Monday:
I usually center my non-PCT backpacking trips around climbing a peak or two (peak bagging in the nomenclature of us cool cats). And since the Emigrant Wilderness is so close to home, I’ve done most of its named summits and many of the peaks within Yosemite National Park where that park borders this wilderness.
Today we planned to hike from Gem Lake to Yellowhammer Lake. Yellowhammer sits among vast granite slabs, at the base of Gillette Mountain.
Open forest and slabs led to Buck Meadow Creek (which was also dry last year):
Good trails continued. They took us to Wood Lake, where we stopped for three essentials - food, water and fetch:
And then we started across country. Sort of. “Sort of” because although current maps show no trails from Wood Lake, south to Yellowhammer Lake, I knew that there used to be one. Sort of. A whole series of trails in the Emigrant have kinda started to disappear from lack of maintenance. And although the distance from Wood to Yellowhammer used to be heavily used while Yellowhammer Camp was frequently occupied, that camp hasn’t been used now for many years and the trail between the two is fading.
Still, this is incredibly open country. If one needs to walk across country, or on barely-there trails, it’s really not that hard.
Over a short hill to infrequently visited (off trail) Karls Lake. And yes, Phoebe and I dressed with twinsies shirts. But since she has no access to this site or ability to respond to this report? I’ll boldly state that I picked my shirt first and she copied me:
Leighton Lake almost borders Karls. And Leighton runs east to west for almost a mile. So we detoured quite a way west to get around it:
An interesting contrast can be seen in the above photos of Karls and Leighton. One purpose of Yellowhammer Camp (photos later) was to build what are called check-dams on many lakes in the area.
Some of the Emigrant’s lakes are relatively shallow. Or at least they were originally. And having introduced non-native trout to all the lakes there, the men who visited the area wanted lakes in which those fish could survive (for better, closer to year-round fishing). So they decided to build small dams across the outlets of the shallow lakes. These check dams aren’t that big (six to 15 feet high), and they aren’t even completely watertight. But they raise the water levels of lakes that would be shallow if left alone. And this means that those lakes keep more water (and stay lakes) for basically the whole summer.
But the check dams also have negative effects. One of the most noticeable negative effects is the “bathtub ring” around the lakeshores of lakes with check dams after those lakes' levels drop later in the summer.
So look at the photos of Karls. With no check dam, Karls has a natural-looking shore. But with Leighton, retained water has flowed through its check dam all summer and the lake level is now quite low. So Leighton is surrounded by grassy mud flats that were covered with water earlier (and the now about 100 year old stumps of the trees which were flooded by these dams are still very evident).
Whatever the history, it’s gorgeous country and we felt blessed to be there with perfect weather and conditions.
From Leighton we moved across and down massive and open slabs toward Yellowhammer:
As we neared the lake that was our day’s goal, we came across the camp. Now abandoned, Yellowhammer Camp was a very busy place for decades (and not just during the 1920s and ’30s while the dams were being built). It’s got a main house, a kitchen, a barn and various outbuildings (and even a vise that still works):
Since we’d only done just over nine miles for the day, we arrived with lots of time to spare. We found a place to camp and relaxed while eating and reading:
Poor Phoebe’s feet were taking a bit of a beating (she didn’t seem too amused when I asked if battered Phoebe feet sounded like a good breakfast dish):
But she took it all in stride (dad pun intended, of course). And even went back to the "swimming-in-icewater" nonsense:
Eventually we decided that it was time to climb our peak. All conditions looked great and we had plenty of remaining daylight:
It’s an easy hike (and we knew it would be going in). But we expected stupendous views and this was to be a first Sierra summit for both Phoebe and Digby:
We were soon on top. And easy or not, we were far, far from disappointed by our summit:
The up was followed by an equally quick down (and without any close shaves!). We got back to camp with plenty of daylight left. So we spent it the only sensible way we could - relaxing in a fantastic location in mountains that we love:
