Wheeler Peak and Environs

Wakey wakey. Time to get up and get moving and pack the crap and hit the road. Goodbye, Butte Lake. Hello, road. Quarter tank of gas took us all the way to Susanville, a tired looking town that appeared to enjoy its beauty sleep. And then it was on to Johnstonville, Janesville, down the 395, down past the gigantic Honey Lake (alas, not a lake of honey, just boring ol' water) towards Reno. And then we passed through Reno, merged onto the I-80, left the I-80, drove through Fernley and out to Fallon. And Fallon, well, that was it, the last chance, the last holdout, the last major fragment of society before the vast expanse of the nearly uninhabited Great Basin Desert. 

Three hundred and twenty-seven miles of road, interrupted by just three towns along the way. No cars, no buildings, no telephone poles, nothing. A long drive through empty country. Empty except for the road, a thin black line in the sweeping void of high peaks and dusty flora. Good ol' Highway 50, AKA "The Loneliest Road in America." A fitting name indeed. The thing is damn lonesome.

Except not really. It's got plenty of company, just not that of the man-made kind. There's mile after mile of sagebrush, Artemisia Tridentata, thousands of them, filling the air with their scent, populous and prosperous. They're everywhere, having conquered the land, living life to the best of their ability. Sage city after sage city. And within and around and between these cities of sage are the communities of saltbush, rabbitbrush, greasewood and miscellaneous cacti, all there, all alive. And though we didn't see any while flying down the road at 70mph, I knew there lurked in the hills a whole assortment of jackrabbits, mule deer, mice, voles, hawks, coyotes, mountain lions, rattlesnakes, lizards and all the rest of those tiny little miscreant desert reptiles and mammals and birds and whatnot that exist outside my knowledge but exist nonetheless. "Loneliest Road in America." Yeah right!

We drove through the Desatoya Mountains off into Austin, the first of three villages along the way. "What Happens in Austin...You Brag About It!" exclaimed a sign. We drove straight through, ascending the road through the Toiyabe Range, never finding out what it is that makes those who stop in Austin so braggadocious. 

More road, more sage, more mountains, more sky. We'd drive through a valley, go through some mountains, and then drive through another valley and then into more mountains. Mountains, valley, mountains, valley. This was the theme of the day. Drove through the Toquima Range up to Hickison Summit, down into another valley, and then up again through the Monitor Range and beyond. Then we stumbled upon Eureka, "The Friendliest Town on the Loneliest Road." There was a rodeo there. We stopped. Not to see the rodeo. Just to have lunch. Ate at a park in the outskirts of town, the sky dotted with clouds and the air crisp and dry.

And then it was back on the road, back through another valley, back through more mountains. Pancake Summit, Little Antelope Summit, Robinson Summit. These ain't mountains, just passes. Why they call passes "summits" I don't know. Maybe it makes them sound cool or something. 

After a long while of traveling through peaceful country we made it to the bustling metropolis of Ely, "You Made It!" Compared to Eureka (pop. 364) and Austin (pop. 47), Ely (pop 3,892) was like a big city, equipped with several hotels, saloons, gas stations, retailers and chain restaurants. We stopped at the biggest market in town for provisions, loading up on more fixin's for quesadillas and the like. And then we left town and hightailed it down the road towards Great Basin National Park.

Up through the Snake Range, out into Baker (pop. 16), and then off into the park. It was raining all around us, the sky full of big, puffy clouds. But the rain never reached the ground, it kind of just hovered around in the upper troposphere until it evaporated and disappeared forever. 

We stopped at the visitor center, making it just in time before they closed. Saw a chunk of "Prometheus," the world's oldest known tree that was cut down in 1964 to see if it was the world's oldest tree. It was, but not anymore. Now it's dead. And there was also an old rifle that was on display, a "mystery rifle" that was found leaning on a tree, abandoned for well over a hundred years, and nobody knows why. Ooooh. Spooky spooky. And then it was off to camp to set up the tent, cook dinner, and get ready for the evening ranger program.

The clouds had cleared up, the sky grew orange and then pink, dinner was consumed and we drove down to the amphitheater for the evening program, a double show. The first ranger talked about bacteria and how if aliens visited the earth they'd be far more interested in bacteria than anything else. This is a bacteria planet, after all. The little buggers are literally everywhere. 

And then another ranger came out and talked about exoplanets. The dude sounded exactly like my high school cross country coach. It was uncanny, like he was doing a perfect impression. But he wasn't; that's just how he talked. Very weird, very weird. Needless to say, his voice and mannerisms were distracting to me so I didn't listen to much of what he had to say. But no matter. Soon, the telescopes were brought out and calibrated and those attending the program got to observe the Hercules Cluster, the Swan Nebula, and Saturn and Titan. Great Basin has some of the clearest and darkest night skies in the entire country, so the stargazing was absolutely fantastic. 

The next day, Grace and I tried to snatch a reservation for the "Wild Cave Tour" in Lehman Cave. Unfortunately, the reservations could only be made online and it didn't even matter because the thing was sold out. So we nabbed a spot for another tour, the "Parachute Shields Tour," which wasn't happening for another 8 hours. With time to kill, we ventured into the depths of the park, driving to the end of the road to see what there was to see.

