Over and out, Friday 2/21/25

 

Our month at Catalina Spa and RV Resort in Desert Hot Springs is over, and it's time to go home, some 560 miles away and a two-day drive with an overnight stop at Minter Field Air Museum (Harvest Host).  We have so enjoyed this time in the desert, happily avoiding those atmospheric rivers of rain pummeling our lonely home in the foothills of Nevada City ... and the cold, and the damp, and the gray.  Jimmy and I packed a lot into this month, going and doing, living life to the fullest we could.  Out and About -- hiking and biking and playing, and swimming -- oh, the pools!  I will miss swimming the most.  (I swam every day but one.)

The places we've gone, the fantastic sights we've seen, most of it new to us this year, and seeing San Jacinto in all its glory every morning when opening the front window curtains, ah, what a way to begin a day!

Being with friends made the time extra-special.  When we first arrived at Catalina, we were greeted by our friends, Betty and Wayne, from Newfoundland.  After they left, we met a pair of Oregonians named Nancy and Doug and formed a fast friendship.  Then our dear friends, Sue and Mo, arrived from Oregon, accompanied by their friends, Joanne and Phil in their RV, also from Oregon.  We were surrounded by Beavers and Ducks!  Wonderful seeing and being with y'all.

Last Monday, Jimmy and I finally met our goal to hike in the Whitewater Preserve, choosing the amazing Canyon Loop Trail, five miles for us, and a 600' elevation gain switchback to where you see us, above, part of it on the PCT.  We started way down below at the V/C, on the other side of the white riverbed (wash).  Quite the hike.  I have many more pics, but I'll keep it down today. 

On Tuesday, we hopped in Smartie and circumnavigated Joshua Tree NP, beginning at the southern entry in Cottonwood Spring and V/C, driving all the way through the park, out the northern end, and back to Desert Hot Springs.  This wasn't our initial intention, but that's the way the day rocked!  Above, Jimmy is being swallowed by Very Sharp Cholla in the cactus garden!  Thousands of cholla line both sides of the road, right up to the mountains.

After that, we parked Smartie and set out to find arch rock.  We saw every other kind of rock, but we couldn't find arch rock.  I added what I considered appropriate captions. 😃

Lucky us, of course, to find heart rock!  We put 141 miles on Smartie and were tired when we returned to Tergel.  This year we've certainly explored much of Joshua Tree NP and enjoyed every minute.

Wednesday was a change of pace and a visit to Living Desert and Zoo.  Though we lost sight of our four friends, we had a delightful time.  The zoo is planning a Glow at the Park function, hence the dragon.  You know I've been hankering to see a Desert Big Horn sheep, and -- yeehaw! -- I saw four here at the zoo!

Thursday afternoon the six of us (in three cars) made it to downtown Palm Springs.  We wanted to share dinner at Tommy Bahama's and then cruise the Thursday night street fair, featuring arts, crafts, food, and entertainment!  Something for everybody, and it's fun.  The restaurant is a block away from iconic Marilyn Monroe -- and it was my turn for a photo op.

Here are the six of us in a selfie, taken just before we pulled out.  Clockwise from me, you see Joanne, Jimmy, Phil, Mo, and Sue.  Impromptu and everyone is smiling!

Last, but not least by any yardstick, here I am on a rare day by myself in the pool on Thursday and loving it.  All the pools (there are four) feature odorless hot mineral springs water.  You can't believe how therapeutic it is to take a step into the nice warm water and simply let yourself melt into it, like a hand inside a warm mitten.  Jimmy favored the hot spa, feeling rejuvenated by every dip.

That's our month away from home.  Maybe to you, the desert is a barren, even desolate place.  To us, it's an opportunity and, if you've read our posts, you'll see what we mean.  Joyous opportunities abound in a landscape that is rich with surreal geologic features and critters and plants.  It's great.  We'll be back ....

On your feet! Friday, 9/27/24

Wow, it's been a year since Jimmy and I have tied on our hiking shoes to wander over the Sierra Nevada mountains, other than bringing Tergel and the bikes up to Lake Tahoe in early August.  Ongoing road construction on Highway 20 and I-80, with delays and stop/go traffic, has kept us away from traveling into the high country.  We hoped the road repair work on I-80 was finished, and thought we'd give it a try today.  Well, Caltrans is still at it and we got caught in down-to-one-lane, stop/go freeway traffic today, both coming and going, but not TOO bad.  Phooey.  One can always hope ....

Last year, we tried to hike the Donner Peak Trail, but (ho-hum) I had it wrong.  This year I made sure to study the map so we could REALLY get there, and even then, it wasn't easy.  But we found the parking lot and -- voilà  -- hit the trail! 

Look, a bit of autumn leaf color lined the trail start. The day was sunny and forecast to be warm, bordering on hot, un-autumn-like; we carried plenty of water.

Oh, yeah, we remembered the rocky, steep switchbacks from our Mt Judah hike back in 2018. Both trails begin at the same place.  The first half-mile is like this, stairways built of large rocks, arduous, and you really had to watch your footing, but we took our time.  It was doable.

At this point the trail evened out somewhat, so we could admire the scenery without tripping and killing ourselves.  Placid Lake Mary amid the trees.

I believe this is a Gray Catbird, perched atop this snag,

and singing his heart out.

Above Lake Mary, we heard a train coming up.  Oh boy, we love trains, so we waited for it to appear, left, above.  We watched for a while, then speculated on how it would continue, to our right and around the mountain, or perhaps to the left where it might find a lower pass up'n'over the mountain?  Trees blocked our view.  We watched and discussed and, by gum, could not figure it out.  Where did the train go?  Haha, it wasn't till we climbed much higher that we saw the top of a tunnel (right)!  No fair -- it disappeared into a tunnel! 

We continued climbing, much of it in the sun, sometimes shaded by tall trees, on the Pacific Crest Trail (PCT), aiming for Donner Peak.  Last time we were here, we took the Mt Judah Loop, and today we'd tackle the peak trail.

A few goodies to see.  Pretty tree fungi, and pine cone city (!), top; cute li'l Woolly bear caterpillar, and tiny pink posies atop the peak.  Apart from a small showing of asters, all the wildflowers had gone to seed. 

Aha!  Donner Peak, straight ahead.  Looks like some rock scrambling is involved.  The elevation gain for this moderately challenging hike is over 900 ft.  The peak is at 8,019 ft.  I'm always flabbergasted at junipers and pines finding a toehold in solid granite and growing, albeit slowly, under harsh mountain (winter) conditions. 

Beneath the yellow x people are gathered!

We're still not at the top.

But now we are!  And the views!

Mt Judah in the distance.

Donner Lake, 1,000 ft below.

Can you imagine our surprise to encounter a group of 20 first graders at the summit? They climbed up here the same way we did, on shorter legs, too!  These kids are from the Sierra Expeditionary Learning School, and (believe it or not) this was their fourth mountain hike this month!  Amazing.  How wonderful for these kids.  We compared the relative ages of first graders vs two really, really close-to-80-year-old's hiking the Donner Peak:  Win-win for all!  The only elementary school field trip I remember was to the Nabisco Shredded Wheat plant in Niagara Falls.  Definitely not the same.  But we were given a package of Triscuit crackers, a favorite to this day 😋.

All the rocks up here appear stacked, like a multi-layered cake.

And there's our old friend, to our north, across the way.  We conquered that one four years ago, woo-hoo!  Click here to read about how much fun it was.

We so appreciate hiking in the woods, with its cooling shade.  There seems to be something magical about these mountains, breathing the rarified air and feeling so alive and well as we step along.  I've been missing the connection this year.

And then it was back to the rocky zigzag steps on our way down, but going downhill is always much easier than uphill, and takes less time.

What a great hike.  It's supposedly 3.7 miles R/T, but the way we operate, going all over the place as we do, we managed to put five miles on the fitbit.  Yes, our legs will feel this tomorrow, but they'll get over it.  You have to know how grateful we are that we can still hike peaks like these.

It's Friday! 9/16/23

 

I thought I knew what I was talking about, but I didn't.  I was sure we were on our way to hike Donner Peak, up in the high country, but we weren't.  By driving up I-80 and exiting at Boreal Ridge Rd, we'd park and hike up to Donner Summit.  Easy-peasy.  Wrong.  When we exited and parked, nothing looked familiar.  I guess I should've looked it up on AllTrails before we left.  Oh well.  We were all ready to go, so off we went, on the PCT, with an unknown destination because we didn't know this trail at all.

Sometimes the destination doesn't matter, as a journey into the Sierra's is always nourishment for the soul.  We were happy to be Out and About on this unknown-to-us, but well-trod trail.

The path itself was kinda sketchy in places, as you see above:  Roots 'n rocks.  Beneath the trees, we appreciated the soft leaf/needle compost underfoot.  We alternated sun with shade, and first we went down-down-down and then up-up-up, and then we repeated the pattern!

