Last week, we took our last trip in the camper before selling it. We headed out to the eastern side of the Sierra Nevada mountains and revisited two of our favorite spots: Rock Creek Lake and the Ancient Bristlecone Pine Forest in the White Mountains. 

Last trip in the camper

Craig and I both love the eastern Sierra Nevada, and in early June — before selling the camper — we decided to make one last trip over the mountains to revisit two of our favorite places. We made reservations at Rock Creek Lake campground and up in the White Mountains.

You can cross the Sierra Nevada by any of several east-west passes. Some are steeper or windier than others. Some are closed during snowy winters. But it was June after a dry winter, and we were planning to drive over Tioga Pass through Yosemite. It’s a steep climb but the most direct route to our destination. We found to our dismay, however, that during prime hours — i.e., 6 a.m. to 4 p.m. — you need a reservation just to drive through the park!

The good news was that this bad news was announced early on by repeated and emphatic signage along the road, allowing us plenty of time to regroup. Plan B was Carson Pass, a much easier drive but further north and longer, especially in the camper. This meant that despite an early start (by my reckoning, at least: Craig would always have us on the road by zero dark-thirty, if he had his druthers), we didn’t reach the campground until about six o’clock. Whew! A long day.

Happily, Rock Creek Lake was just as beautiful as I remembered from our last trip (see below), and I’d picked a good campsite. We set up the camper and settled in.

Difficulty = 3, Scenery = 10

In the morning we were up early. From the campground, the Little Lakes Canyon trailhead is about a mile further up — and I do mean up — the road, at more than 10,000 feet. We wanted to make sure we got a parking place in the small lot, so we didn’t have to waste our energies hiking up the road. Arriving at around 7 a.m., we had our pick of spots. Perfect. There was plenty of time for a leisurely breakfast (turkey sandwiches!) before gearing up and setting off.

Even after a night spent at altitude (9700 feet), a hike that begins at 10,000 feet is a challenge to us sea-level dwellers. (Alameda’s elevation is 33 feet.) Still, while the trail does climb, it’s not steep. And it’s just the most beautiful hike! That said, I admit that I was dragging the last three miles, a bit less appreciative of the scenery and a bit more aware of my aches and pains!

Aside: Pictures from the past

Our previous visit to Rock Creek Lake was in August 2017 — hard to believe that was five years ago. We had ended up there by serendipity. Having no reservations and struggling to find a place for the night, we drove up to the campground on a hope and a prayer, which was answered when the host told us there was space available for a couple of nights! We walked around the lake that first afternoon, then took the Little Lakes Canyon hike the next morning.

I made a few postcards after that trip but never wrote a post to go with them, so I thought I’d include the images here. There were a lot more flowers that year — perhaps because we were there later in the season, perhaps because drought conditions weren’t quite so severe, perhaps both. But my recollection of that earlier trip is that there were flowers everywhere! Here are some photos from our hike:

Before leaving, I got some lovely shots of the lake in the stillness of early morning.

High and dry in the White Mountains

Now back to the present…

After leaving Rock Creek Lake, we were again up early. We would be driving down Route 395 through the Owens Valley, past the town of Bishop, and up into the White Mountains. The forecast in Bishop: 100 degrees — so we needed an early start, as much for the camper’s well-being as for our own. Our destination was the Ancient Bristlecone Pine Forest, home of some of the world’s oldest trees.

We arrived at the visitor’s center mid morning. The temperature up there was comfortable, and we had happily missed the worst of the valley heat on our way.

The orientation videos that the Park Service (or whoever) produces are generally wonderful. We’d seen this one on our last visit, but it was definitely worth a rewatch. I was reminded of the immense age of these trees, the oldest documented is nearly 5000 years old.

ASIDE: Apparently, there was a scientist who had found one even older, but when he died, his notes and core samples were nowhere to be found, so that tree lost its status as the oldest.

Bristlecone pines thrive where few other life forms live: at very high elevations and in alkaline dolomite soil. There’s not much to compete with them under these conditions. Their dense, resinous wood makes them resistant to insects, and a tree can survive with only a narrow strip of bark to nourish it.

What the trees can tell us

Some of the displays in the visitor center focus on the field of science called dendrochronology, which is the study of tree rings in aid of understanding something about the past. Dendrochronologists study bristlecone pines chiefly to understand climatic patterns and change over time. Other scientists use the technique to date historical buildings and other wooden artifacts and thus lead to a better understanding of human history.

As I’m sure you know, a tree creates a new growth ring every year, and the quality of that ring — wide or narrow (and I’m sure there are other factors, but this is the obvious one) — reflects the conditions under which the tree lived in that particular year. By studying these rings, scientists can step back in time to learn about periods of feast and famine, drought and plenty.

What I find especially fascinating is that they can draw evidence from multiple trees that lived in different but overlapping time periods to push their climate chronology further back in time, by using the remains of older trees that had lived and fallen many years before. From carefully extracted core samples, scientists create maps of the ring patterns from each of, say, two trees of different ages. They then overlap those maps so that the ring patterns from the years when both trees were alive line up, thus extending the timeframe of the map — i.e., creating a new map that covers the lifespan of both trees. The process can then be repeated with more and older trees to further extend the reach of the map. This illustration shows how the process works.

Because of their longevity and their dense, resinous wood, bristlecone pines are slow to decay and are thus ideally suited for this approach to climate study.

On the Methuselah Trail

After looking our fill at the displays, Craig and I set off on our planned hike along the Methuselah Trail, named for the oldest tree in the forest. Wisely, the Park Service has opted not to identify this ancient, fearing selfie-seekers and vandals. So you just know that the tree is there, somewhere, along the trail, and that’s sufficient.

The Methuselah Trail is only a little over four and a half miles long, but given that it begins at an elevation of more than 9800 feet, the hike is grueling. It took us about three and a half hours to complete it, and I was seriously dragging by the end. Happily, I had provided myself with GU gel cubes, which gave me the energy I needed to make it to the finish.

I have to admit that I don’t find this landscape particularly beautiful. It’s stark and dry, with little vegetation beyond the ancient trees. And yet these sculptures in gnarled wood are compelling to the eye and the mind, as they cling to life under the harshest of conditions. Sadly, scientists fear that our warming climate may eventually make these altitudes inhospitable even to the venerable bristlecone pines.

After our hike, we drove down to the Grand View campground, where we set up for the night. The altitude — 8500 feet at the campground — had made hiking challenging that day, but it also provided comfortable temperatures for our last night of camping. I have to admit to feeling a bit smug, knowing that the Owens Valley was sweltering in 100-degree heat!

• Tom Stienstra and Ann Marie Brown: Moon California Hiking: The Complete Guide to 1,000 of the Best Hikes in the Golden State (Moon Travel, 2020)
• Ancient Bristlecone Pine Forest
• Anno Domini Dendrolab (Romania): About dendrochronology
• Fritz Hans Schweingruber: Trees and Wood in Dendrochronology: Morphological, Anatomical, and Tree-Ring Analytical Characteristics of Trees Frequently Used in Dendrochronology  (I’m guessing this might be the book from which the above illustration of dendrochronology was taken. I found the drawing on the Anno Domini Dendrolab website)