Gary-Summer: September 2024

Thursday, September 5, 2024

September 5, 2024 - Princess Campground

Title: September 5, 2024 - Princess Campground

Hike Info:

Type: Car: Camping

Description:

Today we will start our five day, four night camping trip. But we still need to get ready and packed. How long will this take? I am hoping to be packed by noon, have an early dinner and be off by 2. Will things go according to plan? We will see.

I get up at 5:40. No lightning to report, but I let my audience know that I will be gone the next four mornings and they are on their own until I get back. Becca from Stanislaus NF shows appreciation for letting them know. And Buck Rock thinks we already have had a wonderful summer.

I ate my breakfast and gathered a bit more stuff. Since nobody else is up, I go for a one lap walk. Along the way, I get called over by Hillary and the Audibon lady. We talk for at least 20 minutes and then I go on. It is getting a little bit warm by the time I finish up/ Sherri is up, but not working on the food yet. So I went out and weeded for awhile-and it is needed.

Now we start getting serious about packing. The non-food stuff is about 85% done, but there are some odds and ends. So I help Sherri with the food. At noon, I have a sandwich before gathering up the rest of the stuff. By the time we are finished packing it is about 3. So it is time to get dinner. We decided to eat Mexican at Casa Quintero. Very filling.

After finishing up our dinner, we come back and we stuff the last of the stuff into the car. We managed to leave at 4:15 with me driving. Sherri, Steve, Korra and myself are the folks on our trip. The drive is uneventful. We get to Princess campground about 5:45.

We are at site #4. I think this is the one we had a couple of years ago. It is a comfortable place. Looks like the campground is half vacant. Steven puts up his hammock and we our tent. With the Exped blower, the Mondo King mattresses are really easy to get blowing up. Much easier than using the schnozzel for an hour to get it satisfactory.

Once set up, we lounge around for awhile. The evening is coming along fast. Sherri suggests we go for a walk, so we walk a couple of loops before going to be. Bed time is at 8:45. I lie in bed for awhile, reading and just enjoying being out.

Monday, September 2, 2024

September 2, 2024 - Park Ridge Lookout and Hitchcock Meadow

Title: September 2, 2024 - Park Ridge Lookout and Hitchcock Meadow
Hike Info : Description : Extra Photo's : Flowers and Plants

Hike Info:

Type: Hiking : Lookout

Trail head: Big Stump Parking Area

Trail: Hitchcock Meadows Loop

Destination: Hitchcock Meadow

Actual Destination: Kings Canyon Park/Sequoia National Forest border

Distance: 1.58 miles 1

Elevation Rise: 285 '

Descent: 285‘

Maximum Elevation: 6,322'

GPS Tracks

¹I did not turn on the GPS. The distance and elevation data is gathered by plotting it on Google Earth.


CoffeePot Fire

Description:

My blood sugar alarm went off last night interrupting a good night's sleep. Turns out it was a false alarm. I managed to wake up at 0600 when Sherri got up. Sort of amazing that Sherri wakes me up instead of the other way around. The task this morning is to get everything down to the car as we will leave after our relief shows up. We get all of this stuff done by 0800-of course we do not have a lot as this is only a couple of steps above backpacking as we have to lug everything up 20’. And today, we lug everything down the 20’.

We go in service at 0800 with Buck Rock following us a few minutes later. Then we settle down for the next hour or so, doing our lookout thing. Sherri gives the cab a good cleaning. I did not get to clean the windows. Maybe I was too busy admiring hawks and being impressed by the CoffeePot Fire.

We stayed overnight last night to provide coverage on Labor Day demo 0800 till our relief arrived-also I just enjoy being up here. Before 0900, our relief arrived in the form of Terry. We met Terry last Labor Day for the first time. We also found out then that Terry and us have something else in common-we go to the same church. We talked about what had happened during the last couple of days-not much. But also some chit-chat about various topics.

Trail to Hitchcock Meadow

We left Terry. Originally we thought of hiking Park Ridge over to Panoramic Point. But even though the smoke is clearing, it still is there. So we decided not to. We head back down the road to the Visitor Center. As we got close to Big Stump, we decided that we could go on a short hike-if it is too smokey we can turn back.

Instead of doing the Big Stump loop, we will go the other way to Hitchcock Meadow. Down the trail we go-down being the way we start off. The Meadow is not too far away from the very popular Big Stump area. But we are alone on it. We usually hike with our poles, but today, we left them in the car. While the trail is a bit uneven, it is not too bad.

The thing about this trail is that there are Sequoia stumps and towering trees. A reminder of what we lost and an appreciation of what we have. Light filters through the canopy. And I wonder if this is what Adam and Eve enjoyed in the Garden.

Hitchcock Meadow

After walking about 20 minutes, we ended up at Hitchcock Meadow. What makes this meadow such an attractive place is the Sequoias guarding the area and the pleasant greeness underfoot. We cross over a small pool of water and walk over to a dirt road on the other side.

