Carson Pass

The seven miles to Carson Pass was an attractive mix, up and down, sage and forest, volcanic and granite. I was glad I walked the stretch in the cool and captivating morning, instead of pushing on in the late afternoon the day before.

I had my usual mug of muesli in a jumble of big granite boulders, out in the treeless open at the foot of a high ridge…. A steep stretch of trail followed, then a return to the volcanic and a traverse of red rocky slope, then down into woods once more.

At the pass I found a full trailhead parking lot and a small log building. The cabin, which I had not known about, is a summer-only welcome and information center for hikers, both day and longer. On this morning it was staffed by three volunteers, retirees, and they indeed welcomed me, with great friendliness and hospitality.

Each wore a green Forest Service Volunteer vest and each was around seventy. Bruce was tall and bearded and rugged, while Tom and Linda (a couple) were small and neater in appearance, he clean-shaven, she with make-up and a careful blonde hairdo. But they were hikers too, as it came out as we talked, experienced in the Sierras and recently returned from a hut-to-hut trek in the Dolomites (Linda said that the food proved much better than she had expected. “I thought it would just be pasta and tomato sauce from a can, but no, the food was wonderful.”).

They had me sign the thru- and section-hiker register, and when I said I was from Minnesota they all made “oh!” sounds indicating surprise and pleasure, as if this was a very good if unexpected place to live. Tom told me he had family in the town of Pillager (west of the Twin Cities), while Bruce said he had a relative in Lino Lakes (an outer-ring suburb). This sort-of sanguinity made them happy and me too.

They peppered me with questions, about my hike, about Minnesota, and I turned from one to the other as I answered. Their demeanor suggested genuine interest, and after ten minutes I was in love with them.

“Would you like an orange?” Linda said. I would, and after I started peeling it she brought over a small trash can and held it out, as if she would wait for each discarded piece, but I took it from her and said thanks and put it down at my feet. It was a challenge to eat the orange and keeping answering their questions at the same time, but I didn’t mind.

Bruce asked if I needed water, and he took one of my bottles and filled it from a large jug (no plumbing at the pass). He told me that as many as 600 people will visit the trailhead on a busy summer day. “It’s the wildflowers,” he explained. “Up there by Winnemucca Lake—you passed a turn-off—it’s supposed to be the best conditions in the Sierras for wildflowers. Of course, they’re good other places too, but everyone wants to go up there….”

The three of them got off onto the subject of dogs, specifically how people are supposed to keep their dogs on a leash but few do. “We walked up to the lake late yesterday,” Linda said, “and five were off. One got lost.”

 “That happens all the time,” Bruce said. “And at least once every season”—he’s worked at Carson Pass the last six summers—“at least one dog is never found.” We all thought about that for a moment, a dog alone and lost up in the mountains…. Bruce said, “Maybe it went off a cliff chasing a rabbit, maybe coyotes got it, but you never know.”

On a happier note, Linda asked if I wanted a nectarine, to follow up the orange. “A lady brought by a whole basket just this morning,” she said. I ate the nectarine as I crossed the road and started up the trail on the other side, and it was perfect.

Six miles of up and down, mostly up, brought me to Showers Lake, at 8600’. Someone was camped at the best spot on the small lake, which was bordered by grass along one side, pale stone on the other. I found the second best spot, just across the outlet stream on the rocky side, and here I did my laundry. I would reach Echo Lake and civilization the next day, and supposedly a washing machine soon after, but I couldn’t stand the state of my shorts and t-shirt any longer. I hung them up on a small spruce tree, and then clouds rolled in rather inconsiderately…. Still, they dried enough after a time, and I set off again, downhill now, and precipitously….

After a while I came to a tiny creek, crossed with a single step, then came to it again lower down, and here I camped for the night. It was only three in the afternoon, but I’d come eighteen miles. More to the point, I only had five more miles to Echo Lake, and, as with Tuolumne, I did not want to arrive late in the day. Especially since this time I would not be camping at the re-supply point but would have to hitchhike to a nearby town. Most of all though, I wanted to camp out one last time up in the mountains and away from any road…. 

