WHAT NEXT?

We drove back to Bishop, where the weather was windy but not stormy. We stopped at a burger place, which was exciting to Christy because they had gluten-free onion rings. While we were eating, I worked on how to spend the last 3 days of our trip. We had two full days to work with, plus part of Saturday. On Saturday afternoon we had to drive back to San Francisco. Our flight home was late Saturday night.

First, we touched base with Uncle Ed. They were spending the weekend at Blue Lakes, and invited us to visit again. Blue Lakes was only slightly out of the way, and it seemed like a great place to end our trip. We would drive up there late Friday afternoon and spend Friday night and Saturday morning with them. That still left us with two days for hiking.

I didn’t have any specific ideas. However, when we were at Wild Willy’s hot springs a week earlier, I overheard a guy raving about the Gem Lakes. He claimed that they were the prettiest place around. I looked at the area on the topo map, and it did look promising. A bit of internet research provided more information. It sounded like a great place for a dayhike, though popular. We decided to do that on Thursday and figure Friday out later.

We still need a place to camp for the next two nights. French Camp, near Toms Place at the bottom of Rock Creek Valley, seemed convenient. Water from the Gem Lakes drains into Rock Creek, and the trailhead is at the end of the same road. We had spent one night at French Camp earlier in the trip and liked it. We went back, and tried to get the same campsite. Unfortunately, it was taken. We drove all the way around the loop, and ended up at a site that was actually a little nicer. We booked it for two nights and set up camp.

The next morning we drove up the Rock Creek Valley to a busy parking area at the end of the road. The Gem Lakes are popular, even on a Thursday. There are multiple hiking options, but we decided to start with the main trail up to the Gem Lakes themselves. We started out in lovely wildflower meadows along tumbling Rock Creek. Before long, the first broad view of the Sierra Nevada crest loomed ahead of us. That as a nice start to the scenery, and it just got better and better. Heart Lake was beautiful, and the trail beside Long Lake was a pleasure to walk. The short side trip to Chickenfoot Lake was worthwhile, too. It offered up more wildflowers meadows at the base of some impressive peaks.

The main trail took us to a crossing of Rock Creek. The trail turns left beyond the crossing and heads up to Morgan Pass. I thought about going that way, but my preference was to see the Gem Lakes first. They were in a basin upstream, but also off to the right on the far side of a steep little ridge. We debated the best approach, before deciding to backtrack a bit to a place where the terrain wasn’t as steep. A short climb brought us to the crest, and we worked our way down through the trees to a small lake. We had lunch there, before continuing towards the next lake. We had to rock hop Rock Creek, and found a perfectly good trail – not shown on the map – on the other side. We followed it to another rock hop crossing and on up to the shore of the main lake. This lake is a lovely blue-green, at the base of some impressive, rocky peaks.

We relaxed there a bit while I debated what to do next. I considered Morgan Pass, but I really wanted to get a view of these lakes from above. I studied the map, and eyeballed the ridge on the west side of the Gem Lakes. It was very steep, but I thought I could climb a gully all the way to the top. I suggested that plan to Christy. She was content to hang out there while I explored.

I circled the lake and began working my way up the gully. It was choked with boulders, but I was able to find my way through. I found a beaten path at the top of the ridge, and followed it up towards Point 11,645’, which is immediately south of the Gem Lakes. I was above treeline now, and the hiking was pleasant along rock slabs. Views opened up to the southwest to the Treasure Lakes, which are just as pretty as the Gem Lakes. I finally reached the summit of Point 11,645’ and found the view I’d been looking for. I was looking directly down at the Gem Lakes, which were even more beautiful from this vantage point.

I enjoyed the view before exploring more. I hiked to the easy side of the plateau to look down on an unnamed alpine Lake. That was less exciting. Next, I aimed for an overlook of Dade Lake at the south end of the plateau. That looked like an flat, easy hike on the topo, but the map lies. The terrain was actually a maze of boulders and scraggly bushes. I went about halfway before deciding that it couldn’t possibly be worth the time and effort required. I aborted that mission and worked my way back over to the west side of the plateau for more views of the Treasure Lakes. Then I headed back down, as Christy had been waiting for a couple of hours.

We headed directly out and returned to camp. After dinner that evening, we returned to Mono Lake for sunset. I was hoping to get some good photos of the Tufa Towers on the south side of the lake in evening light. Sunset was ok, but nothing spectacular.

We had a quiet evening back at camp. I had enough of a cell signal there to begin working on plans for the next day.

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