Sonora Pass

Scenes from Sonora Pass: Leavitt Peak, Stanislaus Peak, Sonora Peak, and Mt Patterson
3 August 2014

Introduction

John and I had got along so well last week that we made plans to climb Mt Brewer two weeks later. However in the days leading up to the trip, the forecast looked more and more foreboding. I had never thought to examine the forecast before embarking on a hike, but after getting wrecked on the Split, it seemed wise to consider the weather. So instead a trip far far away to the north was organized. I was obsessed with climbing 14ers (and SPS Emblem Peaks) at the time and had little interest in visiting Sonora Pass or hiking the peaks proposed by John and his friends, Craig and Eric. But I thought, ‘What the hell, it will be good to meet some new people.’ And boy am I glad I decided to come along for this one!

Scene I: Carpool North

I waited anxiously at a park and ride in Ridgecrest for John, Craig, and Eric to arrive. When they did we made our introductions, and per the customs of my people, the Wisconsinites, I offered a case of Miller High Life to the gang. I thought we could toast a brew in the parking lot to get the trip started off with some good luck. But the guys were eager to hit the road, and we skipped the toast. I quickly realized just how far north we were going. Some time during the ride I mentioned that I was inspired by a PeaksforFreaks post to climb the Northeast Couloir of Mt Langley this past spring. And to my utter amazement…Eric chimes in from the backseat…‘That’s my website.’ I stutter incredulously, ‘You’re the PeaksforFreaks guy?! I love your website, man!!’ This of course led to talks of peaks galore, and although I did not realize it at the time, I had immediately contracted the peakbagging illness from these eccentric travelers. After we passed Bridgeport, I thought to myself, ‘Hmm there were some nice motels back there – I wonder where the gang plans to sleep tonight?’ And not a few minutes later, Craig whips out his GPS and instructs John to pull out on a nearly invisible dirt ‘road’. I’m like, ‘Man this is some real cowboy western shit here.’ Sure enough the guys laid their tents right out in the open like the desert scrub was the goddamn Holiday Inn. Within minutes John was snoring soundly, his legs dangling out the side of his Hyundai. ‘These people are crazy,’ I think to myself…crazy awesome that is…

Scene II: Hiking the PCT

I woke up feeling surprisingly refreshed. Today I would hike many thousands of feet of elevation gain more than I had ever hiked before. My apathy regarding these lesser northern peaks quickly turned to quiet awe. I became fascinated by the volcanic rock on the way to Leavitt Peak. And Stanislaus Peak had a fun scramble near the end. We crossed angry little mountain streams that supported wondrous blooms of wildflowers amid the vast expanse of barren rock. Near the end of the day I was running low on steam. Craig said something to the effect of, ‘Just a typical day of bagging peaks, man!’ Furthermore as we approached Sonora Peak on our way back from Stanislaus, the sun was slowly sliding toward the horizon. I had never hiked in the dark before and was becoming a little nervous. But just as we neared the highpoint of Sonora Peak, something amazing started to happen. The sky turned to fire and layers of mountains peeled away for miles and miles, seemingly to the edge of the world and beyond. I was floored by this display of light and nearly started to cry it was so beautiful. We were closer to the trailhead than I remembered, and everyone was back at the car just as night fell.

Scene III: I Think I Might Be Cursed

Day two of our Sonora Pass peakbagging extravaganza promised to be a little easier. We had plans to climb only Mt Patterson on this day. John, Craig, and I hiked together while Eric ran off and started traversing a ridgeline across the drainage. I stood there watching him, mouth agape, ‘He’s practically running across the ridge!’ To which Craig matter of factly replied, ‘Yeah…he does that.’ Apparently this was normal behavior given Eric’s considerable fitness! After carefully staying on the trail to preserve the fragile Martian-like landscape, we reached the summit of Mt Patterson. We relaxed for a while and then began our descent. Eric completed his traverse, ran over the summit, and caught up to us in no time.

I clearly still had no eye for spotting approaching weather systems, as out of the blue and into the black the sky opened up, dumping a downright offensive deluge of hail onto us. Craig was the only one who had bothered to pack a rain jacket, and John, Eric, and I were left to endure a painful bombardment of hail: very large frozen iceballs which pounded directly onto our exposed skin. John later related to me that he was going to grab his rain jacket, but left it in the trunk because it was buried beneath so much gear (including a gigantic rope Eric had picked up earlier). I must confess that as we unsuccessfully tried to hide beneath a canopy of pine trees, growing colder by the minute, I sort of lost it. I said, ‘I’m just going to run back to the car to keep warm.’ I think John, Craig, and Eric were able to keep their heads much better than myself. As I ran on along on my own, I whooped with truly reckless, liberating, careless abandon, ‘WOOHOO! I AM ALIVE! YEAAHHHHH!’ and giggled loudly with delight. I started to come down and realized that John still had the car keys. I waited on the side of the dirt road in a prominent location, and all of a sudden a truck came rolling along. ‘Hop in the back,’ one of a pair of extremely kind hunters said to me. I hopped in with the rest of the gang. They had arranged a ride back to our car. It wasn’t so far away, but the ride was glorious. I felt like Woody in the back of the Pizza Planet truck in Toy Story, my body shivering violently, my spine crashing into the cold hard bed of the pickup truck. Thankfully the generous hunters didn’t have any large toolboxes stored back there!

I was so relieved to see John’s car. We all climbed in and put on some warm, dry clothes. By this time the storm was letting up, but the floodwaters were rising rapidly. So we waited it out until the waters started to recede. Using my geotechnical engineering powers, I grabbed a big stick and began probing the soils beneath the waters. To my delight the soils were coarse-grained and had retained their strength even with the sudden increase in water content. Further the floodwaters had fanned out in front of our car, losing the momentum they needed to carry any significant amount of material downstream. We all agreed it was safe to drive across, and John gunned it a little more aggressively than I expected across the now gentle waters. He made it across, no problem. We rode back to US 395 and stepped out one more time to organize our gear and prepare for the long ride back to civilization.

This trip was quite the adventure. We had only hiked together for two days but I knew I made some really good friends on this one.

Eric’s trip report