The Chances

Tahoe Rim Trail #7: Echo Lakes to Barker Pass, Overnight, 9-8-07 to 9-9-07

Ahh, tales of adventure. They're almost as good as the adventures themselves.

This one starts long before the trip. As some of you may be aware, my mother's been going through health issues the past 3 to 4 months, which I don't expect to end anytime soon. With my sister in North Carolina, I'm the only person who can help her out.

The Friday before the overnight TRT #7, I was doing some important business for her. She's been in the hospital for about three weeks, so she hadn't been able to get down to the bank. I didn't get her back to the hospital until 7pm.

I went down to Walmart for some last minute supplies, came home and had dinner with my wife. By the time I was ready to pack up everything, it was 9pm. I was finally satisfied with my packing at... 1:30am.

Day One
I left my house at 3:30am to head on up to Folsom. I was supposed to call my friend from work as soon as I got to 50, which I did. He hadn't realized how close to Folsom I would be when I hit 50 (I thought he realized it was Hazel I would come out of), so he wasn't ready to go. On the way through town, I stopped by Iron Point and said hi to Tom, Vee, Mike, & Christina, all of whom were going on the day hike.

Once I got to REI, it was another half-hour before Tim showed up. We stopped to use the restroom before heading up 50. Driving around the lake, we were commenting on how we should have gone up 80, since that's where we were dropping off my car! Live & learn.

We finally started hiking at 10am. About 1/4 mile in, I realized I didn't have the battery for my SLR, so I opted to take it back to the car. There was no sense carrying around 5 pounds of dead weight unnecessarily! I brought the tripod just in case Tim wanted to use it.

After hiking a while, we ran across a family, and as they passed, I asked, "How's Desolation today?" The look on his face said it all, but he responded, "We're about to find out!" Tim and I looked at each other, each knowing the same thing. We'd hiked a mile in the wrong direction. So we high-tailed it back.

By the time we were on the REAL trail, it was NOON. Hah! And I told everyone at Iron Point I'd "see them up there". At that moment they were probably at Lake Aloha! Anyway...

We were off! I really loved the portion around Echo Lakes. In fact, I've decided that very soon I'm going to take my son on the water taxi across the lake, then hike back.

Tim was having some issues with his boots, so he was stopping more often than I would have expected, and hiking slower than me. Quite a few times, I'd hike on ahead, then wait for him. At one point there was a fork going towards Aloha Lake, at which point I decided to actually take my pack off and wait. I had good cell signal so I called my wife, and while talking to her this dog comes barreling towards me at full speed! He stopped short of me and slid on his paws, tilted his head, then booked it the opposite direction. The owners were apologizing profusely, but I thought it was funny. Once I was rejoined by Tim, we had lunch at Aloha Lake.

Aloha's pretty low this year, so rather than one big lake, it was a million tiny ones. It was probably more scenic this year, and certainly a unique feature. Tim ended up getting the scrubber for his water pump stolen by a chipmonk who probably used it in his nest. Some guys camping here were having a tough time hanging their bear bag, and we all had a neat discussion about how tired the elevation was making us feel.

Back on the trail we got warned by someone about how steep the approach for Dick's Pass was going to be. He recommended we go to the top of Dick's Peak, but looking at the time, there simply wouldn't be the time. In fact, we were expecting to be hiking in the dark for a fair amount of time.

At Heather Lake, I ran out of water and used my pump. I was wishing I had fishing gear, because I could see the fish eating bugs off the surface of the water. The sun was going down, leaving gold reflections on the water, and the ducks were bathing. This was what it was all about, right there! As I pumped, Tim went on ahead.

When I was done, I loaded everything back up. Looking at the maps & GPS, I was expecting the steep approach to be AFTER Gilmore Lake, but boy was I wrong. They weren't kidding about the difficulty of Dick's Pass... the incline started shortly after Susie Lake and didn't end for another 9.2 miles.

Speaking of Gilmore Lake, it was at that signpost that I met back up with Tim. My lack of sleep was starting to be a serious detriment at this point, and I mentioned to Tim that we should camp at Dick's Pass instead of Middle Velma, where we had originally planned. He agreed.

