For our last day on the east side of the Sierra Nevada, Candace and I headed over to Bodie Ghost Town. Bodie is an 1875 gold-mining ghost town that is now a State historic park and they preserve the town in a state of arrested decay, so it looks pretty much the same as when the residents abandoned it over 50 years ago. We wandered and explored Bodie for a couple of hours. Bodie is a very interesting and cool place to visit and the summer crowds, and variety of foreign languages heard in the parking lot, attest to that.
When we awoke this morning, we found out that water to the campground in Rock Creek Canyon had gone out, so the Forest Service was closing it and we had to pack up and move out. We moved over to Lundy Canyon and found a nice campsite there for our last night. After re-setting up camp, we toured Lundy Canyon, checking out the beaver pond and had lunch by Mill Creek. After lunch, we again headed up to the 10,000 foot elevation level for some more hiking at Saddlebag Lake. After just walking for a little ways, I admitted that the hike yesterday and worn my out-of-shape bod out, so I begged off and headed back to the resort to hang out while Candace hiked around the lake. She hiked through the snow and I just chilled the afternoon away enjoying the wonderful view and great weather.
One of the reasons for coming to the eastern side of the Sierra, besides the wonderfulness of the area, was to help Candace get acclimated to high elevation for her upcoming backpacking trip. So, what better way to acclimate than to go up high, up to the 10,000 foot elevation of the Ancient Bristlecone Pine Forest. The Great Basin Bristlecone pines are the oldest living trees on the earth and grow in the high mountains of Nevada and the eastern edge of California and western edge of Utah. We drove the twisty tiny road up and up until we finally reached the Schulman Grove. After lunch, where we had cute Golden-Mantled Ground Squirrels visit us and do their begging routine, we headed out for a hike on the Discovery Trail and then crossed over to the Methuselah Trail. The Methuselah Trail is named after the Methuselah Tree, which is the oldest known tree in the world and it lives somewhere in this section of the forest. To protect the tree, they don’t tell the public exactly which tree is the Methuselah Tree.
Candace and I headed over to the Eastern Sierra to spend a couple of days camping and exploring. We arrived in the late afternoon and after pitching the tent we toured the canyon for awhile before dinner, checking out Rock Creek Lake and Rock Creek itself. After dinner, it was nice to just relax and chat away the warm evening.
Candace, Dave and I headed to the Sierra to hike the Transcontinental Train Tunnels to get in a little high elevation hiking. I’d seen the train tunnels and snow sheds from Highway 80 before while driving past, but had no idea they were out of commission and were open to the public. However, judging by the graffiti and artwork covering virtually all the walls that weren’t in the dark, I’m one of the last to know this tunnel hike was here. The building of the tunnels in this area was mostly done by Chinese-American workers who spent many years laboriously chipping away at the granite in order to be able to set explosives that would blast a bit more of the tunnel open. The tunnels were approached from both ends and when the railroad track met in the middle it was less than an inch apart. The Summit Tunnel (Tunnel 6) was the longest tunnel on the Central Pacific Railroad (CPRR) at 1,659 feet long. In addition to the tunnels, there are several modern cement snow sheds built to keep the trains running during the winter. The first train passed through these tunnels in 1868 and the last one passed through in 1993 and now we walk through the tunnels, sans tracks, with our flashlight in hand.
It was one of those days where it could be raining or it could be clear, so Pauline and I packed our rain jackets and headed to Columbia State Historic Park for the Diggins 1852 event, a reenactment of an 1852 Gold Rush Tent Town. Of course it ended up being a rainy day, but my outlook is that I’m neither sweet enough nor evil enough to melt in the rain, so rain doesn’t stop me. I think the rain actually made it a nicer visit, because it kept down the number of tourists and seemed to add to the authenticity of the town. We arrived shortly before lunch time, so we headed to the Douglass Saloon to enjoy some lunch. After lunch, we walked up Main Street checking out the old buildings and all the museum type stuff they had on display. Columbia really is a neat town and worth your own visit. After we explored the town proper, we headed to the edge of town for the Diggin’s 1852 event. Annually, the Columbia docents present living history as they recreate tent city life of 1852. From the mercantile to the gold mining area, lots of tents and costumed docents did a great job of showing what life was like back then and the chill and rain of the day added even more to how hard it must have been back then.
