remaining started up
the steep trail leading up and 5-1/2 miles over to the ruins in Pat Keyes
Canyon. Shortly after leaving the Taylor-McElvoy mill site, while exploring one
of the old mine shafts, we found the location of another of the Bee Keeper's
homes with lots of his bee keeping paraphernalia including bee nets, a smoker
for the bee swarms, jars for honey etc.
We stopped for lunch on the
ridgeline near point 7848 feet on the Pat Keyes Canyon Topo. The spot we chose
was coincidentally a former Paiute Indian camp and we found several arrow
points, lots of obsidian flakes, bed rock morteros, pottery shards and more. We
tried to leave everything in place all through our trip so that others who
follow us can enjoy the artifacts. Then we followed a long stretch of near
level trail at about 8000 ft before nearly loosing a one-half mile stretch of
obscure trail leading past Pat Keyes Spring and down to the ruins at about 7100
ft. The Pat Keyes ruins are marked by a BLM sign at their upper end and include
a large arrastre powered by a one cylinder liquid fuel engine as well as a
smaller traditional animal powered arrastre and the usual cabin sites and other
artifacts. The mechanical powered arrastre is the largest I have ever seen and
heavy chains are still attached to the drag stones. This, our 7th thy with much
lighter packs, we did 2900 feet of gain and about 1100 feet of loss in the
5-1/2 miles. Our high camp was very pleasant and infrequently visited. The area
is rather heavily forested in pines and firs with lots of blue jays and
chickadees. There is plenty of water with a nicely running stream. |
Saturday, May 14th, our
final thy of the 65 mile backpack and more than 16,000 feet of gain and 20,000
feet of elevation loss, started with an easy 1500 foot ascent over point 8688
ft and then a gentle trail over Pat Keyes pass at 9,540 feet. Here we were
again rewarded with terrific views west to the snow covered Sierra Crest. Then
a 4 mile descent through increasingly drier, hotter country, finally with no
vegetation at all. Halfway down there is the remains of an old cabin, an
unreliable spring and a barbed wire stock fence. The trail is shown on the Bee
Springs and Pat Keyes Canyon 7-1/2' topos but the trail from the ridgeline down
to our last night's camp in Pat Keyes Canyon is shown on the 15' Waucoba wash
topo. About 2 miles from the cars Mario Gonzalez called out, "Tell me when you
see the next shade and trees". I looked ahead and responded that they were
about half a mile behind us. Finally we reached a Forest Service signin
register and then our cars. After resting a bit and celebrating the completion
of our Grand Tour of the Inyos, everyone departed one way or another, Robert
Hayes up to Bishop, Ken Olsen to Escondido, Jerry McDonald who served as a
strong dependable assistant back down to Riverside, while Mario took Jim Conley
and me back up to the Cerro Gordo Mine where we had left Jim's car at the
beginning of the week. Incidentally, we found out that the ailing John and
aching Carol got out OK, the day before us.
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| Terry Flood photo of Bill Stevens DPS List
finisher on June 18, 1994. Bill is seen here (back row, 4th from right) with
well wishers on the summit of Waucoba Peak, high point of the Inyos. The event
was planned by Dave Jurasevich (before he left for the Orient) and the climb
was led by Les Hill and Richard Carey. Others joining the celebration were
Les's friend Teresa (her 1st DPS peak!), Dennis Richards, Terry Flood, Rheta
Schoeneman, Vit Martynowicz, Carol Snyder, Mark Bender, Judy Ware, Karen Helms,
Gail Hanna, Mark Adrian and Fred Bright. Congratulations, Bill, on your lofty
accomplishment! Gail Hanna. |
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