We finally reached Dick's Pass at 12:45am. Being dark and lit only by our headlamps, there really wasn't all that much to see, and most of the ground was similar: small rocks, no dirt or brush, so really not much thought put into finding a spot. I chose one on the opposite side of the trees near the trail, to provide a tad more privacy in the morning. We set up camp, and at 1:30am after 22 hours of being awake, I finally got into my bag.

I slept without the rainfly on my REI Quarter Dome, and I gotta say that was the right decision. I got a near panoramic view of the sky! It was a great scene to fall asleep to.

Day Two
The alarm went off at 7am. When I popped my head up, I got a feast for the eyes! It was more colorful than I had expected, and there was a lot more going on here than simple rocks. Once I got my sorry self out of my tent, I spent a good hour and a half exploring. While I was done, Tim had ventured to the top of a hill, and was yelling to me that he could see Lake Tahoe from up there. He wanted me to go, but I wanted to conserve my energy for the trip back.

I really do need to start practicing taking down camp. Packing up always takes me too long! Tim finished packing his stuff up long before me, although to my credit, he was in a bivy. Another problem I had was there was water on the floor of the tent by my feet, on the pad, and on my sleeping bag. It had even gone through, because my socks were damp. The only thing I could think was it was my hydration sleeve, even though the pack wasn't wet and only that spot had water. Cleaning it all up was part of packing.

Once we were packed, I applied sunscreen, put on my hat, and off we went.

The trip down the other side of Dick's Pass and down to the Velma lakes was great, but beyond that the scenery was more typical of the TRT. Lots of greenery, a lot less granite. After the rest of Desolation Wilderness, this part was downright passe! Not exactly boring, but certainly not up to the earlier scenery. As I told Tod on the phone the other night, if you were to do the entire section in one day, it'd be best to go south to north. That way you'd have the average scenery at first, with great scenery as a payoff later.

At any rate, we decided to actually eat breakfast at Middle Velma Lake while pumping water. We called it breakfast anyway, even though it was more like lunch at 11:30. It was a nice place to stop and eat. Our stoves didn't behave very well because the wind was blowing too much. I was able to get a running boil because I was only heating a cup of water, but Tim never going. It was at least hot enough for him to get his Mountain House meal edible. I made oatmeal with the requisite dehydrated strawberries. Afterwards I ate an apple.

On the way back, Tim got really far ahead of me. Despite having a whopping 5 hours' sleep, and eating more than plenty, the tiredness clicked back in and slowed me down. At 5pm, I caught back up with him and he told me a neat story about how he ran into a baby bear on the trail. It ran away but it scared him to death, so he decided to sit and wait for me.

When we finally exited Desolation and got to Richardson Lake, it was dark. Across the lake was a person in an RV trailer who had a FIRE by the lake! I don't know how they got away with having a fire like that, but they didn't seem too worried about things.

The end of the trail was tricky in a few spots. After crossing the Rubicon Trail, finding where the TRT picked back up was difficult. That one wasn't near as difficult as the very end, when you hike down a Jeep trail for barely a tenth of a mile. On the side you exit, the trail is VERY well marked, with reflective TRT signs. The other side, the side we were looking for, was a different story: all it was was a pole with PCT written on it in black sharpie. At night, this made it hard to find, and there were two other trails next to it. Looking at the three maps (National Geographic, TRT Association, & GPS), it looked like the TRT followed the Jeep trail a half mile! That looked to be the obvious direction so we took it, but it was the wrong one. When we turned back, we finally found the right one.

So just remember, at this point, the trail to pick up goes parallel to the Jeep trail but up an incline, and is marked with a wooden pole with NOTHING ELSE written on it except PCT written in felt tip pen. Keep this in mind on Saturday...

When we came out at the end of the trail, it wasn't obvious where we were. I saw a sign up 1/4 ahead on the road we came out on, so I headed for it. Sure enough, that was the entrance to the Barker Pass trailhead and more importantly, my car! We had made it. I won't tell you what time it was, but I will say this: I went straight to work from Tahoe.

That's my story, and I'm stickin' to it.

After loading the GPS track into the computer and reconnecting the spots where I lost signal, my total mileage was 34.99 miles, almost 2.5 miles farther than listed on the TRT Association's website. But hey, we had fun. All that's left is #8, then my two makeups, and I'm done!

Greg