In the summer Megan and I had a week of phenomenal hiking at Rock Creek in the eastern Sierra. Here we have more than a week of winter hiking mostly near Palm Springs. Amazingly given all the hiking I’ve done around Palm Springs all but two of these routes were new to me.
I’ll start with a map though not everything’s on it. This is the area south of the center of Palm Springs including Murray Hill and what’s commonly called the “Indian Canyons”.
From the map I’ll start with the red line — Murray Hill, the most popular of any in this post. I did it one afternoon and liked it so much that I came back one morning with Ferda, Zoë, and Boreth and took them on the same walk in the opposite direction.
Megan took Seda, Bektaş, and me on a fantastic tour in downtown LA, mostly to places I had never been before. Unfortunately I don’t have any photos ’cause I still hadn’t repaired my phone and Ferda didn’t join us (I often poach her photos).
From Pershing Square we went to the Biltmore Hotel with its ornate entrance and fountain. Check out the griffons with fake boobs on the banisters. Almost next door is the Perla hotel which has an atrium with Moroccan arches. Downstairs the toilets are in the old bank vault. Both hotels have notable ceilings. The Apple Store in the theater district is in a restored old theater — beautiful ceilings, old iron work, some Ottoman/Islamic-like drinking fountains. Fantastic. My favorite was the Bradbury building with ironwork reminding me of Eiffel (in Orizaba and Paris) and National Museum of Scotland in Edinburgh. The Bradbury building predates all of those, built in the last decade of the 19th century.
Other stops on the tour felt more like the typical tourist itinerary, maybe ’cause Megan had taken me before — Grand Central Market, Angel’s Flight, LA Public Library (check out the rotunda and the murals in the children’s section), Walt Disney Concert Hall.
Oh wait, I do have a photo taken at the Walt Disney Concert Hall in the Blue Ribbon Garden (from a visit with my Dad to an actual concert!). This piece by Frank Gehry, called A Rose for Lilly, is made with broken pieces of Delftware. It’s a tribute to Walt Disney’s wife, Lillian Disney, who loved both roses and Royal Delft Porcelain — though 200 vases were shattered to make the rose and fountain!
Before Bektaş, Seda, and the kids flew back to Turkey, they spent a few days in southern California. They had a couple touristy days in Los Angeles. One fun thing that we did in Orange County was go to Mercado Gonzales in Costa Mesa. Megan recommended it. I had never been before. It’s sort of like a Mexican market.
We can buy the fruit of the nopal plant in Turkey but never the leaves.
Well, this bicycle tour wasn’t a total bust. Being the first ride on a new touring setup, I knew it’d be a bit of a shakedown, but, dang, there was a lot more shaking than I expected. I learned a few things, but it was at times painful — both physically and financially. Six days in a row of rain did not help my mood.
14 years ago Sage showed up in Erzurum with a Bike Friday in a suitcase and did phenomenally well on that folding bicycle riding up and down steep dirt roads.
Rock Creek Lake is in NW Inyo County, WNW of Bishop, at about 2970m (9750ft). There are both cabins and campgrounds nearby. What a fantastic place to stay for a little High Sierra hiking. Megan and I spent seven nights at one of the cabins. She had been here before. It was my first time.
The drive from SoCal took about eight hours with our longest stop at the Eastern California Museum in Independence where we learned about Norman Clyde and saw a set of homemade dentures made from coyote teeth. They also have a good collection of Native American baskets. There’s no store up at Rock Creek so we bought a week’s worth of groceries in Bishop.
The rest of this post is really just photos of High Sierra lakes in August. Here’s Megan walking by Rock Creek Lake at the start of our first hike to Tamarack and Buck lakes on the other side of the ridge.
