Pacific Crest Trail
Leavitt Lake to Sonora Pass
August 20th - 21st 2008
It was to be a week of hiking in the Immigrant Wilderness section of the High Sierra and perhaps a day at Yosemite. The lure of an actual vacation, hanging out at Pinecrest Lake with the family was strong, so strong that I missed out on about thirty miles of hiking I had planned. Not that going fishing with my 5 year old and swimming in the lake with my niece and nephew was bad, but already being Wednesday, I only had a few days left to do an overnight trip before I had to come back to Washington on Saturday.
Pinecrest Lake
The trail was calling me. I chose to do a short (OK I admit, really short) northbound section of the Pacific Crest Trail, starting at Leavitt Lake, joining the PCT after a mile and a half and camping at Latopie Lake about five miles in. The next day I would hike another five or so miles down to Sonora Pass to be picked up. About ten miles total, less than my typical day hike. Being at or above 10,000 feet in elevation almost the entire hike, I wanted to take it slow as I was unaccustomed to hiking at this high of an elevation. It turned out to not be as bad as I thought it might be, but I occasionally found myself out of breath and gasping for air, taking quick breaths, almost to the point of hyperventilating myself, if one can do that at such high elevation. It is a very strange feeling to be out of breath from just tying your shoes, but I suppose being an ex-smoker of 15 years or so didn’t help matters much. All in all, everything worked out fine and my fears of altitude were unfounded.
Leavitt Lake
I arrived at Leavitt Lake around 11:00 AM via 4x4 and the expert driving of my father in law. His motivation and reward for driving me up, was the chance to do a little fishing with his grandson, my nephew Jacob. I hung out with them for a little while as they fished. Within 30 minutes Jacob had already landed a couple of fish.
Jacob
I heard an out of state fishing license was kind of spendy so I opted out this time, but next time I’m down that way I have to try it out. Around noon I decided it was time to head out. I was not in a huge hurry as I had plenty of daylight, but I was anxious to get out on the trail and see the big expansive views the northern Sierras had to offer.
Leavitt Lake from top of ridge
The mountains in this part of the Sierras are not the typical white granite you see in Yosemite and much of the Sierras, instead it is composed mostly of black rock from volcanic origins, although from time to time white granite does poke out. Being on the trail now after being dropped off, I started climbing, climbing up and up… wait it’s only supposed to be a thousand or so feet elevation gain to the PCT, must be the altitude and me not used to a heavy overnight pack on my back. I’m used to the three or four thousand foot gains, just not the thin air. At any rate, climbing up I finally get to the top of the pass or ridge as it were and took in the view. Amazing! I’m not sure, but I think I could see Yosemite from here. I could clearly see some white granite mountains in the distance. Sigh. I only wish I had the time to explore more of this wonderful place and do a lot more miles than I was doing this trip, so much to see, and only a week to cram it all in.
View from top of ridge behind Leavitt Lake
After taking in the view and catching my breath I hiked the remaining third of a mile to the PCT. I could see a signpost down at the intersection of what I thought was the PCT but I would have to drop back down a couple hundred feet to get to down to it. There was however, a trail branching off to the right from where I was standing going in what I thought was the direction I needed to go. I needed to get down to that intersection so I could read the sign to make sure it said PCT before I started off down some unknown trail, so off I went. About half way down I looked over to where the other trail headed and I could see another sign about a half mile away that I could not see before due to the curvature of the mountain. I decided right then to stop my travel downhill and cut across country to the other sign. I was pretty sure now this was the right trail but without signage I didn’t want to start off in the wrong direction, and there’s nothing I dislike much more than to lose elevation unnecessarily. Once I got to the sign, it indeed did say PCT / Leavitt Lake Trail. I was on the right path.
