Devouring Global Resources?

I was directed to read about the Fourth of July, America’s Independence Day on Wikipedia, and thusly, Kira and I got in the car on the 2nd in order to properly celebrate our Nation’s independence day in full. July two, three, and four.

Leaving at 1 PM on Friday, our plan was fool-proof enough and I walked with arrogance all morning.  However, when 1 PM came and I was leaving Kira’s office, with the car packed, and she with sack lunches in hand, we drove a quarter mile to find the highway stopped at Gilman.  Three hours later we had moved less than 30 miles and our lunches were gone and so was our pride.

With about 40 minutes of 60 mph+ driving under our belts by Sacramento it was no surprise that our car would not put up with the abuse of a hot day and heavy traffic.  By the time we climbed Donner Summit, AC blindly on, and driving smoothly and out of traffic, the radiator flared up and we were again in a limited mode of transport.  A rest stop, some cans of water, and a shotty job of repair later, we limped into Truckee and briefly looked for a hardware store.  Seeing nothing we decided to move along, make camp, and try to forget all about the seven and a half our drive we’d just completed.

Pulling off the 80 E, we headed North on the 89 for about five minutes before we pulled off and dropped in onto Prosser Creek Reservoir where we were greeted by friends.  Kira’s folks had driven all the way out from Colorado to visit, and they were excited to see us and pleased to not have to drive the extra three and a half hours to the Bay Area.  This set of circumstances helped us to forget about our wasted afternoon, we too were soon cheerful.

I spent the remainder of the afternoon trying to get my fly on the water while Kira spent time catching up with her mom and Christopher manned the camping equipment.  After dinner and some star gazing we hit the sac.

……

Woke up the next morning – lounged. Hiked. Dined.

…..

Not a bad weekend.

Another enjoyable summer hike. This time, up the Illilouette creek in Yosemite National Park with Tripp, Karen, and Kira.

Weather was good, and warmer than I packed for.  Crowds were equally better than I’d expected.  And most enjoyably, the water level was wonderfully high making for fun river crossings and some recreational fishing.  I suppose my license, fly rod and the hope of getting some casting practice in inceased the weight of my pack for the weekend, but it was worth the entertainment of pursuing the tiny fish, which I’m guessing were rainbows?, and were about four inches long with a raging thirst for heavily worn flies that kind of looked like ants.

Also adding to the weekend was the ever present wild life, reptiles and insects on the hot dry trail down from Glacier Point, a grouse (Sooty Grouse according to their Birdwatcher List) along a lightly wooded trail to Illilouette Falls.  Deer by the dozen within our campsite, obviously fish in the river by the school, and even a black bear and her cubs walking, digging, and playing along the road down from Glacier Point.  Most fortunately for us, the mosquitos were dormant and our attempts to thwart them were unnecessary. [Visiting Yosemite soon?  Have a look at their animal check lists] Next time we’ll be sure to bring along our edible plants list for the area to help augment our dining. (a guide?)

More so, I learned some better techniques for using a bear cache and I have a stronger understanding for how to prepare for Yosemite summers.  All in all, the hike was a substantial success that has left me on the couch a day later with with tired and sore legs.

Photos! (Thanks to Tripp)

Our Hike: ~5 miles on day one (including walking about Glacier Point). ~10 miles on day two (including a hike east toward Nevada Falls)

2010-06-19 Illilouette Creek, Yosemite, CA

Found a FREE GPS Map site – good for getting topos of any state in the US – perhaps the world?  didn’t look.  Also has roads, state and national parks, etc.  Cool, user supported site.  Hope it grows.

Visit Today!

http://www.gpsfiledepot.com/

For Kira’s Birthday this past weekend we set off on a hike that would, we hoped, begin to off set our highly skewed wilderness record. (see Mongollon).  Our hike this time around was just about six months the opposite the timing of our last adventure, so we felt odds were in our favor.  However, we still set our minds to a week full of planning making phone calls, looking at maps, reading weather reports, trail reviews, and packing both our car and our bags for anything.

I can tell you now, we made it home safe.  Phew.

It was a short 2 mile hike that ended at the junction of Grindstone Creek and the Eel River.  Both of which surprised us with the volume of water flowing through them.  I kicked myself for not acquiring a fishing license and bringing my goods.  Bloody rock was a beautiful view, and framed the wilderness we were hiking through quite well.  Remarkably, the only deer we saw was along the road.  However, through out the hike Kira almost stepped on three different kinds of snake – so that was an added bonus of sleeping on the ground.

http://blog.johnmizell.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/06/2010-06-12-Bloody-Rock-Mendocino-National-Forest1.kml

Photos From The Weekend: http://gallery.johnmizell.com/main.php?g2_itemId=6887

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