Sequoia National Park, High Sierra Trail backpacking trip - day 4
07/04/07 12:11 PM Filed in: travel | backpacking
Upper
Hamilton Lake
Wednesday, July 4, 2007
Fourth of July! We awoke early before the sun crept into the super-dome of a mountain range, with its sapphire sparkling lake and our tent in its font and center, VIP spot. Still awestruck with our surroundings, we made our morning coffee and perched on top of a nearby boulder overlooking our campsite and took in the mystical surroundings.
We noticed multiple Rufous Hummingbirds zipping around, with distinctively ruby-red coloring. Our friend, the yellow bellied marmot was very set on getting close to our gear and the stove, so from our perch we would shoo him away. When our voices didn't work anymore, we threw small rocks in his direction, and that did the trick.
*yellow-bellied marmot & male rufous hummingbird - photos not ours, taken from wikipedia.org*
It had been pretty hot the past four days and as the morning light came upon us, we started to realize just how exposed we were all the way up here. At 8,500 - 8,700 feet, there was much more rock than shaded areas, and our tent was in a spot with no shade nearby. Our first assignment after pumping water, would be to relocate our tent to a more shaded spot.
As we went to go pump water, we started to feel the elevation taking it's toll on us. Simple camp errands including walking up to the pit "toilet", had us panting for air. One thing we weren't expecting was our water pump to be acting up for what seemed like no reason.. each pump of water took five times as long, and gave us 20 times less water it seemed, per pump. In one hour, let me add that was one, long, torturous hour.. we pumped 6 liters of water, which would typically take us 10 minutes. Since we felt the elevation at this point, we concluded that the pressure of the pump was being effected at altitude.. it had to be some crazy flaw in the design of the water pump that we just had no idea about.
At this point in our day, we were still hoping to hike beyond Upper Hamilton lake, to the top of the mountain's ridge at Precipice lake and possibly go beyond that to a gorgeous clearing called "Big Arroyo" which had another back country campsite. Chris was inspired by a photo he saw in Backpacker Magazine of Big Arroyo, which in turn inspired this trip. But with the state of our water pump in question, we were concerned about venturing off deeper into the wilderness to get there.
The heat really began to do it's dirty work around 10:30 am and we quickly found another spot for our tent. It was a little higher up, but close to the original spot by the lake. Mosquitos would certainly be less of a concern where we were moving to ;) We picked a spot next to an old tree and some high bushes, but in the end that spot was just as exposed as the lake-side one. At 11 am we went for a swim, with clothing on so our clothes would remain cool & wet at the temperature rose to 100 degrees. It was so hot, we had no choice but to lay around and nap most of the day. It was unreal how hot it felt! But nonetheless, we were still pretty thankful of all the places to be on 4th of July, here we were at one of the only uncrowded lakes in California, because it was on top of a freaking mountain! That was an awesome feeling :)
We watched countless chickadees and oregon juncos forging for food. There was a local flicker occasionally flying from tree to tree and the rufous hummingbirds were simply entertaining!
Oregon Junco
Oregon Junco - on tree top ;)
Once the sun started to creep away in the late afternoon, our energy bounced back and we took some photos and explored the area a little bit. Still so amazing it only took (us) three days of hiking to get there. As nightfall approached, the mosquitos swarmed over the lake like the previous night, and we watched wild trout, lots of them, jumping out of the lake to feet of the skeeters! Chris commented because I said, no, we shouldn't bring a fishing rod, that's extra weight. It would have been cool to have fished there, so I do regret not having something to cast a line with, with us. But I will say a small, light-weight fishing kit would have been perfect.
Wednesday, July 4, 2007
Fourth of July! We awoke early before the sun crept into the super-dome of a mountain range, with its sapphire sparkling lake and our tent in its font and center, VIP spot. Still awestruck with our surroundings, we made our morning coffee and perched on top of a nearby boulder overlooking our campsite and took in the mystical surroundings.
We noticed multiple Rufous Hummingbirds zipping around, with distinctively ruby-red coloring. Our friend, the yellow bellied marmot was very set on getting close to our gear and the stove, so from our perch we would shoo him away. When our voices didn't work anymore, we threw small rocks in his direction, and that did the trick.
*yellow-bellied marmot & male rufous hummingbird - photos not ours, taken from wikipedia.org*
It had been pretty hot the past four days and as the morning light came upon us, we started to realize just how exposed we were all the way up here. At 8,500 - 8,700 feet, there was much more rock than shaded areas, and our tent was in a spot with no shade nearby. Our first assignment after pumping water, would be to relocate our tent to a more shaded spot.
As we went to go pump water, we started to feel the elevation taking it's toll on us. Simple camp errands including walking up to the pit "toilet", had us panting for air. One thing we weren't expecting was our water pump to be acting up for what seemed like no reason.. each pump of water took five times as long, and gave us 20 times less water it seemed, per pump. In one hour, let me add that was one, long, torturous hour.. we pumped 6 liters of water, which would typically take us 10 minutes. Since we felt the elevation at this point, we concluded that the pressure of the pump was being effected at altitude.. it had to be some crazy flaw in the design of the water pump that we just had no idea about.
At this point in our day, we were still hoping to hike beyond Upper Hamilton lake, to the top of the mountain's ridge at Precipice lake and possibly go beyond that to a gorgeous clearing called "Big Arroyo" which had another back country campsite. Chris was inspired by a photo he saw in Backpacker Magazine of Big Arroyo, which in turn inspired this trip. But with the state of our water pump in question, we were concerned about venturing off deeper into the wilderness to get there.
The heat really began to do it's dirty work around 10:30 am and we quickly found another spot for our tent. It was a little higher up, but close to the original spot by the lake. Mosquitos would certainly be less of a concern where we were moving to ;) We picked a spot next to an old tree and some high bushes, but in the end that spot was just as exposed as the lake-side one. At 11 am we went for a swim, with clothing on so our clothes would remain cool & wet at the temperature rose to 100 degrees. It was so hot, we had no choice but to lay around and nap most of the day. It was unreal how hot it felt! But nonetheless, we were still pretty thankful of all the places to be on 4th of July, here we were at one of the only uncrowded lakes in California, because it was on top of a freaking mountain! That was an awesome feeling :)
We watched countless chickadees and oregon juncos forging for food. There was a local flicker occasionally flying from tree to tree and the rufous hummingbirds were simply entertaining!
Oregon Junco
Oregon Junco - on tree top ;)
Once the sun started to creep away in the late afternoon, our energy bounced back and we took some photos and explored the area a little bit. Still so amazing it only took (us) three days of hiking to get there. As nightfall approached, the mosquitos swarmed over the lake like the previous night, and we watched wild trout, lots of them, jumping out of the lake to feet of the skeeters! Chris commented because I said, no, we shouldn't bring a fishing rod, that's extra weight. It would have been cool to have fished there, so I do regret not having something to cast a line with, with us. But I will say a small, light-weight fishing kit would have been perfect.