Glass Mountain 7-12-10

I've been doing a lot of solo hiking lately. For me, hiking solo is both a challenge and a luxury. Simply put, I can push myself as hard as I want and take breaks whenever I want, but I don't get to share the beauty of the places I'm seeing with anyone else - except all y'all out there in cyber-world. The other great part about solo hiking is that it takes little-to-no planning. If I want a lazy morning and then decide to hike around 1:30, no problem. I'm the only one to blame if I end up missing dinner because I left too late. I pack my backpack the same if I'm hiking 6 miles or 16 miles, so even if I hop in the car planning to go one place and getting side tracked by another, it's no problem.

My latest adventure took me up to the summit of Glass Mountain which is, according to my boss, "one of the most obscure peaks in the Mono Basin." I've been wanting to do this climb for awhile for several reasons. When you live in a place like Lee Vining, it's really easy to get seduced by the grandiosity of the Sierras and forget that the landscape extends out in all directions. Glass Mountain sits out on the edge of the basin between the Whites and the Sierras, slightly north of Crowley and south of the Adobe Valley and has an incredible view for miles and miles. I'm also curious of all the things that exist east of me, because I haven't spent much time out there, even in the Whites. Finally, Glass Mountain is one of the simplest mountains to climb around here. There isn't much of an approach, yet you still reach just over 11,000 ft.

Some kind of buckwheat hugging an obsidian edge

Glass Mountain is on the northern edge of the Long Valley Caldera, one of the biggest calderas in the country, that erupted around 760,000 years ago. Glass Mountain itself is a gigantic volcano that went through a series of eruptions between 2.1 and .8 million years ago. To this day, the mountain is covered in broken chunks of obsidian and pumice that form a patchwork across the slopes. As one of the witty entries in the registry said, "I've never hiked a trail strewn with so much broken glass."

The "getting there" is the hardest part of this hike. There are at least a hundred dirt roads that criss-cross this section of Mono County (I NEVER exaggerate) so not only do you have to find the right one to take off of 120 East, but then you have to make all the right turns (marked and unmarked) to get to the little two track four-wheel drive road that eventually peters out into a little footpath that will eventually take you straight up the side of the mountain. From what I've read, there are multiple ways to ascend Glass Mountain. You can hike straight from Sawmill Meadows, a really beautiful, remote campground that is mostly abandoned, from the north somewhere around Crooked Meadow, from the west (which looks and sounds like death) or from my little two-track. This route appears to be the simplest, most straightforward route up. The key word here is UP. My guess is that the "trailhead" starts around 9400 ft and takes you almost straight uphill to the summit of the mountain. There are a few meanders here and there along the trail, not even big enough to call them switchbacks, but for the most part you are walking uphill through pumice sand.

Initially you pass through a wooded area, lots of aspen that collect near the seeps and springs in small valleys, and tall, puzzled barked Jeffrey's that eventually give way to white bark pine as you begin to climb. The white bark pines take on krumholtz characteristics once you pass about 10,500 feet, so the view becomes clearer and more accessible as the trees become shrubby. Eventually you crest the ridge leading to the summit. From this vantage point, you can see Crowley and have an amazing view of the Long Valley Caldera. The Minarets peak over the ridge and inch into view the higher you climb.

View of Crowley and the Sierras from the top

View of Mono from the top

Once you reach the top, the 360 degree panorama is amazing. You stand on the highest point between Long Valley and the Mono Basin and can see for miles to the north and south. A summit register chronicles the highs and lows of others journeys to the top. I summited on July 12th, but there hadn't been an entry since June 26th. What a remote spot! I highly recommend this hike to anyone looking for a quiet, beautiful area. The hike is challenging but very short, and the view is worth the burn in your quads.

View of Glass Mountain from Hwy 120

A few days ago I took on an epic adventure and hiked the 19 mile round-trip trek to Waterwheel Falls. These falls are one of those kind of mythic, storied places in Yosemite National Park that many people talk about, some have actually been to, and few have seen during peak flow. I now am one of the lucky few. It's a hike I've been thinking about for a long time now, something I had hoped to do last summer but the peak flow came early and my hiking confidence came late. This year was a completely different story. Tioga Pass didn't even open until June 5th this year and though it has now been open for almost a month much of the high country is still completely snowed in. However, because you're hiking downhill to Waterwheel Falls, it opened up a bit earlier than many of the other hikes out of the meadow. However, my confidence still wasn't all there - I was nervous about taking this long of a hike, especially one I was pretty unfamiliar with, by myself. As a result, I left relatively early - I was on the trail by 8:15 - and I hustled my way down.

The hike to Waterwheel Falls begins in Tuolumne Meadows either at the Visitor Center or at the trailhead to Dog Lake. I'm not sure which one is shorter. I took the Dog Lake trailhead route because I was a little wary of the mosquitos, though I think it would have been more beautiful to hike across the meadow from the visitor center.

