It wasn’t the vacation I’d hoped for or intended.
Jennifer and I were going to backpack out of Saddlebag Lakes, just over the Sierra crest from the Yosemite National Park boundary. We planned to cross over the crest—off trail—into the park, then hike northward for six days through Yosemite and the Hoover wilderness. Our trip would end at the Mono Village Resort, some 35 miles north.
It didn’t work out that way.
On our drive in through Yosemite, we stayed overnight at White Wolf Lodge. It’s off the Tioga Road at an elevation of around 8,000 feet. It was a lovely evening and a chance to begin getting acclimated to the altitude.
At dinner that evening, we asked our waiter if he knew anyone who might want to make $100 to drive our truck from Saddlebag Lakes to Mono Village. He was happy to offer himself and a friend for the task. At breakfast the next morning, we gave him the cash and a key. Then we headed on to Saddlebag Lakes.
The resort there operates a boat service across the lakes. In the company of fishermen and day-hikers, we disembarked on the far shore. Jennifer and I hoisted our packs and headed north along the well-graded trail through the Twenty Lakes Basin.
I pointed at the crest, a seemingly sheer, 1,500-foot-high rock wall. “We’re going over that,” I said. Jennifer looked concerned, but—for now—she was still confident that we would find a way over.
Here’s where I went wrong, and it’s embarrassing to say so: I hadn’t bothered to fully research the route, and didn’t have a detailed quadrangle map. I figured we’d find a use-trail over the top, or else find our own route over what I thought would be smooth granite outcrops. After we found our way down the other side, it would be a cinch to follow the outlet stream from Upper McCabe Lake to the other McCabe Lakes. Then we’d pick up the clearly marked trail—shown on my general map of Yosemite—and follow it for the rest of our route.
It almost worked. I guided us off the trail and through a basin of small lakes; then I found a use-trail leading up the mountain. I was full of confidence. The pack felt heavy, and the altitude had us dizzy and fatigued. But it was only noon, and we felt fresh.
Coming over the rim of a cirque, we interrupted a family skinny-dipping in Secret Lake. Ahead, fractured granite blocks stood as a solid wall a few hundred feet high. To the right, a steep talus slope reached up even higher toward snowfields on Excelsior Peak. To the left, faint use-trails led up a mild slope toward a low saddle. That seemed the obvious route.
We arrived at the saddle in the company of some young day-hikers. They were peering over the edge. “Well, you can see Upper McCabe Lake,” one of them was saying, “but I don’t see how you’d get down there.”
Neither did I. We were at the head of the lake’s cirque, and the slope down started at near-vertical. It dropped at least a few hundred feet before it began to level out into something you could actually walk on.
I shed the pack and started hunting around for a route down. We’d read, on various web sites, that there was a sign up here somewhere, announcing the border of Yosemite National Park. Follow the trail beyond the sign, we’d seen it suggested, and you’ll get down safely.
I followed the crest a ways, clambering over blocky boulders. No sign. A passage between two boulders led to a route I could clamber down—at least I could without a pack on. I asked Jennifer to wait while I descended to where the slope eased enough to walk upright. Then I made my way around the cirque, looking for a use-trail.
No trail. I found a rockfall that made a tough, but possible, route and followed it back up to the crest.
“If I can help you get down,” I said to Jennifer, “I can come back for each of the packs.”
It didn’t work out that way.
Jennifer tried gamely, but couldn’t negotiate the handholds and footholds on the boulders.
We went back to the top, and I scouted around for another route. I knew I was running on adrenaline. I was close to exhaustion.
I did find another way down, which would have probably worked: a long slide down a chute of fine talus. I slid down a few hundred feet until I was satisfied (according to my judgment at that time, which may have been dangerously flawed) that there were no major drop-offs on the way down. It would have been a wild experience, actually, to slide and tumble myself, wife, and packs down that gravelly incline. We could have been at the lake, hundreds of feet below, in about five minutes.
I made my way back up the chute, leaning into the rock face and walking my way back up with my hands. Back at the top, I realized I’d have to get Jennifer over there—it was 50 yards or so over and around the precipitous boulders on the ridge—and I wasn’t sure she could do it. When I reached her, she wasn’t interested in trying. It was getting late.
“Let’s go back to Secret Lake,” she said.
We set up camp on a dry patch of meadow on the edge of the hanging cirque. Slowed by the exhaustion and the altitude, we set up camp just before dark. I took a quick dip in the lake. A hot meal was reassuring as well as rejuvenating. The sun set over the Saddlebag Lakes and the Twenty Lakes Basin far below. I was very tired. At 8:30, I was the first to turn in.
