Placer County Big Trees Grove

On July 13, 2023, I wrote that the night before I spent a few hours writing for the night at my Wabena Creek campsite. I went to sleep at 10:30. My pen died and that was upsetting. However, I resolved to ask passersby.

As I hadn’t gone camping by myself in a long time, I ended up combing through my thoughts and memories for quite some time. One memory of my mother really stuck with me that night. My mother and I had planted a sequoia in the yard of her vacation home and it had died recently – after my mother had passed away. It struck me as important so I made a mental note and searched for a picture of her to keep nearby as a reminder of that moment.

I had a hard time getting comfortable as I was going to sleep that night because everything was spooky but by the time I got into my bag I was pretty tired and was asleep by 10:45.

I woke up at midnight and three but mostly got a full night’s sleep. I got up at around 8:30 and noted that the pattern to my packing is to kind of do everything at once. I also noted that I can’t put anything on the bike until I’d eaten and gotten water.

When I was packed, I went for a short distance and reviewed my objective for the day – getting to the intersection of Foresthill and Soda Springs roads. I noted that from where I had been camping at Wabena Creek, I would have to do about three climbs with one light descent. Ultimately the climb was about 1000 feet.

I headed out at 10. I was half way by distance at 11:15. However, I made it to the crest of the Foresthill Divide at one. That spot is essentially the end of Soda Springs Road and the beginning of Foresthill Road but there is no signage or anything else of note for that matter. I passed some guys going to see the petroglyphs on an adjacent road. They gave me a mechanical pencil which wasn’t what I wanted but I thanked them since it was good enough.

At that point my spirits were pretty good but then there were quite a few unforeseen climbs between the crest and Sunflower Hill. I was following the ridge above Duncan Creek (which I couldn’t see) so the road climbed and descended a lot. It was only a drop of about 200 feet and all really. After that I quickly descended to Robinson flat. That was a drop of around 300 feet. On the way, I saw a California fire crew and I spoke to some campers who told me that the water at Robinson was OK.

I got water at Robinson and made myself some canned chili. When I had cleaned up and continued, I noted that Foresthill Road is paved heading south. However, my plan was to go to Placer County Big Trees Grove so I took Robinson Flat Road instead. The climb initially was through stressed, fire scarred forest with a climb of 350 to 500 feet.

From there the dirt road descended sharply. It was long too and I had no cell service the whole way. In fact, I was really concerned I was going the right way. The drop was about 1200 feet over about 5 miles. I could see French Meadows Reservoir and the Desolation Wilderness in the distance when I finally got to Mosquito Ridge Road.

I rode down to Big Trees then. The ride was really quick because Mosquito Ridge is paved. Two work crews passed me near Greekstore doing 60 miles an hour probably. The elevation change was less. Probably around 1000 feet.

When I got to Placer County Big Trees Grove, I was able to walk the trail and take pictures of the two most impressive giant sequoias. There was a grove of mature, but smaller trees. I spoke to a guy from the town of Foresthill who had come over via Robinson Flat. I was concerned because it turned out in Mosquito Ridge Road was closed at Circle Bridge due to the fire recovery activities which meant that my route out – on Mosquito Ridge Road – was also closed.

I contemplated going that way anyway and I was really really frustrated about it. I returned to my bike and set up camp. There were mosquitoes everywhere and noted ironically that that was why they called it Mosquito Ridge. The sun had just gone down while I was writing and I was really dreading not having a tent – probably for the first time in my life.

This is an occasional series chronicling my life. This Notebook Analysis series is meant to be contemporaneous piece developed as an agglomeration of my notebook pages. In each of these posts I used my notes to develop my recent thoughts.