October 18, 2019 - Delilah Lookout

Title: October 18, 2019 - Delilah Lookout
Hike Info : Description :  Menu : Animals 

Trail head: Delilah Lookout

Hike Info:

Type:Lookout

Description:

I slept pretty well last night. A bit cold, even in the cab. I put on socks during the night and that helped to keep me warm. When I awoke this morning with first light, I decided that it was better to snuggle inside of the sleeping bag. So I finally got up at 0730. A bit late for me. Even stayed inside of the bag for awhile. We are slow getting started, but we will open for service at 0930.

Mill Flat Creek coming out of Sequoia Lake

Part of the reason why I lounged in my bag was that I finished reading an article by Michael Kunz in the Pacific Journal called John Muir and Pilgrimage through Sacred Land. Besides knowing Dr Kunz, what was interesting to me was the journey he took to retrace John Muir’s route to look at and ponder the Sequoia trees of our area. Muir explored the area of Sequoia Lake and the Converse Basin, Grant Grove and Giant Forest, and some further down. But Dr Kunz retraced Muir’s travels starting at the Kings River. He says that Muir went up Mill Flat Creek till he hit the Millwood area. All of this, along with the Converse Basin and Grant Grove is in direct observation of Delilah. I spent a lot of the day just gawking over the area, imagining what both John Muir and Michael Kunz saw in their travels. Maybe it is because I know the area or Michael, I enjoyed the article.

Shuteye

One of the good things about yesterday’s front coming through, even though it left things cold, we have a spectacular view! Shuteye Pk, 41 miles away is crystal clear. We can even see the peaks in southern Yosemite, such as Sing and Madera. If I really am able to convince myself, that I am seeing Red and Merced Peaks, about 60 miles away. This is sort of like last year on our last day at lookout, we had a clear and spectacular view. Sort of like a reward for serving the forest all summer long.

Sing, Madera, Red and Merced Peaks

We go in service at 0930 with the weather being great. And then we settle down into our normal life-as great as it is. I show Sherri about setting the handheld to scan so that you can hear radio traffic out of the cabin. Also we look at certain things on the base radio-which leads us to a bit of oops. We have a conversation with Buck Rock. She says that she tried to raise us on R5 Project, but we did not hear her. Sierra had done the lookout check-in without mentioning Buck Rock, so she was wondering if we heard her-affirmative. I figured out why we did not hear her-we had not returned the base radio to scan. Not the worst thing in my life.

No smoke towards our Mud Creek

Then we hear about aircraft being called out for an FKU incident. Where is that. A lot of our viewing incident is for CalFire, so should be able to see a smoke, particularly if calling out aircraft for it. This sets me to scrambling, wondering where it is. After scanning the area and coming up negative, I am desperate enough to turn on the radio for CalFire. Pretty soon we pick up a transmission about a Mud Fire in FKU land. Since fires are normally named after something in geographical proximity, I look for a future in our area with the word “Mud” in it. All which we can see in FKU territory is a Mud Creek about 22 miles to the west of us, just beyond Tivy Mtn. But there is no smoke and no planes. Then I start hearing about closing off roads in Monterey and Fresno Counties. Aha! No wonder. We are not blind! This is 90 miles away from us. Relief is off. Now to go back to the normal bit of looking for a smoke.

Sherri studying the fire finder map

Monarch Area

Yesterday Sierra missed us on the 1000 lookout check-in. Today it was Buck Rock’s turn. That gets cleared up quickly. Around noon, a new incident occurs down near Kernville. It does not really affect us, except that some of the aircraft is moved to support fighting the River Fire. Later that afternoon, our regular radio channels with Sequoia is restricted so we move to an alternative set of channels. That is about the extent of our excitement for the day. At 1600 there is the lookout check-in. Shortly afterwards at 1630, we go out of service for the day. And in our case, for the season. Delilah will still be staffed for a couple more weeks. But all the available slots are filled up. It looks like today is our final time up here. Sort of a time to say goodbye until next May.

On the way back, we stop in Squaw Valley for a pizza. Then head on home. It is nice getting back with a full stomach by 1930.

 

 
Menu

 

Breakfast	Lunch	Dinner	Snacks
Oatmeal and add-ins, such as dried peaches, strawberries, nuts, granola. Tang.	Sandwich: Peanut Butter, Nutella	Bear Mountain Pizza	Smoked almonds and string cheese

Animals