When I awoke, the Milky Way hung close overhead. Every few minutes, a shooting star arced across the moonless sky. I dozed again, fitfully. Then a sliver of sun appeared far down a canyon below. Instantly, our cirque bloomed infrared. A symphony of warm colors reflected off the granite and the surface of the lake.
I’d thought the situation over during the night. Somehow, I’d decided that we’d turned off the main trail too late and had gone up the wrong canyon. Maybe the route didn’t go past Secret Lake at all, I mused, but was on the other side of jagged North Peak, which loomed to the south. After breakfast, we descended back to the basin floor, and tried another use trail up that canyon. We had climbed about halfway up when we met some day hikers on their way down.
“Do you know the route over to Upper McCabe Lake?” I asked a young woman.
“Yes.”
“Is this it?”
“No.”
She pointed north. People go over the shoulder of Excelsior Peak,” she said.
“Above Secret Lake.”
“Yes, it’s above Secret Lake. You scramble up the talus slope. It’s easier than it looks.”
“Have you done it?”
“Yes, as far as the ridge.”
Well, that was it for our planned trip. In the first place, I didn’t think Jennifer would want to climb back up to where we’d just descended from. In the second place, and more importantly, I don’t know if we could have made it up that talus slope with packs on.
Following our informant’s next good advice, we left our packs behind and enjoyed a visit to the Conness Lakes, perched a in a cirque just above where we’d stopped. We sat on the shore and discussed our quandary.
We couldn’t get over the crest. But our truck had, by now, been moved 35 miles north, to Mono Village. What to do?
We decided to stay another night or two and enjoy the Twenty Lakes Basin. We’d find a way to retrieve the truck when we decided to leave.
We retrieved our packs and descended to the Basin floor once more.
We were in the backcountry with no clear goal. One arose on its own: I felt a desperate need to get out of the fierce midday alpine sun. Although protected with sunscreen, my uncovered legs were blooming pink. I felt queasy, and I couldn’t tell if it was incipient sunburn, the altitude, or the glare.
We wanted a shady campsite. A mile or two further north, we spotted two possibilities. Each was a bit secluded off the main trail, each next to a spectacular little lake, each with a shady copse of pines.
And each with a sign: “Restoration Area. No Camping.”
We did finally find a spot to set up camp. Once in the shade, the afternoon seemed serene and lovely. We napped, lounged, read books, and walked down to a nearby lake for a swim. In the early evening, we climbed atop a great rock, from which we could view the entire Basin. Jennifer went to bed early, and I lay atop the rock reading and occasionally switching off my headlamp to watch the night sky.
But all was not well. My Thermarest mattress had sprung a leak. At one stop or another, in the glare and heat of the afternoon, I’d misplaced the camera. My sunglasses case was long gone—probably dropped somewhere back on the crest above Upper McCabe Lake. Jennifer had broken one of her trekking poles trying to get around the boulders on the crest. I’d cut myself on the rocks in a couple of places. My ankles and knees hurt a little.
And there was no sign of a let-up in the heat wave.
In the cool of the next morning, we walked back to the boat dock on Saddlebag Lake. We asked the young guys operating the boat if they knew anyone who wanted to make $80 to drive us to Mono Village. Sure enough, one of them did, as soon as he was off work at 11 am.
Back at the Saddlebag Lakes Resort, waiting for our ride, I looked back at the mountains. There was our route, visible even from this distance, etched in the talus on the shoulder of Excelsior Peak. If I'd only known, or figured it out.
I felt badly that, because of my lack of preparation and mountaineering expertise, we’d cut short our one opportunity for a backpacking vacation this year. I should have planned an easier, on-trail hike for Jennifer and myself. Then again: Adventure is what it’s all about. Who wants to venture into the wilderness if there’s no risk, if you always know what’s going to happen next?
And we’d passed a key test, one we might have failed: We were still having a good time together, even though things weren’t going the way we planned.
By 12:15, we’d retrieved the truck. We drove into the desert town of Bridgeport for lunch. It was hot, hot and dry. We’d had enough mountains and enough heat for the moment. We got back in the truck, turned the air conditioner on high, and headed for the beach.
Five hours later, we drove over the top of Pacheco Pass. I turned off the air conditioner and opened the windows, and we descended into the fog-cooled Santa Clara Valley. We continued over Hecker Pass and on into Santa Cruz. We had dinner on the pier and walked along the softly lit streets, inhaling the fog.