After a good night's sleep, a good breakfast, and some shopping, we headed north on 395 again.

 

 

 

 

We are about 10 miles from Bishop, just starting to drive up the long hill known as Sherwin's Grade. We plan to get off at a place known as Tom's Place, where we will head up the Rock Creek road. This mountain is called Mt Tom.

 

 

Here the Rock Creek tumbles down towards the distant Los Angeles Aqueduct, destined to quench the thirst of the distant city.

 

 

Here we leave the parking lot and head up towards the "Little Lakes Valley", where we have spent many delightful days.

 

 

Here is our first view of the valley, which is about 10,000 feet, and surrounded by majestic peaks, still harboring some of the winter snows.

 

 

It is a beautiful sunny day, and no mosquitoes!!

 

 

You can see part of one of the lakes to the left.

 

 

We stopped for a nice lunch, enhanced with this appropreately named beer --"Sierra Nevada". It was delicious.

 

 

Here is another lake.

 

 

She shared my bottle.

 

 

Marie took the camera and proceded to capture some of the nice wildflowers.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

There, didn't she do a lovely job. Sorry that we cannot name them for you,  but they are just as pretty without names.

 

 

A last look back to the valley.

 

 

And one last flower as we say goodbye to Little Lakes Valley. We then drove to Mammoth Lakes where our nest Motel reservation was.. We had an excellent dinner, and a good night's sleep. On Tuesday morning we continued our drive north on 395, headding eventually to Rob's condo at Kirkwood.

 

 

 

 

We werer enjoying a beautiful drive, but getting hungry for lunch, when Marie spotted this historic Inn in the town of Bridgeport.

 

 

Here you can learn about some of it's history.

 

 

We had a delicious lunch, and did a brief walk around the building. Here is an example of the fascinating furnishings.

 

 

 

We continued driving north through more spectacular countryside, eventrually turning west on route 89, and then later turnign west onto the very senic rout 88, which took us to Kirkwood. Here is the view from route 88 looking up the Kirkwood meadow, which has mountains on the East, South and West sides. The meadow is about 8500 foot elevation, and the taller peak that you see at the south end is about 11,000feet. The ski lifts are at the South and Sourhtwest part of the valley.

 

 

After a great night's sleep, we started a walk up the ski slopes, heading for an area known as the "Upper Corral".

 

 

And, of course, we see beautiful flowers everywhere.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

We are walking up a service road that goes to the top of several of the chairlifts. The trees are superb!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Here are the beautiful flower laden meadows at the Upper Corral. This area is covered with many feet of snow in the winter, and skiers glide down through a different kind of natural beauty.

 

 

Lots of blue Lupine.

 

 

Heading back down the hill, you can see one of the ski lifts, and condos across the street. Rob has a condo in the building on the left with the green roof.

 

Continued on Part 3