When setting out, there are often times where there really isn’t a trail or clear route to the top of a mountain. Cross country approximation to the top of a well-known peak isn’t to be taken for granted. It isn’t just a concern about losing your way or getting off your bearing. It is largely about pace and energy conservation at altitude to maintain your way. Even if by successive approximation until at the top.
A finite number of Sequoia trees exist as they grow in the wilderness that hosts them in just the right conditions. While not as plentiful as the sands on the shore of any sea, they are limited nonetheless as a life-form. A purpose that at least testifies of their enormity relatively speaking. Their unique character, shape, and bearing stands out much more prominent as a comparison to other tree creatures of the forest. A lion of the forest, so to speak. Not as a predator, but as a king of the conifer species.
Asymmetrical balance of light cast upon a lake and its sky above. With reflections of color, shapes, land, and sky, a visual message appears to tell us a story of beauty and peace. A natural setting to contemplate, be at rest, and consider what is just beyond the horizon before us.
Create in me a clean heart, O God,
and renew a right spirit within me.
Cast me not away from your presence,
and take not your Holy Spirit from me.
Restore to me the joy of your salvation,
and uphold me with a willing spirit.
Ps. 51:10-12
Seasonal rivers can flow at varying levels of force, pressure, or strength. Depending on where the river runs, it can rage or flow calm and gentle. SO as an example and time spent to see and learn more about the behavior and characteristics of wilderness features. The presence of temperate and life-supporting characteristics more natural yet unique.
A peaceful meadow in Yosemite. Finding solitude is in itself a viable goal if you’re willing to head out to a more remote spot. And it really doesn’t take much effort or time when you’re intent on getting off the beaten path. Knowing the risk and what it will involve getting back to where you were. The effort, strain, and cost to get that temporary peace. It takes a clear goal, intentional effort, and sometimes a persistence that doesn’t always come naturally.
There are times when out and about the trail just vanishes. Or at best becomes sketchy. The Windy Cliffs upside the mountain in Kings Canyon is just such a place. The trail comes and goes while cut horizontally along a cliff with a slope greater than the angle of repose. Meaning, enough rock slides happen on their own weight where a trail gets knocked out or covered. And that’s especially disconcerting when a trail is at best 12″ or so wide while making your way along the slope along a cliff. When you pull and hang onto vegetation roots along a path to keep going when you know you shouldn’t.
Another long walk back. From a high desert summit plateau just West of the Mojave. Places like this help me with perspective about individual significance and value. It’s sort of like looking up at the stars in wonder. As if our comparative individual size and stature have full bearing on our relevance or rarity. Other than size, what “weight” or significance does a person have among far-off places like this? Since we are self-aware sentient beings with the enormous significance of a different type. Are we not valuable and meaningful in the grand scheme of things?
A ‘sub-atomic’ speck in the universe from one perspective and individual singularities from another.
While out exploring Sequoia forests, you’re going to come upon meadows here and there. And sometimes among those meadows are Sequoias that have fallen and lay in open view while in decay. With all of the upright and living trees around them, they are a reminder about the cycle of life. While their centuries of longevity may suggest a life of immortality, eventually they topple under their own weight. Due to natural forces and their shallow root system.
The Kings River runs along the bottom of Kings Canyon. Much of it alongside a two-lane paved road down to the bottom-most part of the canyon at Cedar Grove. With so many places to find a place to park and explore. Or to just find a road to turn off and set out in a different direction. Even better, on foot with a full heart and camera in hand.
Dana Meadows in full view from the Gaylor Lakes Trail. Yosemite high country about a mile above Tioga Pass. With mild overcast weather yet without any wind, but a pleasant view in the distance.
A route far less traveled. A path much less followed. Along the ridge from one summit to another. Much of its technical terrain with loose boulders, shifting rocks, and large vertical slabs. The topology is with steep relief and contours well above the tree line. Not many living creatures up there at about the 13,000 feet range.
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