Another hike was cancelled. I had planned on submitting White Mountain, at over 14,000 feet. From the top you can see Mt. Whitney and Death Valley. I stopped at the ranger station to get a trail map and was told the trail was closed as the road leading up to the trailhead was snowed in. I could do it but I would have to add 26 miles to the already six mile climb and do it in the snow. I decided that that one can wait.
We instead drove up towards the trail head and the Bristlecone Pine Forest. We stopped at this viewpoint along the way as it was a day long drive from town. We took this trail to the top of the hill overlooking the valley.
Cathy is enjoying the view from the top. It was straight down to her left.
I stopped to “smell the roses” . . . or cacti as it was, on the way back to the truck.
The road was closed from the Shulman Grove Visitor Center so we decided to check out the trees. Before this I could not have identified a bristlecone. There were several hiking trails through the forest and we hiked part of the Discovery Trail.
This bristlecone tree was about 10,000 years old when it fell, about 500 years ago.
Even though the landscape had the appearance of high desert, the area was covered with tiny wildflowers of every color.
We found out about the petroglyphs from the Bishop Field Office of the BLM where we stopped for area information. We then drove to the Petroglyph Drive, a 44 mile loop through the petroglyphs and back to our camp at Bishop. We stopped at all three petroglyph sites along the 20+ mile dirt (and dusty) road, first at Fish Slough, then Chicago Canyon and finally Red Canyon. We encountered no one during the half day we spent there.
Petroglyphs are carved into rocks, pictographs are painted on rocks. Both are found in the Owens Valley Petroglyphs, along with type of rock alignment.
Early native peoples carved these designs in the faces of the rocks, cliffs and cave walls.
This is the only known petroglyph that resembles a man.
I came around this rock and Cathy was sheltering from the sun.
These petroglyphs are carved on volcanic rock know as Bishop Tuff.
The petroglyphs in this area range from 1,000 to 10,000 years old.
I went hiking around the back of the formations and this guy was watching me.
If you spend the time and hike a little, you can see areas that most of the public misses.
These carvings were on the backside of the rock. I am heading back to the truck. The parking area is coming into view beyond the rocks.
After getting dusty, tired and hungry at the petroglyphs, we headed back to Bishop and found a bakery recommended by Kathy Owen, Erick Schat’s Bakkery (yes, that is how they spell it). This is probably the best bakery we have ever seen. We dined outside, enjoying the food and the rest.
Leaving Bishop, we took Highway 6 to Tonopah, Nevada and then on towards Great basin National Park. We found this turnout around sunset and decided to spend the night enjoying the solitude. We only had a couple of other people within sight.
The canyons were impressive. I took a short walk to the rim and it was straight down to the river. This is not somewhere you would let children play!
The sunset as seen from our Motorhome.
In the morning, we stopped at this viewpoint somewhere in the desert. I walked partway out on this ridgeline, until it got a little too narrow.
That is our route winding through the ridge of mountains to the semi flat desert floor. We made it to Colorado by the evening. In the morning we started up the pass between Montrose and Gunnison and our Motorhome overheated. We were stranded at the summit. I had to choose 1) Let is cool down and head into Gunnison or 2) Let it cool and head back to Montrose. I knew the only Freightliner center was in Grand Junction if something major was broken. After letting the engine cool for several hours we headed back to Grand Junction. Three days later we were on our way again. It turned out that our radiator was filled with dirt, mud and dust from our Alaska travels and there was less than 8 degrees of cooling being furnished by the coolant system. We had the radiator cleaned and the overflow tank replaced and we were on our way, but we had to change our schedule somewhat for the three day delay.
Since we were “stuck” in Grand Junction we decided to spend the day at the nearby Colorado National Monument. That is the park road winding below us. We entered the canyon through the Fruita entrance.
This is “Balanced Rock”. It is directly over the winding highway heading up to the rim. We went through the Visitors Center and campground before continuing on.
After passing the Independence Monument Viewpoint, Grand View and Monument Canyon view, we stoped at Coke Ovens Overlook. These looked very similar to the coke ovens we saw in Nevada on a previous trip.
This formation was photographed from the turnout near Grand View. You had to use the provided turnouts to stop as the road was very narrow.
We stopped near Independence Monument on the return. The park was established by President Taft in 1911.
Travelling with the Schinglers 