A Backpacking Adventure in the High Sierras Part II
By Rocky Ferraro


The next morning we left bright and early after breakfast. From the previous
day Gary and I had found the trail to our next destination, The Twin Lakes and
I had marked it on my GPS. Tony and I headed off first. There was a promise
of good sized rainbow trout at our next destination and the weather was clear
so far. On our way in everyone had promised us rain but so far their promises
were untrue. After much hiking through the beautiful Eastern Sierras crossing
a stream or 2 and I must say up some steep switch backed hills. In fact this trail
was steep enough that we took some extra breaks along the way. After quite
some time on the trail Tony and I reached the first Twin Lake. We looked
around for a decent camping spot and found one across an outlet stream
coming from the lake.  We decided then that we would not venture to Twin
number 2. There was no one there when Tony and I arrived. We had pretty
much our pick of spots and we found a rather nice horse pack camp to set up
camp. Once I set up my tent and got things squared away I inflated my float
tube and was fishing. The lake was a beautiful lake not extraordinarily large but
pristine. There were huge boulders in the lake that I had been finding trout in
and around in previous lakes. Not too long after I launched my float tube I had
a strike. It was a nice small rainbow that I released. We had come to a
consensus on what we would keep and how many we needed for dinner. There
were quite a few trees around the shore and the wind was blowing so if I had to
cast from shore there would be slim pickings. Instead I fished the whole lake
catching quite a few nice trout. They fought like crazy jumping and shaking
their heads, typical of truly wild trout.
The weather started changing around 2 in the afternoon. The wind picked up
and the clouds over head started to gather. We got a few Sierra type summer
showers. The water temperature at this lake was quite a bit cooler. Again at
dinner time I was glad I had brought my float tube.

We had a nice trout dinner to our fill with soup as a side dish. Dessert was
cookies and hot coco with rum. We ate till we were full and after sunset turned
in under the brightly lit night sky complete with twinkling stars. The next day we
had our usual breakfast in the wee hours of the morning which was usually
before 6am. It looked like we were going to get some weather today. We were
on our way to Dorothy Lake, which is one of the sister lakes. On the way we
would pass by Bear Lake and Bigelow Lake. Bigelow Lake is a lake that at one
time supported a mine. There are old roads and camps there but there has
been no mining activity for quite some time and of course no access to
vehicles. Also there was Snow Lake on the regular trail but Gary had been
there and told us it was barren which may have been the result of the mining
operation. When we reached Bear Lake the weather finally opened up and it
stared to shower freezing rain, hail and snow at us. We threw on our plastic
ponchos and kept going.

By the time we arrived at Bigelow it was coming down! We found some shelter
under the trees and took a quick break, taking in the beauty of Bigelow’s man
made rock dams and surrounding beauty. We decided to cross country travel
at this point taking a trail that was not so pronounced over a ridge. It was a
goodly climb but not so hard. Once up on top of the pass we veered left trying
to pick up a trail again. We ended up on a rather steep hill that was all
boulders and steep rock ledges. It was snowing/hailing and windy so once out
on a ledge we had to make some quick decisions. The rocks once frozen were
tricky to walk on.

We decided to climb down the mountain and hit the Pacific Crest Trail below.
Slowly but surely we did this finding our own routes and meeting up on the
PCT. From there Dorothy Lake was a hop, skip and jump away. We arrived at
Dorothy and Tony found a camp along the PCT. I went off at the same time to
find something a bit off the PCT. Along my hike I ran into another backpacker
you had a nice toasty fire going. He invited me over but I thanked him and
declined. I talked to him for a bit but I was thinking if I stop now with this cold I
will not want to move to quickly after. Climbing on that mountain and going
cross country had zapped my strength and I need some soup, a warm fire and
to just set a spell. Later Tony Gary and I met up at Tony’s camp. I got my tent
set up and started a fire, had some soup, warmed up and felt much better. I
got my float tube going and began to fish. There were some shallow spots I ran
into at first. Once I got the lay of the lake I found some structure and I was into
many, many wild rainbow trout.

Again we would have a great dinner for 5 with no problem. I unfortunately lost
Gary’s pack net here. Some how the knot untied and the net went sinking off. I
still managed to land some nice trout but now our next destination had been
rumored to have trophy Golden’s and I had no net.

To Be Continued, Next time “We came to a wall of ice, what do we do now?”
The saga continues.
A Backpacking Adventure in the High Sierras Part II
Foster City Rod and gun Club
Click on photos to enlarge