I woke up this morning feeling like I had my first solid night of sleep since beginning the hike. There is a pleasant limpidness in the body, a rich gravity, of having slept well, as though every cell had a chance to settle into its own weight. My morning routine is becoming so established that by the time I’m done with everything, I consistently seem to be breaking camp at 7:05am. Today as well, and I began the downhill trek from the lake feeling refreshed.
I had a goal for the day, which was to walk in a way that didn’t exacerbate my irritated left ankle. A full-on reemergence of an old tendinitis there would probably halt my trip, so figuring out how to continue these next five days and allowing the irritation to subside feels paramount. I knew I had a long climb, over 3500 feet, from Mono Creek up to Gabbot Pass today, and climbing is one of the main irritants. I hoped that I could pay close attention and modify my gait as necessary to prevent further injury. Before I even left camp, I used the metal handle of my ice axe pressed into my calf and vigorously rubbed it up and down, hoping to relax the gastroc and get some slack in the system.
From Laurel Lake I had a long descent to Mono Creek, utilizing a mix of no trail, faint in-and-out trail, and then established trail. For a long time I walked among lush meadowlands, sometimes boggy with standing water that I skirted at the rocky edge, and was accompanied by my regular choir of mosquitoes (I’m beginning to think of them like backup singers). Eventually the meadows ended and the steep hillside plunging to canyon bottom below began. On the way down, as I stopped for a morning constitutional, I was delighted to find a robust field of wild garlic, identifiable by dozy purple fluff-ball flowers and, upon a nibble, that unmistakable spicy flavor.
As I was descending I could see across the canyon into Second Recess, a long and deep print left in the side of a massive mountain ridge. The print-leaver was a glacier, ages ago scouring down into rock. I can’t help but imagine a child with a lump of clay, pushing in dents and recesses and making all manner of texture. An icy child playing with the lump of clay called ‘earth’. My route would cross Mono Creek at bottom of the canyon (the creek was vigorous–I crossed by crawling on hands and knees across a fallen log, white rapidly moving water a foot away from my face), then climb into Second Recess on the way up to Gabbot Pass. There is, by the way, a First Recess and a Third Recess, along the same mountainous ridge, each left by a glacier at play sculpting the land.
’Twas brillig, and the slithy tovesDid gyre and gimble in the wabe:All mimsy were the borogoves,And the mome raths outgrabe.
Eventually I passed Lower Mills Lake, climbed more, passed a couple tarns, passed Upper Mills Lake, all of us–the lakes, the tarns, the cheerful Mills Creek connecting all the bodies of water with one continuous, silvery thread, and me–pinned between soaring granite walls with jagged tops like Jabberwocky teeth.
“Beware the Jabberwock, my son!The jaws that bite, the claws that catch!Beware the Jubjub bird, and shunThe frumious Bandersnatch!”
My climb passed liquid water flowing ever downhill and transitioned to snow, interspersed with talus, the Mills waterways twinkling far below me, until finally I made it to the top of 12250 foot Gabbot Pass, a low saddle between Mount Gabb and Mount Abbot (gotta love a good portmanteau–or should I say, portmounteau). The highest I’ve been yet, and not much a view, because the surrounding mountains are just hogging up all the space by being so mountainous against the sky. Still, a victory of sorts, not to mention that I managed to get there without overly relying on my left ankle. Ready for some beamish galumphing.
He took his vorpal sword in hand;Long time the manxome foe he sought—So rested he by the Tumtum treeAnd stood awhile in thought.And, as in uffish thought he stood,The Jabberwock, with eyes of flame,Came whiffling through the tulgey wood,And burbled as it came!One, two! One, two! And through and throughThe vorpal blade went snicker-snack!He left it dead, and with its headHe went galumphing back.“And hast thou slain the Jabberwock?Come to my arms, my beamish boy!O frabjous day! Callooh! Callay!”He chortled in his joy.’Twas brillig, and the slithy tovesDid gyre and gimble in the wabe:All mimsy were the borogoves,And the mome raths outgrabe.
The descent was easy, little snow, grassy gentle slopes leading down to Lake Italy. Why Lake Italy? Because it is shaped like a boot, of course. Lake Italy is long, about two miles, and dwells above 11000 feet, so the surrounding terrain is stark: rock and snow, fragile small grasses and flowers clinging to life in the gaps. There is a faint use trail winding its way along the shore, right next to the vibrantly hued water, and I greatly enjoyed ambling alongside. I almost stopped to swim but didn’t, a mix of time constraints and a ponderous coterie of fat gray clouds congregating overhead that made me think it might rain soon.
From Lake Italy’s outlet, I curved around a shoulder of granite benches and arrived at Teddy Bear and Brown Bear Lakes, my gateway to the Bear Basin part of the Sierras, where everything is named after cute little ursines. Tomorrow morning first thing I’ll climb White Bear Pass, which looks from down here perhaps impossible, but I’m learning that reading the landscape can be difficult to do until it’s right underneath you.
The swim I didn’t take at Lake Italy. White Bear Pass, this swim is for you.
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