PCT Trail sign
I started walking again and looked back to see a couple other hikers that were a quarter mile or so behind me, go on down the other path to the other sign, and they kept on going. They would be hiking the PCT southbound, as I was going northbound. I hiked on not seeing anyone else until around 1:30 or 2:00 pm when I ran into a south bound PCT section hiker. He said I was the first person he had talked to that day. We had a little palaver and chatted about hiking of all things, go figure. This dude said he had been hiking since Hwy 80 which he then explained was about 180 PCT miles away. Hwy 80 for those who don’t know goes just north of Lake Tahoe. He didn’t seem to have much going for him as he explained he would probably hike south until his job prospects got better. I didn’t go on to ask how he was going to find a job if he was up here hiking. I kind of envied him in a weird kind of way, just eat sleep and walk. I asked if he had a trail name or an on-line trail journal but he didn’t. We parted ways and I kept walking. The section hiker had said that the trail ahead was pretty rocky; choss pile would have been my definition, as it was nothing but scree. It’s funny how the trail can still be easily discerned, even through this talus section.
Scree field
As I walked, I noticed to my right was the ridge I had crossed over earlier was getting lower and soon would be easy to do a little cross country uphill to take a look over. I walked over to the ridge which was actually a cliff edge at that point and looked directly down to Leavitt Lake and noticed that my father in law and nephew were still down there fishing, two and a half hours after I had left them. Must have been catching a few I guessed. I kept walking and soon the trail crossed back over to the other side of the ridge but it was further down the trail and now had no view of the lake. This section reminded me of the surface of the moon as up to this point there was always something growing in the rocks, a few flowers here, a few bushes there. This area was kind of a large bowl that must have gotten a lot of snow. There was a big brown rock down in the middle of it that I actually yelled hey bear to, to see if it was indeed a bear or not. Satisfied that it was not when it didn’t move, I kept on walking, there was lots of talus here.
Moonscape
I looked at my map and realized that just around the bend would be a view of my camp for the night. As I got around that bend, and looked down at my home for the night, I could see that no-one else was around and that likely; I would have the whole place to myself. I also noticed the goat trail down to the lake looked pretty steep and would not be too fun with my heavy pack, going down or coming out the next day. Oh, the joys of hiking.
View of Latopie Lake from trail
Should I continue on and go to Sonora Pass and hitch back down to Twain Harte or go down to the lake and set up camp? This was my nerves talking as I’m still not 100% used to camping by myself. It just gets a little lonely at night after not seeing anyone much of the day. Thruhikers go days sometimes without seeing another soul. That, coupled with my desire to see the sunset and sunrise was enough of a reason for me to head down to the lake. The lake was pretty, but again, without a fishing license or pole to fish, it was nothing spectacular. I quickly set up camp, and made some dinner. It started to get a little breezy which I hoped was not a sign of things to come. I had strategically set up my tent in a grove of the tallest trees in the area. After dinner I re-inspected my tarp to make sure it could withstand a hurricane if need be and reinforced the corner stakes with some heavy rocks on top of them. I had a feeling it was going to be a windy night.
TarpTent
After dinner I sat outside my tent and read for about an hour or so waiting for the big show outside. I was hoping for a spectacular sunset, while not bad, I have to say I’ve seen much better.
Waiting for the show
Part of my goal coming up here was to get some good sunset and sunrise photos. The skies were clear and the stars should be very bright tonight as well. After the big sunset show and almost filling the small 128 MB memory card in my camera, I decided to call it a night.
Sunset
My fears of wind were soon realized as it started blowing pretty hard right after it got dark. It blew so hard that it kept me awake most of the night. I remember looking at the time and it was 3:00 in the morning. The good thing is that my tarp seemed to be holding its own in the gale and my placing it in the little stand of trees seemed to keep the wind coming from one direction from blowing it too much. When the wind blew from the other direction however, it seemed to be trying to blow my tarp over, but like I said, it was holding its own. Exhaustion finally overtook me and I fell asleep pretty hard. So hard in fact that I didn’t wake up until 7:30. I had missed my morning photo shoot. Oh well, I figured I would just have some breakfast and start packing it up. I was going to try a peanut butter, honey and banana tortilla, but couldn’t find the banana I had in a side pocket of my pack, argggh! It must have fallen out on the trail somewhere (I later found it in the Jeep the next day). OK so I would have a peanut butter and honey tortilla. When I went to open the honey stick I bought a few days back in Jamestown, it tasted like lemon, yuck! You would have thought they would have been labeled lemon at the store, I thought they were just plain honey. Oh well, I guess it was not to be, so I just ate my peanut butter and lemon honey tortilla and washed it down with some water. Yummy! (not). After breakfast and breaking down camp, I left around 8:15 and started the steep slog up the hill to get back to the trail. After 20 minutes or so I reached the trail and took some last photos of the lake for a panorama I would later stitch together. The view was amazing. I could see at least four lakes including Latopie. I could see where I had started from the day before but not Leavitt Lake itself, it was hidden behind a ridge, but I knew it was there.