We parked in the lot at the end of the road and started on a trail to two alpine lakes, Stella and Teresa lakes respectively. Both lakes looked like big brown puddles, slowly evaporating, containing nothing but rocks, lukewarm water, and trillions of weird looking bugs. And then we hopped on another trail and entered the "Wheeler Peak Bristlecone Pine Grove." It was quiet there, very few people walking around, the sky bright and the sun harsh. The bristlecones stood tall and silent, still alive in spite of thousands of years of wind and ice and rain and snow and hail and drought and fire and storms and stuff. 

There were many posted signs, offering information about the Bristlecone Pines and how they're dated and how they grow and whatnot. We walked amongst them, gazing at their gnarled branches and twisted trunks and teeny-tiny pine needles. They almost didn't seem like living things, like they were just some sort of upward, colorful extension of the dead granite that lay scattered everywhere, like some type of petrified tree, frozen in time and long since dead. 

But they weren't dead (except for Prometheus, Prometheus is damn dead). Even when they're stripped of most of their bark, their branches bare, their roots sticking out, there's always some part of 'em that's always alive. We'd see a tree, dry and bleached and looking quite dead, and then we'd look closer and see a small patch of bark and some tiny branches sticking out with the smallest of greenery. These fellows simply refuse to die. I suppose that's why they're able to live for thousands of years.  

Wheeler Peak center right

We continued up the trail, towards the glacier that could barely be seen. Up out of the bristlecones, up out of the limber pines, out past the timberline, into the domain of rock and sun. Now within a cirque, the peaks of Great Basin rose around us in a gigantic semi-circle, Wheeler Peak being the tallest of the bunch. The whole area looked as if someone just copy-pasted a chunk of the Sierra Nevada and placed it in the middle of nowhere; I found the terrain familiar and comforting. We walked to the end of the trail, terminating well before reaching the almost non-existent glacier. Pictures were taken, water consumed, and stomachs rumbled in anger since neither one of us remembered to bring any food. Ooops. Time to head back. 

Back at camp, we consumed the rest of the instant rice that we cooked the previous night. And then we hung around camp for a couple hours until it was time for the tour. Down the road, out of the hills, off to the Lehman Caves Visitor Center. We checked in, got in line. A ranger showed up late and apologized, saying that the person who was supposed to do the tour "had a problem" (AKA, major diarrhea), so she was taking over in their place. We wiped our shoes, put on the sweatshirts, and then entered the cave.

Lehman Cave was like most other caves I've seen, fitted with stalactites and stalagmites and columns and water and weird cave bugs and the like. The ranger took us from room to room on the paved path, explaining the history of the cave, how it was discovered, how it was damaged, how it was one of the sets for the movie "The Wizard of Mars." We experienced absolute darkness, saw some 100+year old graffiti, and a whole lot of "cave bacon." 

But the one thing that was particularly interesting was the presence of "shields," a type of cave formation that's about as rare as, well, block ice. According to the ranger, Carlsbad Cavern, a cave system in New Mexico that's significantly larger than Lehman Cave, only has about five or six of the formations, whereas Lehman Cave had nine in just one room alone. Lehman Cave has more than 500 cave shields, perhaps the highest concentration of the formations in the entire world. Bearing witness to these ancient formations in the cool and damp atmosphere of the cave, listening to the muffled conversation of the other tourists, the shuffle of feet, the occasional cough, all of it made for quite the unique experience. And then someone asked the ranger "Is there any airflow in this cave?" and the ranger said "Actually, yes, there is, otherwise we wouldn't be breathing right now." And then it was time to go; we'd been in there for almost an hour.

The namesake Parachute Shields

Once we resurfaced, Grace and I drove back down the road, out of the park into Baker to get some more ice. And then we drove all the way back to camp and cooked a quick dinner of ramen noodles and broccoli, eating it just in time for the last set of ranger programs. The first ranger spoke of wildfires and how controlled burns are beneficial to forests. His presentation contained many "ums" and "likes" and "ums" and "so yeahs" and microphone failures and laser pointer malfunctions but he got the point across. 

And then the ranger who gave the cave tour came up and gave a presentation on space and theoretical space ideas, a knowledgeable and succinct presentation since she actually possessed a degree in astrophysics. And then the telescopes were calibrated and those attending got to see the Swan Nebula and Saturn again, as well as the Whirlpool Galaxy, which looked like a hazy spiral of powdered sugar against a backdrop of complete darkness. And the ranger pointed out Andromeda, visible to the naked eye, the only thing observable in the night sky outside of the Milky Way Galaxy (without the use of a high-powered telescope). And there was a lady there in attendance that had a PHD in astrophysics and a bachelors in whatchamacallit and was explaining things and answering questions from other attendees like she was an employed member of the parks service. Even the ranger asked her some questions. And as the night drew long only the real smarty-pants folks stuck around, asking questions about quasars and black holes and the Boötes Constellation which meant it was time for us to depart. So we did.

