Sierra National Forest - Blackcap Basin - July 17 - 24, 2020

Trip Logistics

• July 17-24, 2020
• Sierra National Forest - Blackcap Basin - Red Mountain Basin and Bench Valley
• Total Mileage - 30ish - Lots of cross country on this trip

Photos

Originally Planned Route - This wasn't the exactly route as originally planned but a version.  There were some deviations that ended up occurring on the trip.

In the April timeframe it was becoming clear that there would likely be no organized Sierra Club outings for the summer and I started to plan for an alternative private trip.  I wanted to explore an area I might lead a Sierra Club trip at some point and also somewhere that was likely not to be too crowded.  I had read of Blackcap Basin just a few years earlier….maybe because it’s on the west side of the Sierra I didn’t know anything about it but reading a friend’s trip report and looking at the topo map it looked great.  The plan was to do an 8 day trip given the length of time to get in and out of the basins and 8 days is about all I can carry in a canister and that usually includes some Ursak overflow.  The key objectives of this trip were to visit Red Mountain Basin, Bench Valley and Blackcap Basin going over 2-ish cross country passes - Lucifer 1 and 2 and Blackcap Pass.   Of course I also just wanted to get into the backcountry and hang with my backpacking girlfriends.  We planned this trip for the end of July and by coincidence during a time when the Neowise comet would be visible in the night sky.  Unlike prior trips we decided to bring all of our own gear to be as covid safe as possible unfortunately that also added some incremental weight. 

Day 1 included a long drive from the Bay Area, a permit pickup in the town of Prather and a drive across the dam at Courtright Reservoir.  The dam is quite impressive and there were a lot of car campers in the area.  The trailhead was not far after crossing the dam….it was quite overcast and looked like rain would be coming so we loaded up and hit the trail. The trail in is quite pleasant and forested.  It was good it was raining a little to keep the dust down.  The worst part of this trail is the trail into these basins….it’s been really beaten down over the years and at times it feels like a sand slog.   Our plan was to get to the junction of the Blackcap trail and Red Mountain basin about 7 miles in.  Given the time of day we stopped just short of the junction with good creek access. While we were in a very tree covered area we were able  to get our first glimpse of Neowise when we went down to the creek.  A great first day of the hike.

Disappointment Lake

Day 2 the sun was out and our legs were ready to do some uphill 

hiking.  The trail into Red Mountain Basin is a bit of slog and I’d highly recommend doing this in the morning while it’s still cool since some areas are very exposed to the sun.  Soon enough we reached Fleming Lake which was very lovely and took some time to relax our toes and refill our water.  This was a beautiful spot and had some camp spots to the east of the lake.  From here to our camp the hike is great and very High Sierra scenic.  Our original plan had been to go to Devils Punchbowl based on a friend’s recommendation.  We decided instead to stay at Disappointment Lake because we wanted to day hike the Hell for Sure pass are and figured this would be a better location and we could move to Devil’s Punchbowl the next ay if we wanted.  The purpose of staying at Devil’s Punchbowl is to be closer to the Lucifer pass.  We had Disappointment Lake to ourselves and it was really really nice.  We setup camp, lounged around for a bit and finally ate dinner and watched the stars come out.

Hell for Sure Lake

Day 3 was a layover day so we could spend some time in Red Mountain Basin.  I really wanted to go up to Hell for Sure Pass in my ongoing effort to “connect the Sierra dots” and look across to the east and to also potentially climb Red Mountain.  The hike up the pass was great and we were getting some nice puffy clouds also indicating we might see some rain later in the day.  Hell fo Sure Lake was beautiful. I’d say the camping at least for a large group was sparse and I suspect quite cold at night.  The views from the pass were outstanding and we could see Mt. Humphrey in the distance.  We were all quite excited about that since we had done a nice semi-loop trip the year before in the Humphrey Basin area. Given the time and the likelihood of rain we did not climb Red Mountain and instead headed back down to Hell for Sure Lake and have lunch. After lunch we decided to not take the trail back to Disappointment Lake and instead did a cross country route and go by Horseshoe Lake and back down to Disappointment Lake.  The route was beautiful and we got back just in time for some rain to start falling.  We also made the call to pack up camp and head over to Devils Punchbowl so we could be better positioned for the following day’s hike.  Of course it stopped raining right after we setup our new camp.  After dinner we hiked out to a vista and had amazing views of comet Neowise a great way to the end day. 

Day 4 was our first off trail pass day….woohoo…well maybe woohoo.  One thing about this area is that is has really great names…..and today we would leave Devils Punchbowl and climb over Lucifer Pass 1 and 2.  Lucifer Pass 1 is rated class 2 and my friend Tom gave me great intelligence about the pass and said it was fine except if there was snow in the final chute to the pass…oh yippee….thankfully it was a low snow year so I wasn’t too worried but it was still July.  The way up is not too tricky…we basically hiked on the northeast side of Little and Big Shot Lakes and then start walking up the basin keeping easterly.  The beginning of the pass included some flat slabs before coming into a very flat area about 600 feet before the pass where we took a nice long break.  Once we got beyond this point there was a lot of “hunting and pecking” as I like to call it …basically going left going right and course correcting.  At some point we did we get ourselves to far left/NE and cliffed out and had to adjust to a more southernly route.  One of the things to look for is a flat shelf at about 10,750 feet once you get to that point the route up is fairly straightforward…at least in a low snow year or late in the season.  Lorraine and I did see snow in the chute as we went to investigate but just to the right of the snow was a clear path to the pass.  Definitely would be a bit tricky with snow as the left was nice big boulders that would likely need to be traversed to get up.  When you get to the top it’s a nice flat saddle with great views looking back to Red Mountain basin.  

