Mineral King: Late May, Early June

There was a fair amount of puttering, cabin maintenance, hanging out with neighbors, a few short walks, and some painting on my most recent stay in Mineral King.

Because I needed to complete two more paintings of the iconic scene of the Crowley family cabin with the stream and Farewell Gap, I spent some time studying the water and a few details that often elude me. Customers don’t care or notice, but if I can’t get it right after painting the scene well over 60 times, then I am a little concerned for my own ability to pay attention.

Classic Mineral King

The snow was holding on the peaks and passes. We strolled up the valley toward Crystal Creek.

Crystal is very wide, but easy to cross, especially if you do it my way, which is to just walk right through.

The early flowers are showing now.

Forget-me-not/Sierra Stickseed
Sierra bluebells/languid ladies

Chihuahua Creek was running strong. This is a seasonal creek that races down the pack station road most years. The trail crew put in a very effective water bar last fall, so now the mud on the road is due to seepage, rather than an errant stream.

Speaking of the pack station, someone asked me about it last week. The short version is that the last concession packers in Mineral King got sideways with the Park, there were lawsuits, and then silence. It was a long time ago (15 years? 20?) No more horse rentals. Now the Park brings up stock as needed to resupply trail crews or just to get the critters out of the heat. They have a tack shed, and there are two abandoned buildings from the previous packer. That’s all I know.

In addition to studying the water at the bridge, I photographed the trees on either side of the Honeymoon Cabin, a mini-museum maintained by the Mineral King Preservation Society. The cabin is the second most popular subject that I paint of Mineral King, so it behooves me to know the details.

Juniper

I took a short walk up to Spring Creek. There is a very appealing curve in the stream below, but I will have to do some rearranging in order for it to make a nice painting.

The bridge was not in, but on the way home on Monday, June 3, we passed a couple of Park guys on their way up to place the bridge.

We took a stroll one evening to enjoy the late light, cool temperatures, beautiful views, and quiet.

On the way down, we encountered this:

Ken wore a hat that read, “Dirty Hands, Clean Money”.

The road has great wildflowers, lots of dirt sections, and is quite passable. BUT, you should be prepared to wait, and be prepared to meet 10-wheelers and other construction vehicles.

First Mineral King Stay of 2024

On the drive up the hill, I was just astonished by the abundance of yellow flowers, particularly bush poppies, covering the areas that burned in 2021. There were also blazing stars, common madia, flannel bush, and monkey flowers, all yellow. There were some other colors too, but yellow dominated.

This is actually looking back downhill.

I have been working on a painting of a scene, incorporating every cabin below Timber Gap and Empire’s outcropping, in spite of there being no actual place to see everything at once. So, this was a good opportunity to really observe each cabin before all the foliage had leafed out.

I spent several sessions standing in various locations, sketching how each cabin might look in relation to its neighbors.

But I bet you didn’t come to this post to see me go on about my work.

View looking uphill from Lookout Point. The tip of Sawtooth is barely visible, but you can see that Sawtooth is still snow-covered.
Farewell Gap is also very snow-covered.
This is the stream by the Honeymoon Cabin.
The Nature Trail has some snow drifts.
The Spring Creek bridge is not in, but someone went snooping around and found a metal plank and placed it below where the stream divides.

The Mineral King road is still under construction with a fluctuating schedule of closures. As soon as I think I know when it will be open and when it will be closed, the schedule gets rearranged. There were many pieces of equipment parked along the shoulders (such as “shoulders” exist on this road), many piles of dirt, and many places of dropping down to gravel where sections will be repaved. But compared to last summer, it isn’t scary.

Let the summer begin!

A One-Person Oil Painting Factory

After the Redbud Festival, it took awhile to rearrange everything in the studio and the painting workshop. I returned many of the paintings to Kaweah Arts, but not all that I had “borrowed”.

While sitting in my booth at the Redbud Festival, I had a lot of time to assess my paintings. I made lists of what to change, correct, or improve on eight of them.

It didn’t take long to do those little improvements. I’m not showing you the before and after because they are too wet to scan; besides, why would it be advantageous to point out all my errors? It was just a small matter of darken this, lighten that, brighten something else, add a branch or two, adjust some color for greater realism or to make it more appealing.

Feeling much better about those “old” paintings, I returned to the small sequoia paintings. The goal is to complete enough so that Kaweah Arts has some back stock. So far, sequoia paintings are the most popular subject, and I am happy to keep producing them.

6×12, untitled at the time of this post
both 6×18″, both untitled

Next, I will return to painting pieces for the Silver City Store (on the Mineral King road, four miles below the actual Mineral King valley) to sell this summer. I have great high hopes, because the resort was closed last summer, along with the entire area. However, the road will be under reconstruction and there will be some closures. In theory, it will open for Memorial weekend. In reality, we shall see what they actually choose to do. There is supposed to be a schedule, but it changes almost daily.

6×12″ along the Nature Trail, 11×14″ some of the cabins

I’m running a one-person factory of oil paintings of scenes local to Tulare County

Mineral King in September

Yes, I know it is still April. Before I left for Texas, I painted this view of the Mineral King valley as it looks from the Timber Gap trail in September. The first layer was done a few days earlier, but I didn’t take any pictures.

