(words by Alex, photos by Dani and Mama P)
On Thursday August 25th, I turned off my cell phone. I am not a person who can flip the switch, I can’t so easily turn work off in my head and with the end of a large sales month coming to a close, I will admit I had second thoughts about leaving the office for a week in the heat of the first round of ski boot shipments of the Fall.
I don’t love my job, but I also don’t hate my job. I don’t work in a corporate office, rarely do people yell at me, I don’t have student loans (thankfully) that I’m paying off and I try not to ruin anyone’s Christmas. But the fact is the amount of time spent in one place imprints itself in your brain, the coffee lubricates the gears and you wake up thinking about how market changes and company growth with affect life moving forward.
I am in the midst of a new chapter in my life. I live with and am in love with a beautiful, successful, talented, brave and hilarious lady who for some reason let’s me hang around. We talk about marriage, kids, buying a house some day and saving money. A far cry from the hooligan who shuttled back and forth between Ames, IA for school and Jackson, WY to bounce around the Teton’s and learn to ski not like a Midwesterner. Thankfully I shook the beer haze and got my act together…a little bit.
As the phone was switched off and the different travel cruxes were met and handled, I just settled into a state of acceptance. We would land eventually, get a bit of sleep in Rocklin, CA and then head to Mammoth.
In Mammoth, we met up with Laurie and Dan, Dani’s parents.
Dani and I are both very fortunate that our parents support us no matter what and are all four very healthy active and engaged parents. They all get out and set the bar really high for us moving forward. They also listen to us complain about working "too hard" at our jobs a stones throw from the mountains and one of which has a "gear stipend." Boo Hoo.
Once in Mammoth, we met up with Laurie and Dan, snagged a bit of shut eye and a Schat's doughnut before hitting the trail.
These photos, although incredible (nice work Dani and Laurie!) do not even come close to showing the breadth of the Sierra. In some of these write ups/trip reports we have tried to give a blow by blow account of the happenings that went on. This has been my tact to try and explain the scenery, the people, weather, feeling of the time spent away. After our trip to the Sierra this last Spring, which was my first, I am learning this is really tough.
The words are hard, the moments cherished and sacred. The mountains have that effect and the Sierra more so than any place I have ever spent time. They are friendly, inviting mountains. The passes we covered don't see much traffic and the fish we caught don't see many lures. There is definitely a feeling that where you are treading 1, you should tread light 2, more deer and pica have spent time than man and 3, someone may have never actually walked up that draw or canyon.
The way we traveled was also very new to me and opened my eyes to a whole new form of trip planning and adventure. It helped a lot that Dan and Laurie had been over many of these passes several times. They had taken the way that looked easier but actually was not. It also helped we had "splitter" weather, no storms to speak of and lots of sun. Skirting ridges and winding around tarns and boulder fields, saying "oh thats where that other pass would have dropped us," or "can you imagine the bushwhack it would take to make THAT possible!?", using the map, but not necessarily the trail, to link landmarks and drop over passes to find beautiful camp sites, swimming holes and great fishing all was made much easier with the lack of storms chasing us to shelter.
Anyway, I'm going to leave it at that. I'll let the great photos from Laurie and Dani show the rest. After a great trip we were able to squeak in some time with Rosie back in Rocklin and celebrate her belated bday. Then it was back to the travel crux: we made all the legs, hiked home and put up the dogs. Glad to have gotten every second the Sierra was willing to imprint on Dierker and the Go Perrots.
Sierra High Route 2016, Mammoth to North Lake
PRE-TRIP
DAY 1
DAY 2
DAY 3
DAY 4
DAY 5
DAY 6
DAY 7
POST-TRIP