The first five miles are relatively flat - a nice jaunt through an alpine meadow along the Tuolumne River. There are about five stream crossings, four of them wadable with waterproof boots. The first crossing is kind of tricky - it's doable over a log a few hundred yards upstream, but then you're stuck on an island and still have to find your way across the other channel while keeping your feet dry. I would probably recommend bringing Chacos or some other kind of water shoe because in addition to the stream crossings, there's about an eighth of a mile section of trail that is a complete lake this time of year. That comes later on. The Tuolumne River is relatively flat and mellow during this section of trail, and there are many places to pop off the trail and take a dip. Because I was in a bit of a hurry, I didn't do this though I saw many people who did and it looked heavenly.

At around mile 5 the trail takes a pretty steep drop down along Tuolumne Falls. If you don't have enough time to hike all the way to Waterwheel Falls, I would still recommend coming this far. The trail isn't phenomenal but Tuolumne Falls is spectacular - it's your quintessential waterfall with layers of rock creating a chute that forces the water together and thunders down a two-tiered drop into a large pool below. Again, because I was nervous about time I didn't linger too long here on the way down.

At this point, the trail branches into three. You can either continue on toward Virginia Canyon following just below the Tioga Crest, you can stop to camp at Glen Aulin, one of the High Sierra Camps, or you continue down the Grand Canyon of the Tuolumne towards Waterwheels Falls. The signs say it's 3.3 miles beyond Glen Aulin and on the way down it feels like a mile and a half. You're walking next to a series of falls and cascades - White Falls, California Falls, and LeConte Falls all line the trail and you get pretty good looks at them as you walk. Somewhere between White Falls and California Falls is the swampy trail section I mentioned previously. It's directly below a beautiful cascade that flows down the granite on the North side of the trail and all the water collects in a meadow that's criss-crossed with deadfall. It's possible to log-hop your way across this section as long as you're comfortable with getting up close and personal with the Lodgepole Pine saplings that are beginning to recolonize the area. I found myself swinging, Tarzan-like, between saplings to reach the various logs that I could then precariously shuffle across until I could grab hold of the next young tree. This part of the trail is probably navigated much more easily simply by bringing along a pair of water shoes. After this point, you begin a steep descent towards LeConte and Waterwheel Falls.

At this point I had been hiking for about 2.75 hours and was pretty tired and hungry. I was initially a little fooled by LeConte Falls, maybe I was just being optimistic about how far I'd already hiked, and thought it was Waterwheel Falls. I was really disappointed. That's not to say that LeConte isn't beautiful, but it certainly doesn't live up to the hype of Waterwheel. Because of that, I figured I'd keep hiking just to make sure I wasn't missing something down below. The Tuolumne at this point is hardly a river. It's more like a series of cascades because the grade is so steep and as soon as I got to a better vantage point where I could see a little way down the trail I knew that all the excitement was coming up ahead. Even before I could see the falls themselves, I could see the mist and whitewater rising up from the crashing water. As I crested the rise, the falls extended themselves below and before me. With such high water, it was an amazing site. I would definitely recommend hiking down the last 400 or so feet to get to the bottom of the falls because they are difficult to see from the trail and the view isn't as impressive from above or alongside.

I reached the bottom of the falls by 11:15 and was the first day-hiker of the day to set up shop near the falls. I got a prime perch right across from the two waterwheels. Aside from the absolute beauty and awesomeness of seeing so much water crashing by, to me one of the most incredible things was the sound. These are noisy falls to be sure so that even if people had been hiking along the trail a few hundred yards away, I would not have heard them.

Having never seen this area when there wasn't tons of water gushing down it, I'm not totally sure what the rocks underneath look like. But because of the way the water acts, I'm guessing that there are huge divots and ledges that stop the flow and force it up and over. Then wind takes over and blows the water back onto itself creating a waterwheel-like rotation. I sat to write in my journal a bit and wrote these words - I wonder why people are so enthralled with waterfalls. Could it be that they serve as a rare glimpse of a power larger than us, a force exerted to a much greater and more beautiful degree? I think that could be. All the time we hear about the remarkable power of the forces of nature - glaciers, water over time, wind - but waterfalls somehow encapsulate that power. I've never been to a waterfall that didn't make my heart race, make me catch my breath and smile. The pure, unadulterated power and noise of waterfalls somehow inspires both awe and fear in me every time I am near one.

Nine miles in and totally rejuvenated by the light mist and churning water, I packed up my backpack and headed back toward Tuolumne Meadows. I ate a delicious lunch of peanut butter and Nutella, an apple and some almonds when I reached Tuolumne Falls and made it back to my car by 4:15. Eight hours and 19 miles later I was both exhausted and exhilarated by my experience at Waterwheel Falls. It's a difficult hike, but one that I highly recommend doing while the water is high.