Papoose Flats July 2008

In July 2008 we went with a group from SCLR (Souther California Land Rovers) to Papoose Flats, which is in the mountains above Independence at about eight thousand feet. You drive up and over the mountain, and there are the flats. A really amazing place with miles of open land, amazing rock formations and trails to explore.

A video of the first day's drive highlights.

We also got a chance to practice more "primative camping" on this trip. No campsite, just find a spot and setup camp. Carefully of course.

We also took a drive through an area known as "The Narrows"... one place you don't want to be in a "wide" Range Rover, is a place called "The Narrows"...

Here's a video of highlights of that drive.



got a few scratches that day. Found an old shack near an old mine.


Sure it was a fixer upper, but we wanted to make an offer.... too bad someone beat us to it!


Ok.. dumb joke and a lousy Photoshop job, but I thought it would be funny.

After camping one night, it was time to make the drive out through Badger Pass. A lot of long roads with great scenery.

Video of the drive out.


Oh, did I mention the road is just a little bit dusty heading out?

For lunch we stopped at the top of the mountain (9500ft) and enjoyed the view. You can see the flats where we came from in the distance.


Here we all are after lunch.

We figured it was silly to take all that camping gear and only camp one night, so after leaving the others, we went to Gray's Meadows just West of Independence. We found a great spot next to a stream, perfect for camping on a hot summer day.

We setup camp and relaxed.

We left the next morning and explored Alabama hills, a strange area of rock formations and where a lot of the old Western movies were shot.

Ok, I'm not saying graffitti is good, but this was kind of funny...



Then on to Mt Whitney. A very tall mountain, a great mountain drive and a fun place to camp someday in the future.



Not really sure which peak is Mt Whitney. I assume it is the really tall one in the back.


On the way back down the 395 toward LA, we saw a sign for "Fossil Falls", this is a very strange place, like being on the moon after a forest fire. A nearby volcano (you can see the cone on the side of the highway) covered the area with lava a long time ago, I don't recall when, but I didn't read about it in the paper, so it must have been pretty long ago :) Anyway. Years and years of being carved by the river and waterfall which are also long gone have left a very alien landscape of lava carved by swirling water, cutting channels and tubes with drops down 100 feet or more to the canyon below. The pictures just can't capture the sheer drop off or scale of what you are looking at. Trust me you do not want to go near the edge.