2022 Backcountry Current Conditions Reports

[dearantler]

Route: Murphy Creek TH-Polly Dome Lakes-Crest below Tuolumne Peak

Elevations: 8191 - 9881 feet

Difficult section encountered on this trip:
- Snow patches obscuring use trail to Polly Dome Lakes
- Large portions of trail underwater or under snow between McGee Lake junction and the beginning of switchbacks toward Tuolumne Peak. Switchbacks free of snow.
- Mosquitoes present but tolerable
- Approx. 70% snow cover at top of switchbacks, at crest below Tuolumne Peak

Special equipment needed/used:
- Microspikes helpful but not absolutely necessary

Possible alternative routes:
- None. Route is manageable even in the early season this year.

[frozenintime]

@generalelectrix, your wire/leopold/toms canyon route is *very* close to our planned route, and for the same exact days. interestingly, because of the cold (and possibly snowy?) forecast, we decided to go to big lake instead, but via bourland meadow. weird coincidence!

we crossed w fork cherry slightly south of the "mile 5" marker on the usgs topo, and more specifically, just below the smallest and most circular widening on the map. the creek was slightly higher on our way in (5/27) than our way out (5/29). i don't know if that's because peak melt is behind us, or because it was absolutely frigid the day before (5/28), or because we crossed an hour earlier the second time.

it's a fairly wide crossing at this location -- maybe 30-40 feet? -- with some spots thigh high (i'm 6'1") and others much shallower, with an exposed rock or two to take a break. the current is fairly slow and the granite beneath is quite sticky. still, it's a bit anxiety producing to cross something so wide since you really don't know what the far side of the crossing looks like until you're there.

otherwise, there were no real issues to report: no other meaningful crossings and there is virtually no snow in the big/hyatt area, as one could tell from the sentinel images for weeks.

[oddtiger]

Route taken: Rowell Meadow TH to Lost Lake, day hike to upper Sheep Creek Lake.


Elevations: 7900-9300ft


Difficult section encountered: just a few downed trees down to Belle Canyon


Snow free on trail, off trail and at Lost Lake and upper Sheep Creek Lake. Some patches on the side. Kids really enjoyed the trip!

[Love the Sierra]

Snow fields above 10,600' were soft and melted/ing from underneath. Postholing could be dangerous if you are over a creek, boulder field or talus and not following the trail.

[kdemtchouk]

Pine Creek -> Italy Pass -> Croft Col -> Royce Lakes -> French Canyon -> Carol Col -> Pine Creek TH

North facing slopes at 12k ft and above have a fair amount of rotten, soft snow. We had to change our itinerary after some post-holing over talus dashed our plans to hike into Bear Basin. Croft Col was straightforward in the morning on harder snow. Sketchy traverse around the highest Royce Lake, but easy going from there down to French Canyon. Streams are running high, but easy to find alternate crossings everywhere. Mosquitos 1/10!

[LightBulb]

Route taken: Mostly off trail, Norris TH > Burro lake > Lady lake via pass north of Burro lake > variety of northern lakes and creeks > return up same pass > Norris TH

Elevations: 8000 to 10000

Difficult section encountered:
Beasore road is closed and a detour is required, highish clearance is needed (we did it with 7.3 inches)

Norris TH to Lower Jackass was badly burned in 2020, not fun to walk though but everything above Jackass is untouched.

Pass above burro lake is very steep but doable for those who would look at it on a topo map and think "I might be able to do that." Down was a combination of glissading and granite climbing. Up was almost entirely granite climbing.

Overall:

Northern\Eastern facing snow patches were thick at the beginning of the trip to almost gone by the end. You will need to leave soon if you want to see the creeks flowing. Full spring flowering to 9000' but just barely getting started above that. The little lake above burro was still partially frozen.

The entire lower elevations of this area burned in the 2020. Look at a map of that fire before you plan a trip in this area.

No campfires allowed around most major lakes.

Only saw two people the entire trip.

[Wandering Daisy]

6/7 S Lake to Long Lake. No snow, trail in good condition. Quite soggy grasses at Long Lake inlet.

6/8 Long Lake to Dusy Lk 10742. Some snow patches going up to Saddlerock Lk. I did not like the looks of the snow on the steep switchbacks lower down on Bishop Pass trail. Many PCT hikers and others stayed on the trail. I decided to try a detour, used spikes, ended up being a lot more snow but all snow slopes had safe run-outs; whereas the trail route was a "fall you die" situation but short. Moot point now since coming back the snow is almost gone from the trail. West side of Bishop Pass has snow patches where you detour short sections. Lots of PCT hikers are now using Bishop Pass for resupply. Fairly crowded.

6/9 Lake 10742 to Palisade Lake. I hit the "PCT Bubble"! I swear I met more then 50 PCT hikers as I was going south and they were going north. Trail in good condition. Only a few downed trees to detour. Plenty of water along trail, including seeps along the Golden Staircase. No snow. Hot as hell!

6/10 day off Palisade Lake

6/11 Return to Lake 10742. Same conditions. (PS- Deer Meadow is NOT a meadow). Checked out crossing of Palisade Creek at Simpson Meadow junction- nothing I would cross- too dangerous for my taste.

