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| Mojave
Expedition (11-12-05)
photo gallery--Click the
photo to go to the gallery |
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Burro
Schmidt's
Tunnel
Update |
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Burro
Schmidt's "Famous Tunnel" now has a group of
"friends" trying to preserve and protect the
site. Click
the photo to visit their Website. |
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Click on
the photo below to read more about Cerro Gordo.
Cerro
Gordo now has its own Web site. Click the link below to visit. 
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The
Panamint Breeze
is a new publication highlighting the history and legends
California and Nevada.
Click
on the logo for
details. |
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The
"Land of Volcanoes"
Photography
by Marty Cole and Roger Vargo |
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Our
June journey returned us to the Eastern Sierra where we explored the
volcanic tableland and mountains from Bishop to Mammoth and Mono Lake.
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An
early morning sun blazes over the 760,000 year old volcanic
tableland north of Bishop.
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| A
brightly colored insect contrasts with the volcanic soil. |
A
sign reminds modern travelers that they were not the first to
visit this area. |
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| Legend
says that "Water Baby" left footprints of man and
animals. |
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| Terri
Geissinger (aka "Bodie Terri") sheds her State Park
Service uniform in favor of casual clothes to welcome guests to
the fourth annual Friends of the Sagebrush tour presented by the
Mono Basin Historical Society. |
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A
mule team hauls a log along a dusty trail at Mono Mills.
Wood to fuel
the steam engine and construction needs of Bodie was cut at Mono
Mills and transported more than 30 miles to Bodie on the Bodie
Railroad between 1881 and 1917. |
| Visitors
look at part of the long buried turn table used to rotate
the direction of Bodie Railroad rolling stock. The turn table
was rotated by muscle power. |
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Marty
and Cecile (top) work together to saw a log while (bottom)
champion logger Mark Eichberry works with Carmen to get the job
done. |
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| The
last surviving rolling stock of the Bodie Railroad, restored by
volunteers, is on display at the June Lake marina. The flat car
hauled logs and sometimes people from Mono Mills to Bodie in the
nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. |
| Anna
Weber leads the way from South Tufa to Navy Beach along the
shore of Mono Lake. |
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| Marty
dons a flotation vest before venturing into the brackish waters
of Mono Lake on a canoe tour led by the Mono Lake
Committee. |
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| Mono
Lake is one of the oldest lakes in North America at over 700,000
years. Ten millennia ago it was fed fresh waters from melting
Sierran glaciers and was hundreds of feet deep. Today, it is
still fed by Sierran run off but its' waters are brackish. The
lakes signature geologic structures, towering formations of
calcium carbonate called "tufa", formed underwater
around fresh water springs. |
| A
canoe full of visitors glides past a California Gull. Most of
California's gull population was born at Mono Lake. |
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| The
lake's raising water level is submerging some tufa towers
(right).
Carmen
(below) samples one of Mono Lake's indigenous life forms,
a brine fly larva. The larva were harvested by Native
Americans and used for food. |
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| Steve
and Anita Spangler cruise Mono Lake with Cecile and Roger in a
Mono Lake Committee canoe. |
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| Andrjez
(left) and Marty pause to make photograph on the way to Laurel
Lakes. |
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| Wildflowers
bloom in the cool air above 8500-feet near Laurel Lakes. |
| Snow
above 9000-feet blocks final access to Laurel Lakes in late
June, 2006. |
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Marty's
new BFG TA/AT tires survive a run along the Obsidian Trail. |
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| Carbon
dioxide gas seeping from magmatic chambers below ground is
responsible for a tree kill at Horseshoe Lake above Mammoth. |
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Contact
the Mono Lake Committee for information about their summer canoe
tours of Mono Lake.
Click
on the link at left or at:
P.O. Box 29
Lee Vining, CA 93541
(760) 647-6595 |
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