Dates: July 17-18, 2010 Duration: 2 days, 1 night Mileage: ~?? miles Group Members: Nick McGuire, Amanda Eberle Pack Weights: Nick (~27 lbs) Contacts: Pacific Ranger District - 7887 Highway 50, Pollock Pines, CA 95726 (530)-644-2349 Notes: Pacific Ranger District office opens at 7AM during the summer. Decided to go ultralight since we were just going for one night and the daytime temperatures were supposed to be in the mid-70s and night time lows in the mid-50s. Took the hammock, one sleeping bag and liner, and one sleeping pad. Route Map Available! Outbound Travel: Left Davis around 6:00AM and headed for the Pacific Ranger station just east of Pollock Pines. Got there about 5 minutes after 7AM and picked up our wilderness permit and parking pass. There was a line of around 4-5 people in front of us and we had to wait a little bit but still had no problem getting a walk-in permit for the Waca Zone. Parking lot had a handfull of cars in it when we got to the Twin Bridges parking lot.
Day 1: Left the Pyramid Creek trailhead around 8:00AM and followed the path along the creek up to the base of the Horsetail falls. Remember to stay low along the creek and go through the forest along the approach rather than getting to high and ending up too far off to the west before getting to the base of the falls. Reached the top just after 9:30AM and proceeded North-North West towards Ropi Lake. Skirted the lake shore between Osma and Toem Lake before heading North along the western shore of Toem Lake and climbing up in elevation to the base of Gefo Lake. Ran into two guys camping along the western shores of Toem lake by the tall rock cliffs people use for jumping into the lake. Continued climbing north towards Pyramid and stopped for lunch along the western shore where the main creek enters at the north-west corner. Lots of mosquitos! Crossed the creek and set up camp in the trees on the northern shore of the creek very near where we had camped last year. Left camp a little after 12PM and head east up towards Pyramid Peak to explore all the waterfalls along the creek. Made it up to around 9000 feet in the bowl below Pyramid peak where there's a small lake which still had ice floating in it. Headed back down to camp around 2PM to hang out by the lake and consider swimming. The water in Pyramid Lake was very cold and the streams were freezing but there was one portion of the lake that was slightly isolated that had much warmer water which we waded in for a bit. Relaxed around camp and set up a bear hang on the opposite side of the creek before making dinner...mosquitos started coming out again though. Decided to retreat inside the mosquito-netted hammock around 8PM even thought it was still not dark yet. Only saw a couple people in the distance while at the campsite and two more people hiking through around dinner time. Weather was nice, slightly breezy. Got a little colder at night but i was comfortable in shorts and a long sleeve thermal ontop of the sleeping pad and with part of the sleeping bag underneath. Amanda got cold because the pad slipped out from under her...definitely need to have something underneath you in the hammock.
Day 2: Woke up around 7:30AM and made breakfast after taking down the bear hang. Cleaned up camp a bit and then decided to pack up since the mosquitos were pretty bad. Left camp around 8:30AM and head back the way we had come in. Didn't run into people till Horsetial falls although there were some peole camped near Gefo Lake. Finally was able to follow the green and yellow spray paint markings the entire way down the rocky slope. The route they chose probably wasn't the best but it is reasonable and leads you to an important final waypoint. The primary landmark to head for is the massive dead tree midway down the slope that towers over everything in the area and is the site of the last spraypaint markings that I've found. At this point you need to choose whether you go right (West) and head down the "tree-ladder" or the rock crevices along side it (which is what we did) or go left down the sketchy steep section of granite closer to the edge of the falls. Saw some people also climb up the middle between the two routes but it was hard to tell how safe it would be to downclimb it. Continued our decent and stopped at one of the big swimming holes along the creek for lucnh around 11:30. Reached the parking lot around 12PM. Not as many people on the trail as last June but still a decent number at this time.
Home-bound Travel: Left the Pyramid Creek (Twin Bridges) parking lot around 12:15 PM. Parking lot was full at this time with lots of cars parked pseudo-illegally around the edges and center of the lot. Stuck behind some slow cars and at the three ridiculous stoplights in Placerville but made it back to Davis around 2:00 PM.
