California's US Highway 395: Kramer Junction to Lee Vining

When I left Joshua Tree National Park headed for Yosemite National Park, I was still undecided as to the route to take. From Joshua Tree you can just as easily travel up the east or west side of the Sierra Nevada range. From the map, it looked like there were a lot of cities up the west side and I'd heard of most of them even though I'd only driven up Interstate 5 and the 101 when travelling through California. I was a bit nervous about the availability of gasoline on the east side of the Sierras - I'm sure that it's available but what if I'm driving at night and the stations are closed?

On the other hand, it was Sunday morning, 9/4/2016, and I didn't have a reservation at Yosemite until Monday night. I had time to kill or fill. I opted for the east side route, looking for some adventure and to see places I'd never seen at all. Note that I didn't take many photos along this bit of the trip.

Near Barstow, California

My 2007 Ford Explorer at Jumbo Rocks campground,
Joshua Tree National Park

From the city of Joshua Tree I headed west on California State Highway 62 to Yucca Valley, north on Highway 247 to Barstow, north on Highway 58 to Kramer Junction where I got on the US Highway 395 which would take me to Lee Vining and my opportunity to enter Yosemite National Park from the East Entrance.

The roads from Joshua Tree to basically the Ridgecrest area, a distance of about 160 miles, is through the Mojave Desert and it looks like desert. I should know after living in Arizona for 15 years.

The trip was pretty uneventful. Most of the roads were two lanes but in good condition. There was very little traffic, perhaps due to it being Sunday morning on a three day holiday weekend (Labor Day). I spent some time in Barstow getting fuel, bags of ice for my cooler, a couple of gallons of drinking water, and coffee at a convenience store. It was a very pleasant drive, perhaps more so because I was on vacation for the first time this year, feeling physically good compared to the health problems I'd had most of the year. Woo hoo!

Desert driving is often somewhat nerve wracking but my wife had taken care of me by getting an oil change and checkup up at our Ford dealer. They'd even found a screw in a tire which my wife also took care of. I was pretty confident in my trusty Explorer (much more so than the Corvettes I've owned in the past).

Heading west out of Barstow I passed through Hinkley. The name didn't strike a bell at all until I saw a sign that said something to the effect of "Thank You PGE" and it dawned on me that Hinkley was where Erin Brockovich took on PGE.

When I got to the Ridgecrest, CA area, I continued up Highway 395 but stopped near the Inyokern junction. There were some hills there that stretched to the north. It is the southern end of the Sierra Nevada mountain range. I had to take some photographs of them regardless of their more desert like appearance. After reading and dreaming about visiting the Sierras for over a year I was finally seeing part of the range and had to document it somehow.

Google Map of part of US Highway 395

Continuing north on Highway 395 the desert starts giving way to more grasslands as well as more people. Once you start hitting the towns, starting with probably Olancha, there is no issue finding gasoline, food, or water. In fact, there was more build up than I expected, and mostly pleasant looking small cities or towns that I would love to live in if I could find work. I ended up stopping in a number of them whether I needed to or not. I liked Lone Pine and Big Pine probably the best.

Lone Pine was very pleasant and is about due east of Mt. Whitney which you can see from the city. I wasn't sure which mountain it was - I wish I'd found some sort of informational booth but I didn't. What I do know is that I've had my eyes on it. You can access Mt. Whitney from Lone Pine. Lone Pine (and other locations along Highway 395) have been used for the sites of many movies and there is the Lone Pine Film History Museum which I'd also like to visit. I plan to go back there - from my home it's about 500 miles or 7-1/2 hours of drive time, a bit more than the time to get to the North Rim of the Grand Canyon.

If you don't know, Mt. Whitney is the tallest mountain in the contiguous United States at 14,505 feet high. Lone Pine is at an elevation of 3,727 feet, over 10,000 feet lower. When you're looking up at Mt. Whitney and the surrounding range it's hard to imagine that they are towering over you by that distance. I think it must have to do with the flat land that you drive through to get there.

