Tales & Trails of a Traveling Wiseguy

As I remarked in my previous blog on hiking the Dinkey Lakes there comes a point in every hike where our thoughts shift from discovery and wonder about what lies ahead to counting the minutes and steps until we're done. I'm mindful of this tendency to make sure it doesn't take me out of enjoyment of the moment. That's what I wrote about last blog—  some fellow hikers we met who'd mentally thrown in the towel and were focused on simply putting one foot in front of the other while we strove to continue appreciating the beauty in which we walk. Another example of doing this came as we got lower down on the trail.



We were already out of the wilderness zone and counting the minutes til we'd get back to the car. That, in turn, was part of a larger calculation about when we'd get home for the night— how long to finish walking the trail, how long to drive back to a paved road, how long to drive down the mountain to Fresno, how long to get dinner, then how long to drive home. We were wondering whether we'd make it all in one night! Ultimately we got home Saturday night, no need to stay over 'til Sunday morning. But at this point in the hike we weren't sure.

This is one of the things I like about photography. It gives me a reason to stop and look. Even if I'm returning back on a stretch of trail I've already hiked, maybe there's a perspective I didn't see before. Or maybe the light is different. That's the case with both of the photos I'm sharing in this blog entry.



I made photos similar to both of these on the way up the trail. I stopped to make more photos— these— on the way down. I'm glad I did, because they look better. Having photos like these helps me remember the beauty in which I walk.

On our hike into the Dinkey Lakes Wilderness last Saturday I made what was, for me, a big choice. I left my camera behind.

"But wait," you might object, "What about those photos you shared in your first blog from this hike?"

Ah, what happened is I left my dedicated camera behind. My really nice, expensive, and unfortunately somewhat heavy camera. I still the type of camera roughly 7 billion people globally carry in our pockets every day— my smartphone camera.



My choice to leave behind my dedicated camera on this hike was a calculated one. The biggest knock against it is that currently I don't have a midrange zoom lens for it. I lost it a week earlier in an alpine swamp. I figured since that's the lens I'd want to make a lot of pictures with, not having it would mean I'd mostly be using my smartphone camera anyway— as in the photo of First Dinkey Lake, above. So why not take only my smartphone and leave the weight of the dedicated camera behind.

It would've been nice to have my dedicate camera even for photos like this. My smartphone took a nice picture.... My dedicated camera would've taken a nicer one. There'd be richer color rendition, more control of depth-of-field, and the ability to zoom out wider. My iPhone SE 2022's camera has a 28mm equivalent focal length. That was considered wide angle in the late 1990s. Since the mid 00s I've been using cameras with 24mm or even 21mm as wide angle. I wish I could have zoomed out a bit wider in the photo above.

"Oh, but there's panorama mode with smartphones...." Sure.



It's fun to shoot panoramas. Like the one above. And smartphones make it a snap to make such pictures, while dedicated cameras still often leave it as something you have to stitch together with software later. But the problem with panos is that they look fake. The perspectives are off. I like making ultra-wide pictures with the ultra-wide lens I have for my dedicated camera. I could have carried the camera with me, and that lens— since it currently isn't broken, despite living a rough life— but it seemed like too much extra weight in my pack on a long trek for what I estimated would be a small number of unique photos captured with it.



As we relaxed at First Dinkey Lake, sitting on a log overlooking the lake, I was both happy and sad for leaving my dedicated camera back down in the car. Happy, because that camera felt so heavy when I lifted it by the strap, deciding whether to add it to my pack. The hike up the mountain was strenuous, mostly because of the high altitude. This lake is at almost 9,300' (over 2,800 meters) above sea level. But also I was sad, because I knew I was missing out on better pictures. As I made the photo above, again I wished that I could zoom out a bit for a wider perspective from our lunchtime perch.

Still, though, I approached the situation with a positive attitude. I had chosen not to take my big camera. Thus, with smartphone camera in hand, I was asking myself, "What nice pictures can I make?"



In beauty I walk.

Saturday morning we drove up the mountain from Fresno to the Dinkey Lakes trail. Most of the drive was along California 168, up through the small resort town of Shaver Lake. We continued several miles further up into the Sierra Nevada, turning off the highway at Tamarack Ridge, elev. 7,582'. From there it was a bit over 10 miles on mostly dirt roads to the trailhead for Dinkey Lakes.