Lucifer 1 pass - west side

The pass and the way down….the long way down.  Note to self….don’t get fixated on preconceived ideas.  I had a very strong pre-visualization about what the way across the saddle should look like vs. looking at the topo map.  Needless to say I headed the wrong direction and lucky us it was also very very dark and stormy looking when we got to the pass.  We had probably gone about half a mile to the southwest when I figured out we were going the wrong way and should have headed a bit southeast and uphill when we got the pass.   We saw lightning in the distance and could hear thunder it also gotten quite windy and cold.  We made the call that we should hunker down for a bit and let the storm pass vs. sticking out the top of a pass….so we huddled for a couple of hours under some very sparse trees. The whole scene was quite funny which you get a sense of when you see the pictures. We never did get much rain or lightning above us and we decide to move on and downhill…the right way.  Of course once we started heading downhill the sun…the hot sun came out and we had to shed our multiple layers…beanies and gloves.  At the point it was quite clear we would not get to far in Bench Valley….definitely not as far as Horseshoe or Guest Lake and we headed towards Crabtree Lake.  We setup camp at Crabtree Lake and had it to ourselves and although it was the end of the day there was a bit of water dipping/cleaning before dinner.  We also had another great night of viewing Neowise.

Six Shooter Lake

Day 5 was a route decision day.  It was clear to me that we were not making great time to get out to Blackcap Basin…we could get there but we’d be there for a day and then have to head back out.  We made the group decision to spend 3 days in Bench Valley with a plan to get to the top of Blackcap Pass so we could peek into Blackcap Basin before heading out to our trailhead.  With that decision made we decided to do a day outing up to the lakes above Crabtree Lake.  This was an excellent hike and very beautiful..I would highly recommend it.  We went to the furthest unnamed lake in the basin at 11,400 feet. There was some talk about scrambling up the ridge above the lake which seemed quite doable…this   is know as Gunsight Pass - a class 2 pass.  Anyways we were lazy and were already debating if we should move camp that evening so we decided to hike down.  Once we were back at camp we did make the decision to move sites and head over to Horsehead or Roman Four Lakes to camp and then we’d day hike up to Blackcap Pass the next day.  We headed down the drainage between Twin Bucks and Roman Four…it was a little bush wacky and slippery but fine overall.  Roman Four was basically a meadow with no good camping so we headed to Horsehead.  We eventually found a campsite on the northwest side of the lake…little patches of sand basically.  The campsites were on the other side of the lake and if I had big group I would camp on that side of the lake.  Since it was a very wide open meadow like lake it got very cold very fast that night and frost was on everything and as a result everyone was in bed pretty early.  

Looking east towards Blackcap Pass

Day 6 would be another adventurous day as we looked to navigate to the top of Blackcap Pass.   There is a trail from Horsehead Lake to Guest Lake and we moved quickly to Guest Lake and navigated around the northeast side to the lake following the obvious drainage to the pass….we kept left for the most part and just continued to head where we believed the low spot to be.  I expected to see a series of “steps” in the chute leading up the pass….those were much more obvious once we were at the top of the pass looking back down.  The views from the top of the pass were amazing and it was clearly an easy walk down into Blackcap Basin.  My favorite feature from the top of the pass was Mount Reinstein a magnificent looking mountain.  The basin looked fabulous but it would just have to be saved for another trip and that’s okay it’s always good to save something for another day.  We headed back down the way we came and looking at my route track we followed the way back down almost exactly the same as how had came up so that made me feel good that we had a good route on the way up.   We got back to camp with plenty of time to lounge around and enjoy our last evening in this wonderful basin.

Day 7 was the beginning of the hike back out and I can’t say I was too excited about this part of the trip.  The trail out was rough to the say the least.  On the map it says “pack animals not recommended”…I could see why.  I have no strong desire to go in or out of this trail again…it was dusty, steep and burnt out in some areas. We ran into some people at the junction of this trail and the Blackcap trail….one of them had been up it before so he knew what they were going to be soon enjoying.  Our goal was to get back to the junction of Red Mountain Basin so we could have a short-ish hiking day our last day.  This stretch of trail was nice and we followed it along the North Fork of the Kings River. The trail was relatively flat which was nice.  I’d say it was an easy hike but the sand trail made it a bit more exhausting and it was also very dusty. I had a dental issue occur….which momentarily which I thought would be urgent and then it became clear it would not be but was perplexing and highly annoying but we hiked on.  We camped in an open spot at the junction with Red Mountain Basin and spent one more evening enjoying each others company and the star show.

Day 8 was a fast hike out.  Surprisingly we ran into a number of people hiking in most of whom were going into Red Mountain Basin.  I think we were lucky, we only saw people 2 of our 8 days in the backcountry. While I was ready to get some fresh clothes and a shower as usual I was a bit sad coming out of the mountains.  I was really glad we did this route it is an amazing area and I would really like to come back some day.  I’m not sure I would lead a trip in here with a big group it’s a very long hike in and out and I don’t think many would enjoy that but who knows.  If I don’t go back with a big group I hopefully will return at some point.

All in all a great memorable and adventurous trip and Nora, Lorraine and I all had a great time.