The American River Conservancy had recently acquired the 272 acre property, which was formerly the Wakamatsu Tea and Silk Farm Colony in 1869, the first Japanese colony in North America. Visits to the ranch are normally available only by pre-registration for a docent-led tour, but today, the Conservancy held an open house and so I headed off to Gold Hill on this beautiful morning. The site is a Registered Historical Place and is culturally significant for not only being the first Japanese colony with Samurai and their families, but is also the site of the first child born to Japanese immigrants to become a citizen and also the site of the first Japanese immigrant to be buried in North America. The open house was a full day of activities and many people showed up, making it was a very good day. I arrived in time to catch the re-enactment of the Wakamatsu colonists arriving at Gold Hill to purchase the ranch from the Graner Family, I then toured the farmhouse and watched the short documentary, Samurai of Gold Hill. Back outside, there were interesting demonstrations on bonsai trees, origami, pottery and Japanese writing. I toured the barn, dairy barn and other outbuildings and talked to many interesting docents and descendants of the original families. The Taiko drummers performed again while Mikuni Sushi catered a delicious lunch for us. After a peaceful walk along the pond, I caught a ride on one of the horse-drawn buggies going to the memorial grave site of Okei Ito. I learned a lot about a piece of our local history today that I had no clue about before.
American River Conservancy Executive Director Alan Ehrgott details the incredible story of the Wakamatsu Tea and Silk Farm Colony in this short video:
Pauline remarked that she’d always wanted to go to Reno, so she planned a trip and invited me along. It had been years since I’d been to the Biggest Little City in the World and my fascination with the glitz of casinos wore off a long time ago, but Pauline planned a trip that showed me another side of the city. We arrived Wednesday evening, had dinner and spent some requisite time gambling on the slot machines. Thursday we took a stroll around town, away from the casinos and it’s quite a nice town. We checked out the St Thomas Aquinas Cathedral and it’s old beauty, walked along the Truckee River Walk, toured the historic Lake Mansion, viewed the exhibits at the Nevada Museum of Art (which, for the most part, didn’t allow pictures). Running the Numbers by Chris Jordan was a very interesting exhibit; he depicts the number and volume of things we use in a given time period, like using 125,000 one-hundred dollar bills ($12.5 million), the amount our government spends every hour on the war in Iraq, as a portrait of George Washington. It’s hard to explain, so check out his website and be sure to click on the photos to zoom in and see the detail. Another interesting exhibit was Animating Light by Leo Villareal and we spent some time mesmerized by his LED light installations. Afterwards, our stroll took us past Powning Veterans Memorial Park, past the capital building, and down the casino strip. After we left the glittering lights of Reno, we took a side road to view the very pretty Donner Lake on the way home.
Pauline and I headed to Gold Country for a day of exploring. Cruising down historic Highway 49, just before reaching Jackson, we saw the sign for Sutter Gold Mine Tours and I asked Pauline if she was game and she said sure. So down the winding road to the gold mine we went. After looking at the mini-museum, we asked about the tour and bought our tickets. We were issued our hard hats and our guide Terry led us to the Boss Buggy Shuttle that would take us in. You go from warm bright sunshine to cool black darkness, but luckily the trolley had headlights to show the way. We drove about 1,200 feet into the tunnel, consistently moving down, which eventually put us 400 feet beneath the surface. We entered the “safe room”, a room in the mine where the men would go to if there was a cave in; the walls of the room had spikes driven into the walls and this somehow would keep this particular room from collapsing. Terry told us some history and facts about the gold mine and how it may become operational again if the price of gold keeps rising. She turned out the lights and we experienced pitch black and then she lit one candle, just as a 49er miner would have, and that really didn’t allow you to see much further than a few feet; I could not imagine that life. We walked down some tunnels, saw some of the tools they used and even spotted a vein of gold in the ceiling! The Boss Buggy Shuttle returned us to the surface and there really is light at the end of the tunnel.
We continued on down Highway 49, where just outside the tiny town of Pine Grove, we arrived at the Indian Grinding Rock State Historic Park. After a bit of lunch under the pine trees, we explored the park which preserves a piece of the Northern Sierra Miwok Indian lifestyle. The museum was closed (budget cuts), but there are the grinding rocks and reconstructions of traditional buildings to be viewed around the grounds. The grinding rocks are large granite slabs that have numerous mortor holes from where generations of Miwok women used stone pestles to pound acorns and seeds for food. A short hike, through the woods, along the southern trail finished off our day.
It was time for the Castles and Kites Festival again and for some reason I really like to go camping at Doran Beach so I can enjoy this affair. Pauline and I headed over to the coast on Friday morning. We spent Friday afternoon wandering around Bodega Head checking out the flowers, the gulls and the cormorants hugging the craggy walls. We then drove north checking out the many beaches of Sonoma Coast State Park. Our last beach to check out was Goat Rock where there is old machinery abandoned on the rocks. I never did figure out why it’s called Goat Rock though. Saturday brought the kiter flyers and sandcastle builders to the beach. I think the dragon with his head stuck in the castle wall was my favorite, but they were all good and cute. I’m sure the light rain we had Saturday evening helped wipe out the sandcastles, but when I looked at them Sunday morning, it was obvious that some feet helped in making them disappear. A stop the read the Two Rock history marker on the ride home marked the end of a good weekend.
