TIOGA-MONO-Etc

We stomped around Tioga a little bit, now we're well down the dry side, it's 4:30, we're just past the Lee Vining Canyon camps where we've stayed before, elevation about 7800. So PRESSURIZED down here! And here all the goldenbrush still has its yellow blossoms, a very colorful view, shades of greens and yellows and tawny browns. interspersed with granite grays and lava blacks and reds.

NOTE: There is plenty of RV water available at a tap below the Lee Vining ranger station.

Mono Lake dead ahead - oh, the lake level looks pretty low... Lee Vining is the same cruddy pitstop, although with the infrastructure upgraded a bit. And fuel is actually cheaper here than back in Chinese Camp.... Rolling along Mono Lake's west coast, resorts along here have been refurbished... But we note that Mono Lake just doesn't seem as magical as it did when we first started visiting, 25 years ago. And I ask: Is it the locale, or is it us? Probably both. Still if we had a few days now, we'd plop down and enjoy it, fer sure.

We're heading towards the grade that slithers steeply snakily up to Conway Summit, all the hills in view are sere and austere and blear, burnt and dehydrated, late-season fried in color and texture. The sun's fairly low, shadows are long, deep blue on the grey-brown sage.

Mono Lake may be low now [see MONO LAKE LIVE] but unlike earlier years we don't have dust storms of alkalai grit blowing thru the air, burning our faces and eyes and mucous mumbranes. The sky and air are clear, no clouds overhead. Step out in the sun and be instantly friccasseed.

Off to the east, Boundary Peak and the White Mountains along the edge of Nevada. The air's a bit hazy in that direction, the Whites are kinda hard to see. So my statement about clear air, that only applies if you're looking straight up. What we need is a good rain for some picture-postcard days so we can snap images and not have to color-correct them. Much.

And as we top Conway Summit, around 8150 feet, off to the left in the gulches and gullies on the dry sage-covered hills are many stands of willows or poplars, most still green but many turning yellow, the autumn colors intruding on us. Maureen sez they're prob'ly alder and poplar. But whatever they are, they're only a small smidge on the landscape. They're in the cuts. Most of this terrain here is rolling dry sage barrens holding the sand together.

Cruising down thru rocky cuts we pass Dogtown and the turnoff to Bodie Ghost Town, we wanna get back THERE sometime soon, regain that high lonesome feeling. And maybe even see What Lies Beyond. [trip strategy discussion deleted]

Coming into Bridgeport, by the side of the road we pass an old wagon - well maybe it's old, maybe it's just backdated. [apathy notes deleted] Yeah Bridgeport, highest gas prices in California. Cowabunga.

Rolling out of Bridgeport the terrain gets sparse again. Ya almost expect the High Plains Drifter to come ambling in without warning. Climbing into the pass north of town the aspens are quaking away, yellow willows flutter here along the watercourse. The view is inspiring. Why, I almost feel like singing a li'l ol' country song:

A SONG: Long Way To Bodie

 Drivin' cross the hot plains, I stomp on the gas
 Doin' leg exercises so I can kick your ass
 If that semi don't give way, I ain't never gonna pass
 And it's a long, long way to Bodie
 -
 Road's lined with range maggots, their sheepy little butts
 Ya throw trash our yer window, ya lousy drunken putz
 Ya might do somethin; brave if ya only had the nutz
 And it's a long, long way to Bodie
 -
[bridge;]
 The countryside looks gra-and, and it's
 Blowin' driftin' sa-and thru yer ears, yer ears
 The hillside are so dry, just like yer throat
 When you run outa beers, outa be-ee-ers
 -
 The sun's beating down, I think I gotta cough
 The road is rockin' ripply, the shoulder is soft
 If the road gets any narrower, I gotta push ya off
 And it's a long, long way to Bodie
 -
[bridge;]
 Been drivin' way too long, my eyes
 They is gettin' pretty tired, pretty tired
 The air is so dry that my boogers
 They are getting really tired, really ti-ired
 -
[repeat first verse]
 And it's a long, long way to Bodie, yee-hah!

Composed at Devils Gate Summit, elevation 7951

WALKER RIVER COUNTRY

We've shot beyond the Sonora Pass turnoff, we're up in West Fork Walker River country now, Beyond these hillsides with all the sage and not much else there's a couple of peaks all covered in evergreens, really lovely country. We keep coming back to these dry ranges and basins east of the Sierras and I've been thinking, What's the draw? What gets us out here, besides there being fewer people and generally better air? And one thing that strikes me is the TIMELESSNESS. Unless this turf is buried under snow or scoured by swirling dust and alkalai storms, it usually looks pretty much the same, most seasons.

