Travel and photography blog by Geoff Panek
I attempted to camp at Gold Lakes last week however, the terrain was a bit rough for my old RV, so I ended up back at my favorite campground, Jackson Meadows Reservoir. Lousy fishing again due to the warm water but had a nice time with the dogs swimming and kayaking. We had some thunderstorms over the Sierra so the cloud formations at sunset were pretty amazing. Here are some shots.
This was a delightful trip back to Jackson Meadows Reservoir located around the 7,000 foot level in the Sierra Nevada Mtns, Tahoe National Forest. Weather was cool at night and warm enough during the days for great swimming. Kate and I took the tandem inflateable kayak (SeaEagle) and paddled around the lake with Biggs inside and Ben swimming along next to us. Fishing was lousy. I tried salmon eggs and power bait. Even tried my kastmaster lure and then lost it to a snag on the second cast. We tried the strange method of keeping flies away with pennies in a ziplock bag filled with water and I do believe it worked. We had site #34 which I believe is the best site in East Meadows campground. It’s at the far end with a nice forest trail on one side and a straight shot to the lake on the other. And an awesome view. Water line was broke so no running water and therefore flush toilet bathrooms shut down for the first day. Once fixed all was well again.
Passe Creek was still running, with small waterfalls but way down from when I was here two weeks ago. We hiked north, this time, on the Pacific Crest Trail and it was just a beautiful hike. I prefer it to the southern direction hike on the PCT.
My first visit to Jackson Meadows this year. One of my favorite lakes for camping. Fishing is normally awesome but wouldn’t ya know, this year I actually have a fishing license and it pretty much sucked. Not even a nibble. We were (are) having a heat spell so the water had warmed up to around 70 degrees which I heard caused the fish to be lazy. Also heard it was because the mosquitoes were plentiful so the fish were full. I tried fishing both from shore and from a kayak. Natha.
Kate couldn’t come along but I did meet up with my friends Mike and Vicki who camped right next to me in site #23, I was in #20. A short path to the water. Even tho we had a really dry winter the lake was quite high, probably only down about 10 feet. The warm winter also resulted in bears visiting the campground. Apparently the night before I got there, the campground was woken at 1am by a woman screaming. She had gone to the bathroom and found a bear in there. What a shock that would be. I hope she held her water.
We hiked up Passe Creek which was still running nicely. Lots of little waterfalls and the water was so amazingly clear. Wild flowers were out, as they usually are at this time of year in the Sierra. Lupines along the highway getting there, were gorgeous.
Swimming in the lake with Ben was a great cool down and fun. He would spend the entire time in the water if he could. While we were there, they were experiencing 107 in the Sacramento valley. I think it was 100 at least at our home in the foothills, in Colfax.
Click the first thumb to start reviewing them at large size.
In June, after the French Meadow campout, Kate and I did Sugar Pine Lake, Giant Gap campground for a weekend of camping. This is only about 1.25 hour from our house and at the 4,000 foot level. The lake was full with great swimming but crappy fishing. Just got a couple bites when I tried fishing from our inflatable kayak. Ben got a lot of swimming in as he would swim along while we paddled around the lake. Biggs enjoyed the ride. Click the first pic to nicely go thru them at big size.
After the storm, the ocean waves were awesome! I took a ton of pictures of them and they can be found on my picasso albums. https://picasaweb.google.com/106198852688550183940/WrightsBeach?authuser=0&feat=directlink
