Tuesday, November 10, 2009

Desolation Wilderness: Grass Lake, Mt. Tallac, and Yet-To-Be-Named

Two coyotes near the road to Fallen Leaf Lake - only one in the picture - sorry.



After dropping our gear at the camp site we traverse around Grass Lake ...



... which has a fair amount of grass.



We find a creek bed with little water in it and follow it for a while: Frank, William, Kirsten, Patrick, Jürgen, Harshit.



Ancient tree.



Up the hill towards the trail.



We take the trail towards Gillmore Lake and Tallac and arrive at the summit of Mt. Tallac.



View of Lake Tahoe from Mt. Tallac.



View of the Crystal Range with Pyramid Peak from the western slopes of Tallac.



Back to Gillmore Lake in the warm evening light.



Gillmore Lake - time for switching on headlamps and staying on trails.



As expected, night and morning are chilly.



Kirsten, Frank, and I take off towards Pyramid Peak. There's no trail to get into the big valley with Aloha Lake, so we hike up the nearest canyon behind our camp site at Grass Lake towards Lake Margery, and from there West toward Pyramid. Many beautiful lakes in various shapes and sizes here - granite complimentary.



We hike up an unnamed granite dome and upon noticing that there's another drop towards Pyramid we celebrate the views with a good break.



If you look from the right angle we're actually above Pyramid.



Crossing various streams and lakes is entertaining. The right end of the log is suspended in mid air ...



Not sure how well this granite bridge works with high tide.



Another view with Pyramid Peak and a lake.



Oops, sorry. Due to my sloppy navigation we hike another unnamed peak before finding the canyon that we came up. The lake in the picture is Jabu Lake.



Some rock scrambling in the canyon.



Looking down towards Grass Lake.



Almost there. Heavenly slopes at the other end of the canyon.



Back at Grass Lake.



Some unfinished business with Pyramid Peak, but other than that: awesome scenery and great company. A bit chilly, but the weather could have been less friendly this time of the year.

2 comments:

  1. Where is the snow? I had high hopes for an early skiing season this winter. :)

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  2. Yeah, we need more snow asap. Unfortunately the recent storms ended up drifting north / arriving dry ... :-(

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