At Mesa Camp you start climbing in elevation (Mesa Camp is about 5,000 feet) and you start seeing more pine trees. You'll continue through Tom's Place to get to the built up area around Mammoth Lakes, a large ski resort. June Lakes is after that, another decent sized ski resort. By this time I was seeing signs for Mono Lake and Lee Vining.

Lee Vining is the town near the junction of Highway 395 and California Highway 120. Highway 120 heads west from the southern end of Lee Vining into and across Yosemite National Park and was my destination. However, I didn't have a reservation in the park until the following night so I was looking for a place to camp out near Lee Vining. 

I pulled off of north bound Highway 395 into a view point that overlooks Mono Lake, just before it intersects with West Portal Road, 16.5 miles south of Lee Vining. That's where I met Gene.

I drove around the drive, passing a Ford Ranger, and continued to the lower RV parking area. I got out and walked to the edge of the pavement to get my first view of Mono Lake.

Mono Lake is a very large and natural, salty lake located near the California - Nevada border about mid-height in California. It's near Lee Vining (very near) and therefore the eastern border of Yosemite National Park. I had started hearing about it while reading about Yosemite and had decided I wanted to visit it too.

I started to get out my Nikon D610 to take some photographs when the driver of the Ranger approached me. We started talking and I ended up putting the camera down and drove up near where he was parked. I took some photographs while we continued to BS. He was very interesting - he is a year younger than me and has been a mountaineer since the early 1970s. He's been to the top of most of the peaks in the Sierras as well as hiking on some other mountains around the world including Mt. Everest. 

He pointed out the mountains we could see as well as features we couldn't see (for example Grant Lake which is hidden from the view point by a moraine). He explained how the Los Angeles water district owned a lot of the property along Highway 395 and wasn't permitting growth which helped keep the towns in pretty much the same condition he'd seen them since the 1970's. He pointed out that Mono Lake was used as the location for High Plains Drifter with Clint Eastwood. He was a fountain of knowledge near the fountains of John Muir. I really enjoyed meeting him!

He was headed in to Yosemite the following day as well, to stay at Porcupine Flat Campground. We ended up staying up until after the sun went down where I took some night photographs (at this time I'm still processing my milky way shot but it's not turning out very good). We both slept in our vehicles that night, and I got up a bit before him at about 5:30 AM to take some sunrise shots.

I was hoping to get the sun coming up on the eastern edge of the Sierras and/or on Mono Lake. The Mono Lake photos were better (I'll post them when I get them processed). The Sierras just weren't that interesting to me photographically without any significant snow cover. Perhaps because at that location they did not have many pine trees and appeared too similar to some of the Arizona mountains.

When Gene got up he made me coffee! What a great guy! We chatted a bit more then went on our ways. I stopped on the way in to Lee Vining to shoot some more of the eastern Sierra Nevada mountains so lost him and never did see him again. 

I made it in to Lee Vining, got fuel at the Shell station, and went to the Mono Lake Visitor Center but they were closed (it was probably about 6:00 AM). I walked around the property and read all of the information posts. I saw a rabbit in the parking lot. There were surprisingly quite a few vehicles there - I guessed that some had camped in the lot.

Heading west on Highway 120 from Lee Vining

I got a breakfast burrito, coffee, ice, and finally found the California Road and Recreation Atlas at the Mono Market. I'd been looking for that atlas since getting in to California and hadn't found it. I have and use and have started to wear out my Arizona edition. I REALLY like these atlases and REALLY wanted the California version. The detail is much better than any other atlas I've used (and I'm still old school and use and like paper atlases / maps). Gene told me this store had them. The people (I'm assuming the owners) were very friendly and made a great burrito and coffee.

I went back to my Explorer, parked behind a car with Oregon plates, ate my burrito and drank my coffee outside of the laundromat while looking at my atlas. When I finished I headed south out of Lee Vining to make my right turn on to Highway 120, the Tioga Highway, and in to Yosemite National Park!