TR Sabrina Basin 06/26-06/28
Posted: Mon Jun 29, 2020 2:28 pm
Day 1: This was our first time entering the Sabrina Basin so we were excited for new explorations! We arrived at the trailhead around 0930 to drop packs and park the car at the overnight parking (about a ½ mile down the road). Once on the way, we began the steady ascent up the trail. We reached Blue Lake in about an hour and 45 minutes after leaving the car and stopped for a quick snack break. We pushed on past Dingleberry Lake and the beautiful (and wide) creek crossing just beyond. At this point, the mosquitoes were definitely biting, which gave us good incentive to keep pushing on to higher elevations. Shortly after passing Dingleberry Lake there is a turn off to Midnight Lake—we went left toward Hungry Packer. There is a great deal of camping in the granite-filled meadow basin surrounding Sailor Lake and also near Moonlight Falls (very prominent waterfall that can be seen from the trail as you enter the large basin below Hungry Packer). Having heard there is sparse camping at HP, we decided to push on to Moonlight Lake. We found a great campsite at the NE end of Moonlight Lake (cross outlet stream) that easily accommodated our 3 tents.
There was also a fun jump rock not far from our campsite!
Unfortunately, the mosquitoes remained quite bad all the way to Moonlight. We used quite a bit of DEET and head nets and still walked away with a LOT of bites. If you are entering this area for at least the next month, be prepared for a lot of mosquitoes.
Day 2: We day hiked over to Hungry Packer Lake and then on to Midnight Lake. Both are very beautiful…you really can’t go wrong with choosing a lake to camp at in this basin.
At Midnight Lake, we attempted to scramble up to Blue Heaven Lake by climbing along the hillside to the NW of Midnight Lake. We reached about 150 vertical feet above the small meadow between Midnight and Blue Heaven when we decided to turn back due to building thunderheads. Still a beautiful view from where we ascended!
Day 3: Our second night at camp was extremely windy. Fortunately, this drove away the mosquitoes but made for a very restless and cold night of sleep. We packed up camp early and headed back to the car in about 3.5 hours. Lunch at Jack’s in Bishop featuring chocolate milkshakes!
PS. There may or may not be a frisbee at the bottom of Moonlight Lake about 20 feet out from the NE shore near this campground. If anyone ever finds it, it's yours!
There was also a fun jump rock not far from our campsite!
Unfortunately, the mosquitoes remained quite bad all the way to Moonlight. We used quite a bit of DEET and head nets and still walked away with a LOT of bites. If you are entering this area for at least the next month, be prepared for a lot of mosquitoes.
Day 2: We day hiked over to Hungry Packer Lake and then on to Midnight Lake. Both are very beautiful…you really can’t go wrong with choosing a lake to camp at in this basin.
At Midnight Lake, we attempted to scramble up to Blue Heaven Lake by climbing along the hillside to the NW of Midnight Lake. We reached about 150 vertical feet above the small meadow between Midnight and Blue Heaven when we decided to turn back due to building thunderheads. Still a beautiful view from where we ascended!
Day 3: Our second night at camp was extremely windy. Fortunately, this drove away the mosquitoes but made for a very restless and cold night of sleep. We packed up camp early and headed back to the car in about 3.5 hours. Lunch at Jack’s in Bishop featuring chocolate milkshakes!
PS. There may or may not be a frisbee at the bottom of Moonlight Lake about 20 feet out from the NE shore near this campground. If anyone ever finds it, it's yours!