Look at this extensive granite "slab" littered with giant boulders!  This was next to the trail, not part of it.  Our elevation here was roughly 7,000'.

We passed several small ponds with clear, tannic water.  One had a large population of Bullhead Catfish, which isn't necessarily good as they can overpopulate and "stunt in ponds."  These guys were still small, maybe three-four inches long, but we saw lots.

Paralleling I-80, not close but within earshot, it became a background "white noise."  Eventually the trail turned south and the sound disappeared.  We saw a couple of day hikers early on and then we were alone.  When we finally gained the first high spot, we were sorta surprised to see Donner Lake, but then we realized where the trail would take us.  

Ain't nature's designs grand?

Not many wildflowers were blooming this late in the year.  I spotted a few Pink Spirea, including the flower with bee, above.  In semi-sunny areas, Indian Paintbrush and Checker Bloom still flowered, and Aster and Goldenrod color foretold autumn's imminence.

By gollies, here we are!  Three-and-a-half miles in and we're up top, overlooking Hwy 40 (old Lincoln Hwy, way down below) and the snow sheds and the China Wall, places we know from past hikes.  We knew how to get down to Hwy 40, but didn't need to.  Instead, this was our turn-around point.

Yup, we parked the day packs, sat on a boulder in the shade and ate our lunch.  Behind Jimmy is George R. Stewart Peak at 7,389'.  If I looked off to my right, I'd see the snow sheds and China Wall.  As we were leaving, a large group of young adults (kids, really!) bounded up the boulders from Hwy 40, nodded to the two old fogeys, and continued their caper up to Stewart Peak.  Just a lark, right?

The afternoon was perfect, warm with a fresh breeze, maybe 75/ish.  On our return, we were aware that all the downhills we had would now be uphills, and our ol' bodies protested, but no matter.  As we made our way, we marveled at the stamina of the PCT thru-hikers.  This is a really tough trail.  Being younger helps, I'm sure.  Meanwhile, we were treated to views (across I-80) of our big buddy from three years ago -- legendary Castle Peak.  Click on the blue link to read about it.

I'd listened to the weatherman the night before and he said "no thunderstorms for the Sierra tomorrow," and I believed him.  When we saw the gray clouds forming, I wasn't worried.  Nope, no thunder, no rain.

We love hiking up here.

Nice balancing act.

Like the brilliant red Snow Plant in spring,

these rosy Pine Drops always catch my attention.

Finally, we came back to the granite slab.  Hi Jimmy!  One nice thing about an out-and-back trail is you see stuff on the return that you missed on the way out.  We were so finished with the switchbacks and uphill/downhill, elevation gain/loss, and we were both tired.  We rated this ourselves as "moderately challenging."  Seven miles and our dogs were barking!  We didn't make it to Donner Summit (oops!), so we'll save that for another time, now that we KNOW how to get there!

I don't know if this map is of any use to you guys, but here 'tis anyway.  The Prius was parked where the blank spot is from everybody's finger pointing to it, and we followed the PCT (red line) down to about Lake Angela.  Our only time to hike exclusively on the PCT.  This entire map area is a great locale to get in some aerobic exercise!  Awful pretty, too.

You can't succeed ... Friday, 8/28/20

... unless you try.  That's what the guy we met coming down from the top said, as we tackled the uphill.  So, okay, we gave it the gungho try today, escaping smoky Nevada City for the high country of the Sierras, specifically Castle Peak.  If you are a regular reader of my blog, you know this is our fourth time this year on the Castle Peak trail, and maybe our last (but, you never know!).

View at the top.

And I'm proud to tell you that these two 75-yr-old folks made it all the way to the top!  Our starting elevation was approx 7300' and the finish was roughly 9100', or an elevation gain of 1800'.  It was not easy; in fact, I read this morning that the trail is rated as difficult (no kidding), especially the last couple of sections.

That tall peak you see at right is where we were going.  But, here's how we roll at our house:  On the drive, we discussed going to Five Lakes, Summit Lake or Castle Peak, with no final decision.  Smoky air was our only consideration.  We waited till we got to Donner Pass and saw some blue sky to our north (Castle Peak/Summit Lake), and yucky sky to the south (Five Lakes).  North was the choice.  Once on the main trail, we got to a split -- left to Castle Peak, right to Summit Lake, I turned right, Jimmy to the left.  "I thought we were going to Summit Lake."  "I thought we were hiking to the top."  I'd found a penny at the Donner rest area, so I dug it out of my pocket, flipped it (heads to Castle Peak, tails to Summit) and it landed heads.  That's why we were hiking to Castle Peak today. 

