Posted on by Katy Chappaz

Seeking stillness in the Sierra

July 2020: plans to return to the Alps this summer crashed and burned, so we pivoted locally and went backpacking in Southern California’s backyard: the Eastern Sierra.

Eric and I aren’t classic trail warriors. We prefer to follow our curiosity up pathless valleys and over unnamed saddles, walking quietly, treading lightly. Optimism is our strongest skill when it comes to finding the way.

We sleep in alpine lake basins, which are carved out valleys full of turquoise waters and meadows; they’re how mountains remember departed glaciers. The surrounding ridge lines are as sharp as our sudden separation from the news and its portrayals of this tragic year. We have nothing to do now but to keep ourselves alive and join the stillness.

A sense of stillness, in pictures

  • Mammoth: a quirky volcanic landscape
  • First camp: Deer Lakes
  • Backcountry breakfast
  • The pass from the Deer Lakes to Duck Lake
  • Alpine paintbrush and little elephant heads
  • Duck Lake from above
  • Eric at Duck Lake
  • Night two: Lake Anne at sunset
  • Dinner preparations at Lake Anne.
  • The crystal clear waters of Lake Anne
  • Map time from the ridge line behind Lake Anne
  • Just us
  • The graveyard lakes
  • Eric at Peter Pande Lake
  • The white, sandy beaches of the Sierra Nevada
  • Reflections in the outflow
  • In paintbrush heaven
  • Paintbrush heaven
  • Breakfast at Lake of the Lone Indian
  • Eric considers a dip
  • Red and White Mountain, real and reflected
  • Contemplating the way through
  • Red and White Lake from the pass
  • Heading toward Grinnell Lake
  • Camp 4: Grinnell Lake
  • Morning at Grinnell Lake
  • Losing elevation
  • Altitude birding in Pioneer Basin
  • Proud of himself
  • Night five in the Pioneer Basin
  • Dawn in the Pioneer Basin
  • Alpine Paintbrush
  • Lupine at sunrise
  • A little car camping in Rock Creek
  • Full Circle: back to Mammoth

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