We headed toward California from Great Basin on Highway 6, which does not hold the title for “loneliest road” in Nevada but probably should be considered.
This was about a 5.5 hour drive through blazing heat in a landscape that looked like Mars with gas stations over 150 miles apart. We did try to visit two of the very few points of interest (a lava flow and a crater) but the washboarding on the road made us feel the wheels may come off.
The road has a few decrepit ghost towns along the way, and in the only sizeable town we passed through a Clown Hotel. We went into the museum against our better judgement, which was exactly what you may expect – thousands of clown figurines and memorabilia.
Mammoth Lakes
We settled on Mammoth Lakes as it gives easy access to the John Muir and Ansel Adams wilderness areas but had limited time to research in our one night of replanning.
When we reached the Mammoth Lakes area, we were pleasantly surprised to find a free campground with nice sites that included tables (this is important, because I refused to bring a folding table that Jon-David suggested).
Our first full day we went into town so I could handle some trip logistics – riveting post on health insurance upcoming.
We then took Duck Pass trail in an attempt to reach Duck lake. We ended up not crossing a final snowfield over the pass as I didn’t think it was safe, but we did get a nice view of some other lakes below.
Saturday morning we got up very early to be allowed to drive to Devil’s Postpile National Monument, avoiding a mandatory shuttle bus after 7am. This is a volcanic formation with massive stone columns that formed hexagons as they cooled. We saw the monument as well as numerous waterfalls. Overall this was a great stop that we would have missed on our original itinerary.
By the third day, we were feeling a little burnt out from the blazing sun and did some smaller hikes around a lake and up to a small alpine lake above June Lake. After our final night in Mammoth we did one of our most beautiful hikes yet to Gem Lakes, which had crystal clear water.
Some Week 2 Reflections
I assumed that week 2 would be a little challenging and we may feel homesick, which is why I had planned for a region we were familiar with like Southern Utah to reduce some stress. The change to California kept us out of (some) of the extreme heat, but the unfamiliarity did add some pressure.
The first couple days of the week, we were both feeling a bit like we should be returning home from a vacation. We chose to slow down a bit with some shorter hikes and making some decent food at our campsite. We managed to locate showers at a public pool which helped improve our spirits, and by Saturday we were feeling a bit more energy again.
Over the next week we have 5 nights of backpacking and 4 car camping in Kings Canyon and Yosemite. We’re certainly looking forward to some backpacking nights – and we are going to try to find showers more frequently this week.
Not Sew Fancy Travels 