Now it's late summer, flowers are blooming, trees are green, hillsides are their usual burnt color, a little water's running down there in the Walker. This could be late spring, or winter in-between storms after a melt, or just about any time. To look at it, anyway. You'd have a slightly different perception if yer wading around in the stream trying to outsmart fish.

Of course, events are linked. There's a reason the flowers are blooming and stuff is still green. And it's the same reason there are fires up above. And that's because, six or eight weeks ago a hurricane came up the Pacific coast and zapped Baja California again. Its northern edges spawned thunder-n-lightning storms up here, the lightning strikes set the fires whose smoke has been befouling our air for so long.

This Walker River highway takes us thru some real narrow, steep, crooked canyons - rocky at the bottom, sandy slopes up above, almost devoid of trees, what trees there are look pretty burnt. A long line of cars here trailing fitfully behind a big semi truck marked SWIFT, but isn't.

Now we're in the great metropolis of Walker, population 500, elevation 5400. We've been thru here in years past, this place looked like a baked cowflop of a Western town, but it's doing pretty good now. A couple trading posts with Injun Stuff. Lots of refurbished tourist facilities, two new galleries. A Deer-Hunter's Barbeque coming up. Walker MiniMall - antiques, gifts, car parts. Yeah, we'll be back, poke around town for an hour, that's about how long it'll take to see it all.

Walker don't look so bad now, eh? Of course that rain in the last few weeks probably washed off some of the grime. And it helps that it's late afternoon, the town's in shadow, not out in direct overhead blasting sunlight. This stretch of the Walker drainage is Antelope Valley - the hills on the west sure look dried, sandy, burnt, fried, a few skeletal charcoaled trees - and no antelope to be seen.

OVER MONITOR PASS

Now we're on the road climbing to Monitor Pass, we leave the Wild West behind for a couple weeks. And we see that these slopes aren't just sandy, they're granitic and steep. Crawling up the usual slash of a canyon with the usual dry groundcover, the usual riparian foliage in the gully, and the sun occasionally burning out my eyes.

We haven't been over Tioga Pass for a long time. We haven't been over Monitor Pass for even longer. What I remember, what to expect when we get further up is high green country with wonderful vistas. This time of year such vistas should include clear skies, fall colors and no snow. And fortunately nobody's biting our ass as we slowly wind our way up this steep grade in this heavy old RV beast.

Some trucks and big trailers by the roadside here, could be some drovers working at getting their cattle, hauling them from the summer ranges, trucking them off to greener winter pastures, or maybe to a slaughterhouse, whatever the case may be. Depending on how fat and juicy they are.

Climb up a little further and we're at one of those remembered vast vistas, here looking south into the great interior swathe of Slinkard Valley, looks like miles of great meadow for the cattle when the grass is green, which it ain't just now. We're only at 6000 feet here. [road prospects deleted] Well, wherever those thunderstorms struck, they sure didn't reach this far - all this country looks really burnt-over.

A little higher and we're above that vast firepit, officially the Slinkard Little Antelope Wildlife Area - we're coming up into more conifers and aspens now - greener, darker. Then we round a bend and we're overlooking a huge expanse of adjacent Nevada. And Maureen sez HOLY MOLY and she's quite right. Holy Moly Roly Poly. A few big gnarly volcanic cones that we threaded on our way up to here from the Walker, and then miles and miles of mountainous miles and miles out beyond, rising and falling and thrumming in their old mountainous way. Sharp shadows outline the contours of Slinkard Valley, revealing...

As we wind further eastward we're higher and more exposed and back in a burnt zone again. And pinhead, no pinwheel, no hairpin turns - will we make it? The suspense is killing me! Aaarrgh!! [weaving around on the road] Ok, we whip around that bend and we're at 7000 feet with smoke and dust and the sun in our eyes. My eyes! My eyes! [more weaving]

Just above 7000 feet it looks like an interior slope, a piñon-juniper community like the high Mohave, with various sages and desert brush. And ephedra, yeah, lots of ephedra here.

And around another few bends, we're on an outcropping overlooking the Western World, and hardly anybody else on this road to bother us. Around a few more bends we're in shadows again, still dry but no longer burnt. Here we can see where there are seeps along the hillside - the green, darker, more verdant vegetation, more blossoms. Above that, watercourses, deciduous trees with leaves turning color, those colors running in bands up above the road a couple hundred feet. All else is grey sage, or worse.