6/12 Upper lakes in Dusy Basin. Snow patches up by the uppermost lake. Camped at Lake 11388. Lake below was significantly greener. Little flowers starting to bloom. Tremendous wind storm that night. Blew constantly from 3PM to well after midnight. Dark clouds but no rain. Peaks were covered in clouds at times. Definitely wind-tunnel tested my tent!

6/13 day off - hiking and fishing-- very cool mid-50's with a steady but mild wind.

6/14 Dusy to Rawau Lake. Stayed on trail over Bishop Pass and it was significantly melted. Did not use spikes. I think the snow will shortly be entirely gone. Went cross-country to Rawau Lake from Saddlerock Lake. Use trail drops to lake at south end, but there was steep snow, so I stayed high (a bit of a bushwhack) and then dropped to the outlet.

6/15 short walk out. South Lake is really low! Tons of day-hikers. Went up to pass to check out Chocolate Lakes on 6/14. There is no snow down to the lake but decided not to walk out that way because morning light not good for photos.

[commonloon]

June 13-17.

Snow: more remaining than last year this time. I brought microspikes but only used them once. Snow varied a lot thru the course of each day. Lots of smaller snow fields, the main obstacle was avoiding elephant traps where ever a rock was -- sometimes where you didn't realize it was. Late it day, snow was softer (duh). Early morning (e.g. 7am) snow was harder but warmed quickly. I was able to mostly kick steps, plunge step, etc. I just had to move more slowly while on snow.

Water/Crossings: I had no trouble making any crossings but did use trees it a couple of occasions. No problems whatsoever finding water.

Mosquitos: Only in the Bear Creek area were they a problem. I would say a 4.

Weather: clear, mild to cool during the day. COLDer than I expected at night. One night near Mammoth (Duck Lake), overnight I experienced one hell of a wind storm.

People: didn't see anyone on the off trail bits, but the PCT/'JMT had lots (mostly the former North bound).

[genetastic]

Kibbie Ridge: Cherry Lake to Huckleberry Lake, out-and-back, June 8th 2022, 3 nights

Route taken:
We parked at Shingle Spring Trailhead which was down a pretty well graded dirt road past the dam.

We hiked just under 9 miles to the trail up Kibbie Ridge to the unnamed lakes at 7745’. This trail was moderately forested with some nice but buggy meadows. The burn is old enough that the brush is pretty grown in. You’ll want long pants for some of the thicker patches of cats claw. We found a nice camping spot just past where the trail leaves the lakes at their north east corner.

The next day it was only a mile to Styx Pass (which only feels like a pass when you’re coming back the other way). At this point Cherry Creek Canyon opens up below you in the form a gorgeous granite bowl. Descending down into Lord Meadow brings you back to boggy terrain. After Lords Meadow, following the lead of another trip report on this site, we skipped two river crossings by staying on the north side of East Fork Cherry Creek. This is open granite territory, so the off-trail hiking is easy and fun — you just have to make your way up the north side of the smaller dome along the north side of the river and eventually catch up with the official trail after if it has crossed back over the river and headed north.

The next section leading up to Huckleberry included two deeper river crossings with fairly strong currents. Our plan was to camp around Huckleberry Lake, but when we got there it was quite buggy and shrubby with no obvious good camping sites. The map suggested the same terrain all the way around the lake. Presented with this, we decided to backtrack and see if anything more inviting presented itself. About 1/2 to 1 mile back from Huckleberry Lake, depending on how you define the start of the lake, we took a chance on heading off trail to the north side of the river. Crossing a big log jam, we found a lovely place to camp between little granite ridges and small eddying pools of Cherry Creek.

Not wanting to follow through on our original plans of going along Huckleberry Lake the next day due to the mosquitos, we cut across the granite to the trail from the southern end of Huckleberry north to Letora Lake. This trail is not shown on the USFS map, but two different versions appear on the NatGeo Trails Illustrated map and the Gaia Gps base layer map. The spot where this trail supposedly connected to the main Huckleberry Lake trail was hidden amongst river and swamp, so we cut across open ground until eventually finding trail a half mile in. A few times the trail descended into bogs, but mostly it was in good condition. Notably, where the NatGeo and Gaia versions of the trail disagreed, the Gaia trail matched the facts on the ground. Letora Lake was lovely and we hung out on the eastern side for lunch.

We ended up retracing our steps back for the rest of the hike. Our arrival at lake 7745 was early enough in the day that we decided to keep going. Not finding any other decent water sources between 7745 and the trailhead, we hiked the 15 miles from our campsite south of Huckleberry Lake to the trailhead in one day.

Elevations: High point at around 7950’ less than a mile past Sachse Springs, Styx Pass @ 7689’

[c9h13no3]

3-4 annoyingly sun cupped snowfields cover the trail. The snowfield to the col itself has a well established boot pack beaten in.

There was a cold snap this weekend, so nothing meaningful on the mosquito front.

Spring flowers go up to about 10,000'. Above that, plants are just starting to wake up.