Lakes
Off in the distance, on the trail behind me that I had hiked the day before, I heard some rocks clattering. Looking closely I noticed 3 deer having their morning breakfast. I was surprised to see anything up here as the vegetation was so sparse. Maybe it was hunting season.
Deer
Turning back around, I could see the path in front of me was going to go through a little notch on the ridge. This part of the trail reminded me of something you would see in a western, I could almost see Indians waiting to ambush me as I walked forward. OK maybe that’s a bit much, but the geology was very interesting to say the least.
Notch in pass
Once at the top of the ridge and in the little notch I could see I would be going through a little bowl and dropping down in elevation a little before picking it back up on the other side. I could also see there was a fire way off in the distance. It looked like it was well to the east, way on the other side of Hwy 108. Oh yes, this was the first time I could see the highway as well. It looked like my trip was coming closer to an end.
Bowl
Fire
Out of the bowl, and on to the next ridge, the wind just about knocked me over. I had to take off my hat and carry it so it wouldn’t blow off and get lost. I could see the highway again and the steep, granite walled valley it goes through. It was very stunning.
Hwy 108 in valley below
According to my map, I would soon reach the highest point of the trail on my hike at 10,870 feet. This last high stretch of trail was very scenic and probably my favorite of the whole hike. The grade was very gentle and the elevation gain practically imperceptible.
Gentle grade
Soon I approached the last ridge and high point of the trip and was crossing over the ridgeline for the last time on the way down to Sonora Pass. I could see not only the highway this time, but Sonora Pass itself. It only looked like it was about a mile away and maybe 1200 feet or so elevation loss, but my map said it was 2.4 miles from here. Looking down at the trail, I could see that it did indeed wind around quite a bit. I guess it’s true what they say about the PCT that the grade is mostly gentle the whole way. If this was the Olympic Mountains where I’m accustomed to hiking, the trail would be steep switchbacks the whole way down saving a lot of walking. I think each way has its virtues. I was just glad to be on the trail a little longer.
Looking down at Sonora Pass from the high point of my hike, 10780 ft.
Winding around and around the trail went. I could see a lone hiker below, making their way up. I could also see some tall trees and shade below, something I hadn’t had since that morning. Speaking of shade, did I mention that I got a little sunburn on my neck the day before? I had applied sunscreen but I must have missed a spot as my neck was on fire, right next to my left pack strap. All morning I had my baseball cap on backwards so the brim would cast its shadow on my neck to keep it from getting burned anymore. Note to self, do a better job applying sunscreen when at elevation without shade. Anyhow down I went and finally reached my first shade of the day. Another first of the day walked around the bend on the trail below and soon approached me as I told them they were my first human contact for the day. They were surprised, much as I was the day before with the section hiker. They asked me if I was a thru-hiker, and flattered I told them no, I was just out for an overnight. The couple was going to spend a few days on the trail making Latopie Lake one of their stops. I couldn’t believe how huge their packs were for just a couple of nights. Advice was doled out on the trail conditions ahead and difficulty to get down to Latopie Lake and soon we parted ways. No sooner did I start walking than another hiker came around the corner. This one was a day hiker and said hi as he cruised by. My sunburn was bothering me again and I cocked my hat around to block the sun from that spot. I probably looked like one of those home boys that never wear their hat straight. Another couple of hikers popped around the next corner and I felt silly with my hat like that but what could I do? My neck was burned and the shade helped a lot. I soon passed a couple of spots along the trail that looked like great camp sites. I could just imagine the thru-hikers that come through setting up a little stealth camp here. I was almost to the end of my journey. I soon approached the last PCT trail sign and on the ground next to it were two Heinekens that someone left with a note that read “Until Aug 22nd (Friday) these beers are for Dana & Bill. After Aug 22nd whoever wants them can have them. Please don’t litter!” Someone was working a little trail magic for someone, this was great. Well since it was only the 21st and I was in no mood for warm beer, I walked on over to the highway and crossed it to head to the picnic area where I would be picked up.