Following the PCT trail to Castle Pass, it's an eight-mile R/T hike, and the first section through the woods is delightful.  Always uphill, but gentle, and it's pretty.  Out of the woods, at Castle Pass, things change and the trail gets steep and rocky.  Three young women (30/ish), above, came up behind us and we stopped to let them pass.  With long strides and young bodies, they "bounded" up the rocky slope.  Jimmy and I looked at each other.  "They're young."  "They'll get over it."  The red x is the trail (above and below).

Our turn.

We joked most of the way up to this point -- I can see our house from here -- Pretty soon you'll see the Pacific Ocean -- There better be a sign at the top:  You did it! -- I see the car down there [not] -- My hip hurts, carry me, and so on.  You see how hazy (smoky) it looks and, yes, the air we were breathing was not the best, but it was okay.  The higher we climbed, the better it got.  The smoke seemed to settle in low areas.  Here, we were just coming into the trees seen at the red x's (in pics above).  Look closely and you can see where we'd been.

Old and young, dead or alive, the trees of the Sierra are captivating.

We finally made it through the trees to the top.  Wait, this isn't the top?  There's more?  Yes, a couple returning FROM the top said, keep going another ten or fifteen minutes and you'll be there, but be careful, the trail is really steep.  Phooey.  Mountains are like that.  Behind what appears to be the summit, is another step, another peak, and behind that is yet another, and then at last:  The Summit.  Whew.  I asked for a photo; she said, sure.  Here we are, almost there! 

Tipped way over, 90 degrees, and still growing.  The tree!

Its trunk is at bottom, left.

I was sort of surprised to see clouds forming, but as we continued hiking, we appreciated the occasional cloud cover!  That sharp peak in the center is Basin Peak and below that, on the left out of sight, is Round Valley.  

Lots of loose gravel, dust, volcanic rubble,

and rough footing on both ascent/descent.

Scrambling up.

If you can see the head at the top of the rock (center), you know we're close to the summit.  The three young women were there, and when we finally stepped into view, one said, "You made it."  Yes, we did.  I asked for a photo and she obliged with two.  The first one in the post and the one below.

On top of the world, with 360° views, even under smoky skies, the majestic Sierra Nevada Mountains surrounded us.  What a feeling!  It took us about two-and-a-half hours to make the four miles, with little stopping.  That's how treacherous the trail is.  We found one small flat rock among all the sharp volcanic stuff to sit on for a minute to admire the views and rest our legs.  Perched as we were on the rock, we could look straight down on either side, as in straight down.  We saw more trails winding along below.  Oh boy, more trails.  We stood up and shook hands.  "Good show."

Before beginning the vertical downhill, I said to Jimmy, "I'm terrified of this."  He said he was, too.  We each had a walking pole, which helped.  Okay, nothing to do but get to it.  So, we carefully commenced.  We slid and we skidded, found our footing, and we didn't fall and didn't get hurt.  I don't want to do it again.  Above, you might be able to spot portions of our trail, which goes around the black rock at right and then follows the ridge line before descending into the trees on the left.

Huh!  The clouds had amassed and suddenly we were sprinkled on!  We didn't mind.  I just didn't want to hear any thunder, but hadn't heard anything on last night's weather forecast about mountain T-storms.  Good.  After a bit the sprinkles stopped.  We kept on.  Six miles, two more to go.  Down, down, down.  Our feet hurt from all the rocks.

Look where we were (red x)!  Look where Jimmy is now (barely visible, center)!  Crazy!  We made it off the scree and rubble and into the woods, grateful for a softer carpet of pine straw and dust.  I was also grateful to know we had a refrigerator full of leftovers -- meaning, all I had to do was shower and warm up leftovers for dinner.  Funny what we think about.  It took us two-and-a-half hours to descend.  We were really tired by the time we got off the PCT and onto the main trail to the car.

As we neared the Prius, maybe a couple hundred yards away, an ear-splitting thunderclap crashed behind us, in the direction from which we'd just come, and raised gooseflesh on my arm a mile high!  Yikes!  Then another.  Why, just a few minutes ago (well, an hour or so), we'd been up there where it was now lightning and thundering.  Being on a mountain in a thunderstorm scares me as much as being in the same room with a spider!  Then, a few feet from the car, and big BIG drops began falling.  We got in.  We were safe.  We were done.  We were done in.  We succeeded.  Let's go home.