Honeymoon Road Trip Part II - The Eastern Sierra Mountains

Our visit to the bright lights, bouldering and mountain biking of Las Vegas would not last long, our desire to head West would overcome all desires for gambling and the familiar terrain. We headed West toward the rock-solid Eastern Sierra mountains, more bouldering and mostly SKIING!

The drive to Bishop, CA from Las Vegas, NV is incredible. We traveled deep into the Mojave desert. Aided by the desert winds, our packed car passed great basins of desert depressions. Animal life was extremely sparse, but the views immense. After the desert flat lands, we climbed into the the Sierras. The passes were intense. The steep winding roads were like none I've experienced in Colorado. Finally, we reached Bishop.

The snow was falling in Bishop and instead of heading up in to the Sierras, we had to stop at an auto parts store to buy tire chains. It is a law in California that during snowfall and on the mountain passes that you carry tire chains. One might also be required to actually put them on. We were fortunate that we did not have to put on tire chains in a snow storm. Instead we took in the powerful Sierras.

The rocky ridges of the Sierras are granite mixed with volcanic rock. In fact, the land has undergone some serious changes throughout Earth's evolution. Millions of years ago the Sierras were covered in Ice. As the Ice pulled away, the water flowed. Instead of the Mojave desert a great sea covered the land. The land is a mix of opposites. In the Sierras, you can hike to the top of the contiguous United States at Mount Whitney (15,000 feet above sea level) and 80 nautical miles away visit the lowest at Death Valley (- 280 feet below sea level). So it was this environment in which we were to play.

We reached our destination, which was a small cabin between Mammoth Lakes, CA and June, CA. The town isn't much of a town, instead more of a halfway point. We parked our car on the side of the road, strapped on our snowshoes and hiked the 1.5 miles to our cabin nestled deep in the woods. Hiking to our cabin was dramatic. The snow was lightly falling and the light was slowly starting to change to the amber so loved by photographers. It was beautiful. However, we couldn't bask in the beauty for long. We had work to do, which included hauling our gear to the cabin and warming ourselves. After our gear was safely stored and our food hiding from the mice, we set to opening some wine and then falling asleep.

We woke to bright sun and quickly strapped on our skis to head to June Mountain, a ski resort famed for cheap prices and cool terrain. At June we were rewarded with no crowds and the famed affordable lift tickets. Pumpkin Pants did an amazing job on her turns. I would've preferred more powder for my telemarks, but loved getting in some skiing. We skied the whole day and had a blast. The next day, would be more suffering - Walker style.

Again we woke to beautiful sunshine. The air was crisp and seemed to awaken every sense of your body. We loaded up our gear for a cross country ski trip. On the map, we figured our round-trip to be something more like two hours. Instead, after seeing the Inyo Craters, the backside of Mammoth ski resort and Deer mountain, we clocked our trip at five hours! It was off to bed immediately after a trip like that. In the morning, we would head to Bishop, CA and more bouldering.

The Happy Boulders in Bishop, CA are volcanic formations atop a ridge which looks as if no boulder could stay for long. The steepness of the ridge side is wild, but as you crest the top, one is rewarded with an amazing array of boulder problems. Ranging from V-easy to V-super hard to V-super hard and super scary, the bouldering is awesome! For over three hours we pulled on the super cool rock formations and topped out some of the three-star boulder problems. With beat hands, we descended the mountain and headed back to Las Vegas, for, you guessed it, RED ROCKS!!!

More on Red Rocks in part IV...