Trail Magic
I was way early as it was only 11:00 and my ride out would not be here until 1:00. I ate the last of my landjager meat sticks I had brought with me from the Bavarian Meats store at the Pike Place Market in Seattle, (yes its that good!) and turned on some music on my mp3 phone to while away the 2 hours I had to wait. I flopped myself out on one of the picnic tables there and dozed.
Sonora Pass Picnic Area
Around noon a young guy with a beard that looked to be no older than 20 or 21 came over and asked me if I was a thru-hiker. Wow, two in one day. Do I really look that much like hiker trash? I don’t even have a beard. At any rate he said he was thru-hiking southbound and had lost his PCT data pages for the area ahead. He was mostly curious about water so I let him look at my map and I told him of the water sources I had passed, just a stream across the highway and the lake I stayed at. He was grateful but I could tell he wanted more info as this next section for him was a long one, all the way to Toulumne Meadows in Yosemite. I was a little curious though as I watched him trace his finger down the map, he wasn’t even looking at the PCT trail. He was looking at an Emigrant Wilderness trail. Once I pointed it out to him he was kind of embarrassed and thanked me. It just struck me odd. He explained he started on his long walk in Canada and made it down to Stevens Pass and could go no further due to the depth of snow. The winter in Washington this year brought a lot of snow and the spring was a cold one. We had snow in the mountains fall as late as May this year, so I was not surprised he got turned back. He said since he could go no further, he came down to California and hiked northbound to Stevens Pass which was melted out by the time he got there. He was now back in California and back on his southbound hike. He only had about a thousand miles to go to get to Mexico. I asked if he had a trail name or on-line journal but he said he was keeping a private journal for his mom but nothing on-line at this point. As we talked I heard a car pull up and there was my father in law in the Jeep, 15 minutes early to pick me up. The thru-hiker and I said our goodbyes and I wished him luck on the rest of his journey. I climbed into the Jeep and my amazing PCT hike in California was over, as I bounced down the highway at Sonora Pass.
PCT trail sign
Sonora Pass trail sign
How to get there
FROM MEXICO
Starting at Campo California, stick you finger through a hole in the fence at the border so you can say you were in Mexico. Turn around and heading north on the PCT walk about a thousand or so miles until you reach Sonora Pass.
FROM CANADA
Starting at Manning Provincial Park BC, start walking south on the PCT. After about 1600 miles or so, you will be at Sonora Pass.
THE EASIER WAY
From within California, the bay area specifically, make you way out to Hwy 108 and go all the way up to Sonora Pass. You can park here and make an out an back hike to Latopie Lake going southbound on the PCT. Or for a more rewarding hike have someone drive you up to Leavitt Lake and walk northbound to Sonora Pass. A four wheel drive vehicle with good clearance will be needed to get up to Leavitt Lake. If you really need directions beyond these, you should consider buying a map or getting a GPS, you'll need it for the hike anyways.
Stanislaus National Forest Homepage
Other Things to consider
While although the weather was very cooperative for me temperature wise, this part of the PCT is above 10,000 feet in elevation and you should be prepared for the weather that kind of elevation can bring, summer or not. In the middle of the night the temperature was around 50 degrees for me but with the wind it felt much cooler. It had been in the upper 90s during the day. It would be real easy to get fooled into thinking you might not need layers or a wind breaker up here, but I would have had an uncomfortable night without them. Once in my tent I was OK. Also being so high up, some kind of sunscreen is highly recommended. I applied sunscreen before the hike and missed a spot on my neck which got a pretty bad sunburn that made me uncomfortable the night I was up there. This part of the trail stradles the Stanislaus and Humbolt-Toiyabe National Forests. A permit is required to overnight here and can be obtained at the Summit Ranger District office at the turnoff to Pinecrest Lake off of Hwy 108, or at the Mi-Wok Ranger District office on Hwy 108 in Mi-Wuk Village.
