Desolation Wilderness 7/17 - 7/19
Posted: Wed Jul 22, 2009 1:29 pm
Took my 13 yo daughter to Desolation Wilderness for a respite from the heat. Cheated and took the Echo Lake Boat taxi for the first 2.5 miles. Left the dock around 5:45PM.
After about a 4 mile hike w/o seeing another soul we settled here.
Nights were extremely warm for being close to 8000 feet. It probably never dipped below 60.
The next morning we wandered 4 minutes west and set up a little breakfast nook with this view.
After breakfast we went for a stroll. First across Lake Aloha Dam. This is only place we saw people on Saturday and even then we saw them from 1/4 mile away.
While climbing below the dam I noticed a little leak
\
View to south from dam
We then decide to go for a swim. Ahh refreshing............and cold.
After our swim my daughter wants to climb some granite
We decide to head for this little peaklet just north of Pyramid Peak
Climbing
The mutt thinks she's queen of the forest
We're almost there!!
We gotta climb that?!?!?
Batteries then died and the extras in my bag were dead also. I managed to squeeze a few out after intermittent "rests" to the lithium batteries.
Lake Aloha pano
Pyramid Peak
Mt Agassiz and Mt Price to the north. I made a navagational error and ended up on the pealket instead of Mt Agassiz which is where we wanted to be. Oh well still spectacular.
And we even got the mutt tired!!! This rarely happens
The 'squiters were enjoying a fine dinner as well as us. They were only bad around dusk, but they were bad.
Our view from the breakfast nook on Sunday
A little blurry but this is the peaklet we climbed from our camp.
Pano from Pyramid Peak to Mt Price from our camp.
Sadly it was time to get back to reality. So all this....
...went into these.
Mine weighed in at about 35 ponds, my daughters at 25 pounds.
As we departed one last shot from camp of the crew and or little climb from the previous day.
All in all a fantastic voyage. On Sunday we saw 5 people wander through our camp aside from them twe only saw 4-5 people on Saturday at Lake Aloha, there were lots of people up there we just managed to avoid them. The walk out was another story though. I've never seen so many damn people. I was getting frustrated.
A few observations and rants:
The group size should be limited to 6 people. I saw a group of 10 plus people on the trail that looked like they had never been in the mountains before.
Why don''t people bury their TP or carry it out. I was appalled at the amount of TP I saw.
When the USFS is issuing a wilderness permit, instead of telling you how close to water you can be for camping, eating, and going to the restroom etc. , they should ask you, if you don't know. NO PERMIT. People need to know before they go. I saw far too many groups going in as we were leaving that just on appearance, did not look like they should be in the mountains. maybe I'm just an old curmudgeon.
After about a 4 mile hike w/o seeing another soul we settled here.
Nights were extremely warm for being close to 8000 feet. It probably never dipped below 60.
The next morning we wandered 4 minutes west and set up a little breakfast nook with this view.
After breakfast we went for a stroll. First across Lake Aloha Dam. This is only place we saw people on Saturday and even then we saw them from 1/4 mile away.
While climbing below the dam I noticed a little leak
\
View to south from dam
We then decide to go for a swim. Ahh refreshing............and cold.
After our swim my daughter wants to climb some granite
We decide to head for this little peaklet just north of Pyramid Peak
Climbing
The mutt thinks she's queen of the forest
We're almost there!!
We gotta climb that?!?!?
Batteries then died and the extras in my bag were dead also. I managed to squeeze a few out after intermittent "rests" to the lithium batteries.
Lake Aloha pano
Pyramid Peak
Mt Agassiz and Mt Price to the north. I made a navagational error and ended up on the pealket instead of Mt Agassiz which is where we wanted to be. Oh well still spectacular.
And we even got the mutt tired!!! This rarely happens
The 'squiters were enjoying a fine dinner as well as us. They were only bad around dusk, but they were bad.
Our view from the breakfast nook on Sunday
A little blurry but this is the peaklet we climbed from our camp.
Pano from Pyramid Peak to Mt Price from our camp.
Sadly it was time to get back to reality. So all this....
...went into these.
Mine weighed in at about 35 ponds, my daughters at 25 pounds.
As we departed one last shot from camp of the crew and or little climb from the previous day.
All in all a fantastic voyage. On Sunday we saw 5 people wander through our camp aside from them twe only saw 4-5 people on Saturday at Lake Aloha, there were lots of people up there we just managed to avoid them. The walk out was another story though. I've never seen so many damn people. I was getting frustrated.
A few observations and rants:
The group size should be limited to 6 people. I saw a group of 10 plus people on the trail that looked like they had never been in the mountains before.
Why don''t people bury their TP or carry it out. I was appalled at the amount of TP I saw.
When the USFS is issuing a wilderness permit, instead of telling you how close to water you can be for camping, eating, and going to the restroom etc. , they should ask you, if you don't know. NO PERMIT. People need to know before they go. I saw far too many groups going in as we were leaving that just on appearance, did not look like they should be in the mountains. maybe I'm just an old curmudgeon.