Hmmm, this is all so weird. I will refrain from sharing my opinion about the government shut down, because people come to this blog to be entertained and inspired. Discussing a difficult and divisive subject could possibly be entertaining, but I doubt if it would be inspiring.
Have a look at a painting of a familiar, comforting scene in Mineral King. Feel inspired. Feel entertained. Don’t worry, be happy!
Mineral King Autumn, 8×8″, oil on wrapped canvas, $95, sold
In early September, I had the pleasure of a weekend at the cabin with two dear friends. They requested a hike to a lake. Eagle is steep, Mosquito didn’t call to me, one friend has been to Franklin twice, Crystal is really difficult, and Monarch is far but has a well-graded trail. It was ten miles round trip, and a good time was had by all.
This guy knows he is safe on the west side of Farewell Gap this time of year.
Hmmm, maybe we should have gone to White Chief – look how the sun is shining over there.
It is always reassuring to come to this sign, which is not telling us that Crystal Lake is a DIFFICULT 1.4 miles compared to the 1.2 relatively easy miles to Monarch.
Are these trees considered “monarchs”? Is that how the lake got its moniker? (couldn’t help myself – monarch and moniker obviously go together)
Some folks were swimming. I hate immersing myself in cold water – hate it!
A weird view of Sawtooth – too close to see its true shape.
I love these women dearly.
They look chummy and palsy here, but I think they might be propping one another up!
Mineral King is a happening place in the summer, especially in August, and most especially on weekends.
The Mineral King Preservation Society has two annual events. One was called the “hoe-down”, and was a square dance. It developed into a concert with stories of MK history, and it came with dinner.
Have a look:
Okay, dinner wasn’t a big deal – just sandwiches, fruit and cookies. No one complained, and nothing was left over.
Keith and Esther call themselves “Mankin Creek” and they are FANTASTIC musicians.
Hi Mary – glad you were having such a good time!
Can’t remember these peoples’ names, but they have been camping in MK for years and years.
Hi Jenna! Nice family portrait!
And then the moon rose. It was a wonderful August evening. Maybe you’d like to come next year!
Some people collect rocks. Some people learn about them, join clubs, polish them, and make jewelry. Some people notice shapes, some notice textures, others notice patterns, and I notice colors and sparkles. Here is a collection of photos of many rocks found through the years in Mineral King. They are all Leverites – “leave ‘er right where you found her”.
These were all found on the way to Soda Springs by people who notice shapes.
Galina, the stuff the Mineral King miners got excited about.
Shape, color, patterns all appear in this one rock.
The color is turquoise but the rock is not (and I’m not telling where!)
Anything white, sparkly and sort of crystalish gets called “quartz” by me. I don’t know the difference between quartz and mica.
Multi-colored and sparkly – got my attention! This is part of some mine tailings in White Chief.
This obsidian was found on Empire and must have been traded with other Indians from the east side of the Sierra for the making of arrowheads.
Oh yes, we heart Mineral King. It rocks.
I don’t want to tell the world where this hike is because I want it to stay trail-less. So, I’ll show you photos. If you know where it is and you choose to comment, don’t write the name, okay? Thanks!
I hiked the first 5 miles wearing my old Tevas. Isn’t that amazing? I recently discovered that I probably have Plantar Fasciosis instead of Fasciitis, and wearing Tevas sort of proved it to me. (You can learn about it here.)
That is an Explorer’s Gentian gone mad – usually they have 5 petals.
Time to switch to hiking boots, leave the trail and begin the upness.
Looking back.
Are you tired of your trails going up and up and up? Leave the trail and find out what up and up and up really feels like!
And up some more.
Very uppity place.
Can we stop now? I want to savor this place.
No really, can we just sit here for about an hour?
A BRAND NEW-TO-ME FLOWER!! Anyone know what this is??
No, really, can we stay here?
Nope. Miles to go before we sleep.
Hey! Stonehenge!
Okay, we are finally leaving the Uppalachians and heading home.
More of my favorite late summer wildflower, this time with the proper number of petals.
Wait for me! I have to change back into my Tevas! Thirteen miles total (thank you, Cowboy Bert, for the loan of that very nifty Garmin device which told us that our highest point was 10,800′) and 8 of them hiked in old Tevas that I bought used on eBay in 2007. Incomprehensible, but I think my foot is finally on its way to healing!