Now we're at the Alpine County line but the Pass is further on, beyond more swaths of color. Last time we came thru here, everything was under layers of snow. No leaves on these deciduous babies then. Ya don't even have to go to the East Coast to see autumn color.

MONITOR PASS: And here we are! Traversing an aspen grove and at its heart we pass the sign, Monitor Pass, 8324 feet. It's all downhill from here. Mostly. Up ahead we see the Sierras and smoke blowing off the Stanislaus fires. So let's inhale while we can.

Coming down into the intermountain valley that nestles Markleeville - beyond are the Sierra peaks, Mokelumne Wilderness ahead and Carson-Iceberg Wilderness to the left, all smirched and smudged with smoke. Murky mountains swathed in painful pastels of pyromaniacal purity. Gorsh, these here dangerous curves sure make me wax poetic!

Maureen sez I'm some sort of idiot for driving with one hand on the wheel, mouthing off into the tape recorder held in the other. And her point is?? Oh, that I'm an idiot. Well. OK.

Now we're whipping around more excruciating tight curves and knive-edged rocky cuts thru a vivid paper-thin canyon, under more of those damn colorful trees as well as darker conifers and a very verdant watercourse down below - which we will avoid joining and intermingling our juices with only by my superior driving skills, innate intelligence and the fickle finger of fate. If you're reading this, everything worked out fine.

Uh oh, here comes the sun again, there go my eyes.

Snow. We are passing banks of snow, across from Looper Canyon. Or maybe it's just sand that looks exactly like snow. But I wouldn't bet on it, even though it's much too low and hot here for snow. Possible?

OUTA MONITOR PASS

And a quarter after six PM we're down on the other side, that was a gnarly 18 miles. At the highway 89-4 junction, a cusp - we'll take the easy leg, just a couple more miles into Markleeville. Won't even think about the other direction, to Stockton. But now we're on the peenultimate leg of the journey home. And we still have a quarter tank of gas. [musing deleted]

Getting closer to Markleeville we see the Sun thru a cut in the mountains, its bright beams being thinned and mellowed by that thick layer of smoke. Turns the countryside bright red. That'll be a joy to drive into, I'm sure. North above Markleeville the rocky hillsides are characterized by this volcanic conglomerate, gnarlier than gnarly. Try doing a little rock climbing in THAT stuff!

We stop at Woodsfords for a wee smidge of fuel, not much at these prices, we might as well be back in Yosemite. The driver dashes over to the minimart building like a man in need of a urination, followed soon by the copilot. Then I'm toasting tortillas over an open flame in the RV and slathering them with low-fat Swiss cheese and sliced smoked turkey breasts, washed down with a peach Fuzzy Navel. The copilot drooling with food lust, even though she'd already had her protein blast.

Now we're crawling up the grumbly east gorge of the west fork of the Carson River, all these rocks and trees and plants and things - hey, wasn't there a song about that? Anyway, cruising up this gnarly notch, pretty soon we'll be at Picketts Junction, Hope Valley, and then on up to Carson Pass and it's almost like being home except we're not there yet.

I was thinking of handing the controls back to Maureen so she'd have another chance to bag a deer but she wouldn't take over. Darn. Well if I hit a deer this time on the same side it won't really matter 'cause that headlight is already out. Actually it's not likely because it's not nearly as dark now as it was on that impacting night. That was what, two transits ago? Yeah.

I make it sound like Maureen's afraid but she's not. She blames it all on the machinery. Or now she blames it all on me. Go figure.

Crawling up the dark Carson Canyon, getting yet more fall color, aspens or whatever interspersed among the pines or whatever - the trees like an alluvial flow out of the rocky hillside. Maureen sez. Maureen is also admiring my journal-keeping skills. Please, just don't coax any more deer out onto the road.

A bit after seven o'clock we crawl over Carson Pass and start the long descent homeward. Ahead we can see the knobs that loom over the Kirkwood ski resort, all bathed in the sunset-red smoke, layer after smoky layer thickening in the distance, the lower Sierra elevations disappearing in the hot haze. And no deer jumping out in front of us. Good.

Now down onto Caples Lake, the surface bathed in this red-grey-blue glow, very ominous and creepy-looking down here. Maureen sez. Well, she sez creepy, I say ominous.

We pass Carson Spur (7950 feet), looks like we're descending further into a California Hell, the dark-red glow looming in the west like hot coils. But it's our Hell so what the Hell.

And then we're home. Finally.

Back to Part I