvent, the compound required by every form of life we've so far discovered: amazing stuff. The warmth of sunlight on my cheek reminded me: without that light from our nearby star, I could not have witnessed this landscape with such clarity. Furthermore, without the sunlight's daily contribution of energy (about a kilowatt per square meter at mid-day) much of what I gazed upon would vanish irrevocably. I felt very honored to be a small short-lived observer of this abundance of beauty.
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