The site was superb, a flat bench of brown duff on a steep mountain slope, with the small creek running down one side, big mountain hemlocks looming overhead, and a high wall of granite on one side. Through the trees I could see the south end of Lake Tahoe far below. There was room for a large group, and my small tent looked puny standing between two of the massive trees….

I was sitting on a rock reading when two thru-hikers came by. I’d seen them on and off during the day, in the distance behind. They were friendly and talkative, just the sort I’d been hoping to meet up with over the last two weeks…. The man was in his forties, shirtless and barrel-chested, his once pale skin dark red from all the days and weeks in the sun; he was unshaven and hatless and his gray-hair stuck up in various directions. She was more demure, with long dark, straight hair pulled back in a loose ponytail, plump arms and light-brown skin; she put me in mind of one of Billy Jack’s devoted female followers….

“Im Michigan Wolverine,” the man said.

“And I’m Evenstar,” the women said, more quietly but smiling cheerfully.

I told them my name, and like most other people they took it for a trail name. I also told them I was finishing my hike at Echo Lake.

“No!” Michigan Wolverine said. “Do one more. Go to Sierra City! It’ll be great!”

Evenstar nodded in agreement, and I thought to myself, maybe I should…. But then, only if I can hang out with you two. But after a few minutes they were on their way, headed for Echo Lake and the fleshpots of South Lake Tahoe. All the thru-hikers take a holiday there…. Before they left, the man said, “I hope we’ll see each other again along the way.”

After dinner—couscous and tuna, and the last tortilla—I was cleaning up and preparing to retire to my tent, when another hiker appeared, a lone man. He was going south but his beard and worn clothing appeared to mark him as another thru-hiker, which he was. He introduced himself as Diesel.

He had come off the trail at Tuolumne and then spent a week in Reno and South Lake Tahoe with a friend. He’d decided it would be easier to walk back to Tuolumne, then hitch north to Tahoe, rather than the other way around. He’d been with a group of fellow hikers from the start, and they were still coming north, and he was looking forward to surprising them when their paths crossed.

Diesel was full of talk of his just-finished weekend at one of the hotel/casinos in South Lake Tahoe. There had been an annual celebrity golf tournament, and evening gatherings and shows, and he had spotted a number of well-known sports and entertainment figures. The latter included Robin Williams, and others I can’t remember, but Diesel was most interested in the football players. The highlight had been shaking hands with Jason Witten, a tight end for the Dallas Cowboys. “I got a picture of the two of us together,” Diesel said, clearly still excited. “See, he went to the University of Tennessee, and I went Tennessee too.” With his long beard and trail-battered equipment, he didn’t look like an ardent sports fan or someone who could be so smitten by celebrities. But there you go.

“Last night in the casino,” he told me, “I was standing right by Rodney Harrison”—a former defensive back for the New England Patriots—“and I said, ‘how’d you do?’” This referring to the gambling. Harrison had laughed, said not so good. But then he asked Diesel a favor. “Hey, man,” he said, “I’m not going to get back over to Harrah’s, can I get you to swap me for this chip?” The chip was for $100, and it sounded like a scam to me, but Diesel happily forked over the cash, and apparently it worked out since he didn’t say anything to the contrary….

Diesel ended up camping nearby.  I told him he could share my site, but he said it was okay, he used a hammock so he didn’t need a flat spot.

I got in my tent and started to think of the day ahead but then stopped. That would come soon enough. Instead I cast back over the previous fifteen days, especially the eight since leaving Tuolumne. I had come 160 miles since then, 270 since leaving Bishop. On the trail from Tuolumne I had gained 27,000 feet in elevation and lost just about as much…. I’d seen a lot of mountains and rocks and creeks and lakes and trees and flowers and chipmunks…. I’d thought about a lot of stuff.

I thought I might miss it, but I also thought the days ahead off-trail would be interesting too.