I thought that pretty close to here is the Park boundary, but it's not. We walk a ways down this road. Nothing fabulous, but something to explore. The road gets to a place where it dips down into the Forest.We decide to return after looking down into the area.

As we start back, a young man comes down the road we just came down. We talked with him for a bit. He has a cabin down in the area. I had seen him jogging by Wilsonian when we drove by.

We just reversed our trip out, enjoying these last moments here. I linger back, enjoying how the light filters through the trees. It is a good way to go out. We get back to the car and leave. It is uneventful back to Fresno. After we unpack and shower, we decide to go out to eat. Steven and Korra are on the coast, so it is just the two of us. The Old Spaghetti Factory sounds like it will be good for us. After eating, we just relax for the rest of the day.

Extra Photo's

A Glorious Morning has broken

Initial tint of the rising sun

Sherri walking back to the parking area

More morning breaking

Sequoia along the trail

Sequoia guarding the meadow

Hitchcock Meadow

Flowers and Plants

Blue Elderberry

California Lilac

Sunday, September 1, 2024

September 1, 2024 - Park Ridge Lookout

Title: September 1, 2024 - Park Ridge Lookout

Hike Info : Description : Extra Photo's : Animals

Hike Info:

Type:Lookout

Description:

I both woke up early and was slow getting up. The early part is that I woke up well before 0500. The slow part is I did not get moving until 0600. But really, there is not much reason to get moving too early. It is not like I am going to go for a walk with an AQI of 170 and climbing. But I think that AQI is more than up here as it is taken in Wilsonia and we are a thousand feet up from there. We get our day together and have breakfast before going into service this morning.

It is another extended day, so we go into service at 0800. With the smoke, there is not much to see. When we went in service, we went in with an optimistic three miles of visibility. Things do not get much better. But we do what we are paid to do and continue to try to pierce through the smoke looking for smoke. (We get paid in sunsets, in case you are wondering about our wages.)

We have four visitors from San Diego who braved the smoke. They were interested in how the lookout functions. They indicated they wanted to come back when there was better visibility.

Then back to doing our scans for whatever that is worth as we still cannot see more than 3-5 miles. But we do our scans anyway. And the rest of our morning goes on normally.

Somebody let the Coffee Pot overheat

Then as noon was closing in, two women came up: one from Fremont and her friend from Vancouver. We do our normal song and dance talking about what they are seeing around them, the CoffeePot Fire smoke which is hampering the view, where the General Grant Tree is, the effects of the KNP Fire three years ago and the recent prescribed burn which they just walked along. They are interested and I might say even fascinated. The Vancouver lady asks me about how we get our volunteers and I talk about that. Also about the training we go through where we learn how to use the fire finder, read a map, use the radio and take the weather. Take the weather? Wait, did we take the weather this morning? No! Wonder what Wendy will say when she finds out?

One of the things about being conscious about doing our scans is that you see things. Isn’t that why we are lookouts is to see things. While not seeing smoke, well at least not seeing smoke which is not part of the CoffeePot Fire. But what we do see are birds. Not just any birds, but some hawks which seem to be doing a sky dance. When they disappear, we go back and finish our scan, only to have them reappear and resume their dancing. Not sure what kind of hawks they are, maybe a Cooper Hawk. Whoever they are, they are certainly mesmerizing.

Earlier today one of the visitors asked me don’t we get bored just staring out onto the forest? Not with entertainment like those hawks. Plus there is the CoffeePot Fire, which when we can see that far, captures our attention. First with the clouds of smoke billowing out from it and then at night, we see the fire-red glow from its destruction. Of course, being able to observe it requires some clearing of the smoke we have been enveloped in. Today as the afternoon has progressed, the smoke has lifted and we can see more and more.

Dancing Hawk

Also not bored as with a couple of fires one down in Cedar Grove which causes some excitement with the Park. It is by the Visitor Center there and seems pretty small. Staff there have it contained, but Engine 42 goes down there to check it out. The other fire, actually two separate ones, are in CalFire territory down in the Dunlap area. There is too much smoke for us to see, but we are able to figure out where it is, in case it becomes visible. Delilah’s lookout is a second year person. I refreshed him last June. So I give him a call and we talk through the fire and where it is and why it is not visible to him.

At 1750, we went out of service with Ash Mountain Fire. But we stayed on for another two hours with Porterville. Sherri fixes the lasagna and bread for dinner. Nothing else exciting happens, which is a good thing. As the sun goes down, the shadows deepen. Instead of smoke obscuring the landscape, darkness does. Finally at 2000, we went out of service with Porterville.

Sherri has a new phone which should take night photos better. She has seen some really interesting shots and wants to attempt using her phone for her own photos. When it gets dark enough, we descend to the ground, shut off lights and enjoy a bit of star gazing. Night sky photography is something which takes a while to figure out. But Sherri gets some photos for initial satisfaction. Also we play with various effects. My attempts do not come out at all. By 2130, we are safely back in the tower, all tucked away in our sleeping bags, ready for our last night here.