It is steep, really really steep, but White Chief canyon/bowl/valley begins only about 2-1/2 miles out of Mineral King. It has so much variety – you can go short or far, there are natural caves and historical mining tunnels, and a zillion kinds of rocks, sink holes, a lake, some sort of ponds, and even some cabin ruins.
In August, there was an official hike to White Chief led by the experienced and well-studied Laile DiSilvestro. She is from a long time cabin family, so in addition to the facts that she studied, she has rich history passed down through the generations. She brought along great photos, and I learned more from her than I have learned in all my years of hiking to and around White Chief.
There were 9 of us all together. (Nice to meet you, Dan, Sandy, Lindsey, Rich, Dana, and Bryn!)
This is called “galina” and it is what got miners excited. They cooked it in smelters to determine which, if any, precious metals remained.
This is where we turned around on a simple walk to White Chief back in August. This time it was a real hike, with packs, food, water and walking sticks.
There are many holes in the ground, both man-made and God-made. The variety of rocks is wonderful! Some folks are drawn to shapes, others to texture, some to patterns, and me? Color, of course!
This is quite high in the White Chief canyon/bowl/cirque/whatever you want to call it. I’ve taken 3 different friends there, and each one got a Big Fat Headache (Hi Robin, Lisa and Carol!) Guess this isn’t a very friendly hike, and I’ve stopped dragging people there because I could run out of friends this way.
This is not a chunk of snow – it is marble! REALLY! I’m sorry I don’t have anything next to it for size, but maybe it is like an ottoman (but a very uncomfortable one).
We are the group in the upper photo.
This image is courtesy of the Crowley Collection and is included in “Mineral King: The Story of Beulah.”
Bryn and I sat here for awhile and visited while I soaked my foot. (Yes, just one of them.) This is an area that confuses me – in my memory it is ponds. At this time it was a slow moving creek. Hmmm – the altitude messes with my memory? Prolly.
Sometimes in Mineral King we just hang around the cabin, knitting, splitting wood, reading, playing a game called Mancala (I don’t like games but this is a tradition with my annual guest PC, and besides, the marbles are really beautiful), and baking pies in a wood stove oven.
Then we say, “What are we doing?? It is a beautiful day, and we could be out on a trail!”
Sometimes, a hike is just too much trouble. Pack up food, water, be prepared to be gone the bulk of the day, find a walking stick, do you need a poncho or parka, which camera shall we take, can I fit in this knitting in case I’m just sitting around?
So, we opt to not take food or water and just go for a walk.
Look Ma, no packs! It is just a walk, not a hike, after all.
A mighty steep walk. Some parts of the trail to White Chief are so steep that I have to do them on my tip-toes, because it is hard for my feet to bend at the angle of the trial.
As we were heading up the trail, I kept wondering, “Who Moved My Chief?”
Okay, that’s far enough. Can we go back now? It looks sort of as if it might rain.
Good camouflage, Miss Deery.
Weird sky, weird glowing light on Sawtooth, which is behind the darker peak that we call “Sawtooth’s Shadow”, even though its real name is “Mineral Peak”.
Final view of the trail as we hurried back to the cabin – aren’t those walking sticks interesting? Handy if you are heading out, but they won’t keep you dry in the rain.
PC LOVES the rain! I can tolerate it if I have a decent parka or poncho, and Trail Guy HATES to be caught out in it. The whole gamut of rain opinions resides in our cabin, but we are all immensely grateful for any water that falls from the sky.
(Today’s post is about cabin life in Mineral King rather than hiking. If this is boring to you, tune in again next Friday.)
In a former life, I was a baker. Pies were the specialty of the outfit where I was employed. It was a long time ago. Now I only bake pies for special occasions, and it amazes me that one pie makes the same huge mess as 8 or 12 pies do.
For 27 years there has been no oven at my cabin. Last fall, Trail Guy and Cowboy Bert remedied the situation.
We have some once-a-year neighbors in Mineral King, and over the course of the last 28 years, they have become cherished visitors to the cabin next door. Our friendships have progressed to the point where they are now comfortable hanging around in our back yard! Last year I knew they were coming, so I baked them a pie.