Sky first.
Clouds second
Upper edges of peaks to get the shapes right.
Moving forward.
Skipped photographing a few steps because I didn’t want you to fall asleep.

I left it wet on the easel to put branches and greenery on the tree and sign it after I get back home.

Tomorrow: Things I Learned in April.

Speedy Quick Like Lightning

After spending most of the winter working on difficult subjects that took much thought, revision, and enormous amounts of time, painting familiar small Mineral King oil paintings to sell in the upcoming summer months feels speedy quick like lightning.

I think Hiking Buddy took the reference photo with her superior iPhone, generously sent it to me, and I phoofed up the colors, making them more vivid than the real life scene. Still, it was better in real life, because everything is.

This is Farewell Gap Alpenglow, 6×12″, $125, and it will be available at the Silver City Store this summer, unless it sells before that.

Happy Birthday, Hiking Buddy! (2 days early because I don’t post on Sundays.)

Four Steps to Timber Gap

If you have ever walked to Timber Gap, you know experientially that it is far more than four steps. I don’t remember the specific mileage, but it seems to be about 2 miles.

This post is actually about painting Timber Gap, and it took more than four steps. However, I only took four photographs. (I liked the title, and I am the boss of my blog.)

The trail is not the Timber Gap trail. It is the trail that leads to Franklin Lakes and Farewell Gap, but we are headed the opposite direction here. The Timber Gap trail has terrific views of the entire Mineral King valley. The flowers are Bigelow sneezeweed.

The Other Day. . .

. . .I walked into the painting workshop, looked at all the paintings in their various stages, and just wanted to walk back out.

Why?

Because it was so beautiful outside and because I couldn’t figure out where to start.

Wet and finished
Wet and finished, wet and unfinished
Which to begin on?

The simplest solution was to start where I stopped the day before.

Wet, obviously unfinished

So, I did.

Some friends brought us lunch and we sat together in the front yard, then took a walk. YEA! I got to enjoy the perfect spring day with excellent people!

After lunch, I just dove into those embryonic Mineral King paintings. Knowing my heart wasn’t in it, I just took a handful of the paintings a short distance. When it required too much concentration, I stopped, and began another.

That’s enough on this one.
This used to be my favorite subject to draw and paint before I got completely enamored by orange groves with hills and mountains in the distance.
That’s enough on this. It is just as hard as I remember.

Suddenly the day was finished. None of the paintings were, but four new Mineral King paintings are closer to being finished than they were when I arrived in the morning.

Painting on a Rainy Day

On March 1, a Big Storm, nay, a Very Big Blizzard was predicted. I painted that day, of course working on more pieces of Tulare County’s prettiest places.

I just couldn’t leave this one alone. A couple of things were nagging, so in spite of thinking it was finished, I made a few more tiny improvements. Can you see what they are?

AND NOW I SEE SOMETHING ELSE TO FIX!! Sigh. Will this painting ever meet my ever-increasing standards??

The trail painting needed another layer, some corrections, and the wildflowers.

Then, it finally rained. Trail Guy raced out to tell me to come look, hurry hurry hurry. So, I did.

Tucker had diamonds in his fur. The camera didn’t quite capture the magic.

So, I went back to the easel to work on White Chief (Mineral King). First, I redid the sky, then added some refinement to the peak. (You’ll have to wait until you see it in person to appreciate the amount of detail.)

After that, I worked on rocks and grass.

Finally, I worked on the water, bigger rocks, and placed some trunks of trees, doing my best to not arrange them like an orchard. There is an automatic bent to put things the same distance apart; I do it, my drawing students do it, and we all have to remind one another to keep things looking natural and a bit more haphazard. (Of course, if we are trying to make something perfect such as stairs, we cannot make it look right.)

This one is shaping up very nicely. I love White Chief (in Mineral King), and it feels as if I am there when I am painting it (minus the gasping and sweating and tired legs). The trees, more waterworks, and the rocky thingie on the bottom left remain. Then I’ll probably keep polishing and refining, because that’s what I do.

Mineral King Road at the end of January

The end of January had some very clear days with temperatures in the 60s. We took advantage of this to check out the Mineral King Road, just as far as where the snow might become a driving problem. There was no agenda, just some friends hanging out, stopping when and where something struck our fancy.

We walked some too.
We were curious to see if there was water in the flume.
The boards on top were very slick, and we heeded this warning.
Despite recent roadwork, all drainage troubles aren’t solved.
Our guys did what they could.
Weird sausages made from straw keep the road from sloughing off down the canyon.
There was a deep hole here all summer, just below Slap Jack but now this dirt pile (in the foreground) has filled it up.
This was a CCC camp.
Trail Guy found remains of their outhouse.
Some cabin neighbors used to refer to these redwoods as Aunt Tillie and Uncle Pete. We call them “Redwood”, as if there is just one, but it is short for Redwood Creek.

We turned around at Atwell Mill, not wanting to deal with the snow.

Just above Lookout, we saw something we’ve never seen on the Mineral King Road before.

Those are rock climbers!!

Such a clear beautiful day, and we hope it is the last chance to drive up for while because there will be too much snow soon. (But not so much that the road falls apart again this year.)