If you were to look up directions to get to the Dinkey Lakes trailhead, this is probably not the route you'd see recommended. It's an alternate I figured out last year when the normal route was impassable due to a washout. That said, as far as alternate routes go, it's a fairly good one. The trail only gets really bumpy on the last 1/2 mile or so, and by that point the main route has merged in so it's not longer an alternative. Plus, in our Nissan Xterra Pro4x I didn't even have to engage 4 wheel drive. The vehicle's stock high clearance, combined with skilled driving, was plenty to get over everything the trail threw at us.

Stay tuned... the hike comes next!

It's now six days since we hiked Rancheria Falls and Dinkey Creek Falls (part 1 of 2) and I'm still catching up on it. This trip is in danger of getting lapped; later today we leave on another trip, and I doubt I'll have this one wrapped by then. Anyway, here's the colorful part of what's left, part 2 of 2 on the Dinkey Lakes trail.

When we encountered the first falls on the Dinkey Lakes trail we weren't sure if it was "the" falls our hiking book guided us to. If it was, there were mistakes. We decided to press on as if the book was accurate and merely overlooked the existence of that other falls sitting right there just past the trailhead. We pressed on and were rewarded with another falls.



This Dinkey Creek falls is at least 3x the height of the previous one. It's at the back of a small canyon formed by the rock face it drops over. Curiously the trail skips around it. To find this falls we had to trek cross-country for a few hundred yards. That's where our guidebook proved its worth. This falls is not visible from the trail so there's no way we would have found it without the book... and a fair bit of wilderness route-finding, as the book was less than clear in describing things like "a big striated rock".



Getting to this little grotto below the falls also required some rock-hopping. We had to cross the stream twice— each way. In both areas we found places where rocks to step on were either above the water or just below it so we didn't get more than the outside of our boots wet.

After coming back to the main trail we considered ascending to the first of the lakes on the Dinkey Lakes loop. Hawk's back was already bothering her from the bouncy 4x4 drive to the trailhead, and the stretching on the slippery water crossings made it worse. Oh, and the mosquitos were pretty thick up here at nearly 9.000' elevation. We decided to pack it up for the day and head home— which would also be a smart decision as it would get us home at a reasonable hour of the evening instead of dragging home achy and sleepy late at night.

In my previous blog I described how our plans came together at the last minute (well, 36 hours ahead of actually getting there) to hike Rancheria Falls. It would be a lot of driving just to hike one short hike. Thus I looked for ways to make the trip a two-fer. There was another waterfalls hike nearby, on the first bit of the Dinkey Lakes Loop. It was in just the right place to be a two-fer. The only problem? AllTrails.com says it is CLOSED.

I'm glad I read for more details because it's not actually the trail that's closed, it's the dirt road getting there. When I see that a road is closed, and I'm planning to go there in my 4x4 already, I think....



Seriously, I've driven around "ROAD CLOSED" signs several times in my 4x4. I've even driven around a "BRIDGE OUT AHEAD" sign once. And yes, that time I drove down the embankment, through the water, and back up the other side!

But this trek didn't require anything like that. There are other roads to get there. There's a whole network of dirt 4x4 roads in the area. A helpful post on the website clued me in to where to start looking, and I mapped it out.



We drove back west about 10 miles from the turnoff for Rancheria Falls, to the top of the Tamarack Ridge. From there a well-marked trailhead sat on the side of the road, beyond a large parking lot full of pick-up trucks with empty trailers. The area is popular with people driving XUVs. (XUVs are extreme ATVs. If you're not sure what that means, imagine a golf cart with 4 wheel drive that goes stupid, dangerously fast.)

The paved road ended just beyond the sign in the photo above. From there it was dirt roads the next 9 miles. The first 8 miles were passable by a regular street vehicle, but the last mile— after we joined with the the road that was closed lower down the mountain— definitely required high clearance. I'm pretty sure we hiked Dinkey Lakes once before, umpteen or more years ago, but I don't remember the last mile of road being that rough.



We rolled up to the Dinkey Lakes trailhead at 1pm. The Dinkey Lakes Loop is an amazing 7 mile trail in the high Sierra. From here at the trail signpost it looks... well, dinky. I'm glad I've been here before so as not to feel rooked after the tough drive.

Our plan wasn't to hike the whole 7 mile loop but only to visit a waterfalls near the start and then maybe hike up to the first lake and back. BTW, as much as hiking at Rancheria Falls was tough because of the elevation, here it's even higher, 8,600' (2.6 km) at the trailhead.

Update: keep reading as we visit... one of... the Dinkey Creek Falls.