Valentine Lake
Last Sunday I took a hike to Valentine Lake. I decided late in the day and didn’t get on the trail until 2pm. Just in time, as it turned out because I got back to the car just as it was getting too dark in the forests to see.
I took a hike up this trail in the spring this year, but I was stopped by snow about a mile or so away from the lake. And earlier this summer, the slope you see in the picture below (which was taken from Mammoth looking southeast) was on fire – the closest a major fire has gotten to my house since I’ve lived in town.
On the trail I was also trying out a GPS tracking application on my iPhone. I was using TrailGuru on Sunday, and also have a copy of RunKeeper (which I’ve used on the mountain bike.) In this area, the GPS tracker works ok, but you’ve got to be careful about where you carry it. This trail runs south on the way in, in the direction of most of the satellites. I think the combination of trees and the location in my backpack hid the skies from the iPhone part of the way in. On the way out, however, the tracking was perfect.
And one of the good things about TrailGuru is the ability to send a track to the web site and then onto Google Earth…and here’s the trail view in that program!
The trail is about 9 or so miles round trip and 2,000+ feet in elevation gain – a nice afternoon hike around here. Once up there, the lake is the prototypical alpine lake, surrounded by peaks, rock and forest. Here are two views looking south.
From the rocks above the lake you can turn north and see the eastern part of Mammoth in the distance. It was stunningly clear, so you can also see to the peaks north of Bridgeport, the Bodie Hills, and into parts of Nevada as well. All in all, a great hike.
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