This year, I baked them 2 pies in a wood stove oven!
It was a big project. My dear friend PC peeled and sliced the fruit, I rolled out the crusts, and Michael operated the stove. Honestly, it took all three of us.
We had to rotate them very carefully and thoughtfully. It sounded something like this:
“Don’t open the oven yet. There is one in the back right corner and one in the front left. Pull the front one out and set it on the stove. Then rotate the back right to see if it is getting dark. If it is darker than the front one, take it out. Put the former front one in the back right, but make sure the darkest part is toward the front of the oven. Okay, GO!”
“Did you reset the timer? How many 10 minuteses has it been? Do you think we can pull them if the crusts look brown?”
The apple pie took 50 minutes and the peach pie took 40. I think both needed more time, but the peach pie got sort of burned-ish anyway. No one complained. All were complimentary. I don’t much like pie (unless a thing is ice cream or dark chocolate, it is rarely worth the calories to me), but I certainly enjoyed the project process.
It was Cathy, my bona fide Mineral King Expert friend who thought that inverted colanders would be good cooling racks. She was right, of course.
For clarification, this blog is about a California artist, me, to be specific. Mineral King is one of my main sources of inspiration, it is in California, I call my business “Cabinart”, there are cabins in Mineral King, and this is The Season in Mineral King.
Any questions? Yes? Click on the commenting line that might say “Be the First To Respond” or “# of responses”. No? Let us proceed. . .
1. While enjoying the sunset on the Mineral King bridge one evening, I met Claudia and Dustin.
They were delightful, and Claudia told me about a great website whose name I am afraid to type on my blog. It is called cabin {blank}. The blank begins with a “p”, has four letters, ends with “n” and has the word “or” in the middle. It is fabulous photos of cabins from all over the world. Unfortunately, I just can’t put the name in my blog because who knows what sort of firestorm of spam it might unleash! So, put on your thinking caps, figure it out, and type in www dot cabin (that word) dot com and enjoy some wonderful cabin photos.
2. You’ve read about the Nature Trail AKA Wildflower Walk in Mineral King several times on this blog. (Or maybe you skipped those days. . .) While on the trail the first weekend in August, I found yet another flower that I’ve never seen before. It is on the downstream side of this little bridge. On the upstream side of that bridge I discovered a new flower several years ago, a Monk’s Hood. That is a real thrill to this rural regional artist who never goes anywhere (except Alaska twice, Chicago twice and China twice). It is a shrub that makes a berry in the middle of the blossom. Two friends said, “Wild Coffee Berry!” but it doesn’t match the photos I found on the internet.
3. This guy blew past me on the Wildflower Walk with his dog. HIS DOG! There are signs at either end of the trail with a picture of a dog and a slash through it. I overheard the guy say that he knew dogs aren’t allowed on the trails which is why he had to walk so fast. Hmmm, that means you don’t have to follow the rules??
We left our eight hikers at the bunkhouse ruins just below the Empire Mines in Mineral King.
There are four different mining holes. (Are they called that?) I don’t know if they are separate mines, or entries to the same mine. Some might be enterable, but not unless you have ropes and know what you are doing!
See the rock spires above? Up there are a couple of air shafts that drop down into the mines. Only Scott, the youngest on our hike, ventured up there. He didn’t have to save his knees for the descent as the rest of us older duffers had to do.
Not much to see in there.
The rocks are very interesting at the mine entrances. This particular mine hole was closed with dirt by the Forest Service back when this was their jurisdiction. They didn’t want people falling down the hole. Sheesh!
This is the New England Tunnel. The New England Tunnel and Smelting Company was involved in the mining of Mineral King. I read Louise Jackson’s Mineral King history book twice, and I still can’t remember the details.
There’s nothing to see here, folks – keep moving.
But it looks so cool from the inside out!
Actually, it looks pretty neato from the outside in.
After the mines, we got on the old road. There is a road up there. Really!
We followed the road toward Timber Gap, and encountered about 6 or 7 more people. Turns out we knew them, and right there on the old wagon road that was built by miners, the descendants of some of the miners met up with their cabin neighbors. It was really fun!
Here is the final relic of the day. There was a gate between 2 trees on Timber Gap. These hinges and some wire remain.