I awoke bright and early the next day, well before sunrise, the air a tad chilly. Wheeler Peak was on the menu, something that I'd be doing by myself (Grace doesn't like high altitudes). I drove to the Summit Trailhead and began the short but steep climb up the mountain, walking underneath the canopy of young aspen trees, the air silent save for the occasional whisper of a breeze. 

I had the whole trail to myself, walking at a steady pace, slowly gaining altitude one step at a time. At one point, I came across a small herd of deer. Five bucks, four does, three bambies. They payed me no mind. And then I reached the timberline and said goodbye to the trees and hello to the rocks and the weird little flowers that somehow find a way to make a living amongst the rocks. Maybe the rent is cheap. Who's to say.

Bald Mountain

Wheeler Peak

I walked in the shadow of a great mound of granite for a bit, slowly ascending until I finally reached a spot of brief flatness, Wheeler Peak straight ahead. All that was left was a steep jaunt up several switchbacks to gain the summit. The wind was howling, ripping over the ridge, originating from nowhere in particular. Despite the wind, I was working up quite the sweat heading up that ridge, trudging up the thing one foot at a time until finally reaching the top.

Wheeler Peak Summit

I had breakfast at the top. Panoramic views, a calm morning sun and rock shelters to block the wind all made this a rather pleasant occasion. As I nibbled on the bars, I looked around, observing the notable features of the land. I looked but didn't see, unable to recognize and name anything that stretched before me. All of it was just wild, wild country, unknown and mysterious. Mountains and valleys, mountains and valleys as far as the eye could see, only interrupted by the occasional collection of wind turbines and lonely country roads and struggling farms. What struck me most while observing all this was just how isolated everything felt. Everything stretched out far and wide, dry and bitter, barely marred by the rare fragments of civilization. There was a timelessness to the views, a feeling of eternity. Much of the country I saw likely hadn't changed much over the past hundred thousand years. And it would remain that way, changing ever so slightly, remaining seemingly static for generations to come. 

I walked east towards the rising sun, heading down a ridge to what I expected would be an overlook of the cirque Grace and I had explored the day prior. Sure enough, the ridge terminated at a cliff, and I sat down on a rock and looked at the cirque, most of it covered in shadow. Out of the wind, not a sound reached my ears. Not a damn thing. No birds, no echoes, no rockfall. It was eerily silent, like I had entered a soundproof room of some kind. Strange phenomenon. I rose and got going, entering the land of sound once again, my ears blasted with the screeches of the wind. 

It was time to go. I jogged most if the way down, the trail much more pleasant now that I was no longer going uphill. I passed many people on my way down, all of them making their way up, all of them breathing hard, trudging along, squinting in the sun blowing snot rockets out of their noses. I eventually made it back to the trailhead, completing the whole thing in just over 4 hours. The parking lot was completely full, the road leading down to the Bristlecone Parking Area closed for some reason. Perhaps it's only open on the weekends.

I returned to camp, sat around. Grace and I didn't have much else planned for the day, so we kinda just hung around camp and read for a bit. And then we went for a little drive, checking out Baker Creek and the Grey Cliffs Campground. And then we turned down a dirt road and followed it for a bit, driving next to a small cliff band dotted with a couple of caves. The road narrowed, the road curved, and then we took a right and ended up at the Pole Canyon Trailhead. With plenty of daylight left, and with nothing better to do for the rest of the day, we decided to hike the whole loop, a 6+ mile saunter through varied environments. 

It was hot at first, the surrounding flora dry and prickly, looking very similar to that of Quatal and Apache Canyons in the Cuyama Badlands. Pinyon pines, junipers, and snakeweed defined much of the landscape, the canyon fairly narrow and chocked with brush near the trickling creek. And then the canyon widened, the temperatures cooled, the pinyon pines disappeared, and we found ourselves walking next to meadows and aspen trees and ponderosa pines, tall and shady and pleasing to the eye. We continued to walk up the canyon, stopping occasionally in the shade every now and then. Reaching a junction, we turned right, heading out of the canyon, up to a saddle, expansive views of the east coming into focus. 

Pole Canyon

We reached the saddle, Baker Creek well in view, Wheeler Peak and Doso Doyabi filling up the background. Down we went, descending into Baker Creek, back into the shade of aspens, back to the sound of water. We crossed the creek, hit some more junctions, and that was basically it; nothing left but a nice downhill walk through some campgrounds and dirt roads on the way back to the car. 

Quesadillas for dinner, enjoyed in full, no rush, no hurry. There weren't no more ranger programs. No more telescopes. No more laser pointers. The evening was free. And so we sat under the stars and read books using the red light of our headlamps for a while before turning in for the night. No need to wake up early; only had to drive 150 miles the next day. We'd get a casual start, spending most of the morning in the park, using the time to refill our water jugs, have a picnic lunch, see dead Prometheus one more time, stuff like that. It had been a good stay in the park, a place neither one of us had ever visited. I'd like to go back someday, see some more sights, climb some more peaks in the area. Despite its small size, the park has a surprising number of things to do. It's well worth a visit.