The Long & Winding Roads

At 5:30 a.m. I creaked my way out of the tent to start breaking camp, but noticed that the people at the adjacent site were asleep in the back of their SUV, parked inches from my Subaru, and all their doors were open. I delayed my task and crept around mouselike until, thankfully, they got up half an hour later. It turns out their tent had transformed into a bathtub during yesterday’s downpours, so they had a change of sleeping plan. Meanwhile, mine was a champ, though I still don’t understand how all that water snuck in between the ground cloth and the floor.

I don’t like collapsing tents and other gear after a rain because they get all muddy. And because they’re soggy, they’re also heavier to haul. Unfortunately, because I won’t get home for two more days (more on that in minute), I fear they’ll mold while locked in my car in the triple-digit heat. As soon as I return, I’ll set everything up yet again, this time in my backyard where it all can dry.

A couple hours later I bade farewell to my perfect campsite and started off for my next destination: about 1.5 hours west of Yosemite, where I’m to meet up with Molly for two nights. As I mentioned, I had no cellphone signal, so was glad that I’d brought a paper map. I wiggled down one curvy mountain road for a number of miles and then turned west onto Highway 4, aimed for Ebbett’s Pass (8,732 feet), and then down the west side of the Sierra. Oh my, what a hairy road that is. I didn’t expect that. The scenery was spectacular, but it would have been unwise even to glance at it. The route went from regular two-lane highway to extremely narrow two-lane highway to this for thirty miles:

Actually, this shows a good spot in the road. I didn’t try to take a photo of the treacherous ones, like the innumerable blind curves where there was no shoulder at either edge and, on my side, a straight drop-off down the mountain. Luckily at that hour there wasn’t much traffic approaching from the opposite direction; when it did, I had to slow to a crawl so we could squeak by each other with inches to spare.

After about two hours I reached the aptly named Calaveras Big Trees State Park, my original camping destination before I changed it to Grover. I popped in for a little 1.5-mile walk through the forest. The trees are just too giant and grand to capture with a plain old lens so I have no good pictures. About half a mile into the one-way loop, a woman and her daughter hurried toward me, returning from where I was headed. “There’s a mama bear and two cubs just ahead, and she won’t move off the trail. Be careful!” I well know about the serious danger of such a situation, but I continued on, hopeful for a distant glimpse before turning back. A few minutes later I came upon a group of eight loud Americans who were ambling along, singing loud songs about bears. As I passed them, they reported that they had in fact seen the ursine family and scared them off into the woods only seconds before I appeared. 

Before leaving Calaveras I took a spin through its two campgrounds, and was even more delighted than before that I had opted not to stay there. Not only was it noisy and crowded, but the sites I had initially reserved were awful: sloped, minuscule, and surrounded by other campers. 

Still with no GPS, I got back on Highway 4 and wound my way down through the foothills. I wasn’t sure of my route, since the map wasn’t clear, so every few minutes I checked again to see if I had a connection. Eventually, up popped Google Maps, informing me that in three miles I had to make a turn, one that didn’t appear on the map. As it turns out, without that last-minute instruction, I would have gotten thoroughly off track and hopelessly lost.

Around that time I realized I’d taken on an inch-long stowaway. My guess is that it’s a pine borer beetle. What do you think?

Though the little adventurer was perfectly content remaining as my passenger, I decided it might get homesick, so, while stopped, I tossed it out the window.

If I’d thought Highway 4 was particularly hairy, that was because I’d never been on the part of Highway 49 that I now had to travel. I knew that other sections of it snake along with sharp curves for miles. This was the same, except here the road was just a narrow gash in the face of a what must have been, I swear, a 65- or 70-degree slope, with nary a guardrail and, once again, no shoulder to speak of. I was on the downhill side, where there were only about two feet between me and eternity. Though I was creeping along at about 25 to 30 (despite the inexplicably higher speed limit), some sharp turns took me by surprise; it looked like the road continued straight, but I suddenly realized that it hair-pinned left. Straight ahead was a 700-foot plunge. Imagine my relief when I finally reached lower ground.

Now I am contentedly ensconced at a two-bedroom cabin that Molly discovered, a couple miles into the country outside of Ahwahnee, CA where now, at 8:00 in the evening, the temperature has dropped to a mere 88°. Yikes. Happily, all my camping schmutz has been washed down the shower drain and I feel human again. I have a pass to get into Yosemite tomorrow, but because it’s a long drive from here, and because there are waits of one to two hours at the gate, we may give it a miss. Pity to be so near and yet so far, but queues are something I’m not good at. We’ll see what we find to entertain ourselves in tomorrow’s heat.