I planned to run directly to Mono Lake for a day of rest and resupply, but there’s one more stop to make first before we take in the lake – Green Creek to Virginia Lakes. Don’t ask me why, but I’ve heard of the Historical site where the old miner’s cabin is way on the other side of the Sierras. While scanning Google Maps this morning for today’s route, I saw reference to it and, well, we had to go there. Mono Lake and Lee Vining will come tomorrow.
Green Creek to Virginia Lakes
High Sierra Trail: Green Creek to Virginia Lakes
The early morning sun breaks over the rugged crest of the High Sierra, casting long shadows across the frost-covered granite and pine needles of Green Creek Basin. Sitting deep in a dark, oiled Wade saddle packed with a canvas bedroll, woolen slicker, and leather saddlebags, a rider feels the rhythmic, sure-footed step of Sierra, a strong-boned golden palomino. Her thick winter coat catches the crisp mountain breeze, and her long, almost white mane whips lightly across her neck as she negotiates the frozen trail. Dressed in heavy tapaderos, leather chaps, a wool vest over heavy flannel, a silk wildrag, and a wide-brimmed felt hat, a seasoned rider moves with quiet confidence across this vast mountain wilderness. It is just the two of us today, carrying the same lightened load as our last episode, striking out on a circuitous route from Green Creek around toward Virginia Lakes while skirting the eastern basin of Mono Lake for the time being.
The Lower Green Creek Ascent and Glacial Moraines – Green Creek to Virginia Lakes
Leaving the trailhead near Green Creek Campground, the route begins in the deep canyon bottom where Green Creek rushes over granite boulders. The trail climbs alongside the watercourse, bordered by towering stands of quaking aspen whose remaining golden leaves tremble in the autumn wind. Up here, the air carries a sharp, frozen bite, heavy with the clean, resinous scent of lodgepole pine and the cold metallic tang of approaching winter.
The terrain quickly reveals its ancient glacial origins. The trail ascends onto the massive lateral moraines of Green Creek, where huge granite boulders lie scattered like tossed marbles. Sierra’s iron shoes make a steady clink-clink against the hard glaciated stone as she picks her way over granite step-overs and loose gravel. In these timbered draws, wildlife is active; a mule deer buck with a thick rack watches silently from a stand of red fir before slipping into the shadows, while Clark’s nutcrackers call loudly from the high canopy.
Skirting Dunderberg Peak and the High Ridges – Green Creek to Virginia Lakes
As the circuitous trail winds south and west, it climbs out of the Green Creek drainage, ascending steep switchbacks across the exposed shoulders of Dunderberg Mill and the lower flanks of Dunderberg Peak. The climb pushes up past 9,000 feet, where the forest thins out into open alpine country. To the north and west, the jagged summits of Gabbro Peak, Quarry Peak, and the distant Finger Peaks loom large against the pale sky.
Looking off to the east, the vast high-desert basin unfolds, offering breathtaking glimpses of Mono Lake shimmering in the distance. We skirt its broad expanse for now, keeping to the high mountain shelf. The footing along this high traverse turns into treacherous fields of loose shale and scree, where thin slate slabs shift under weight. Sierra moves with immense patience, testing each step as her tapaderos brush past low bitterbrush and sage. Black bears are known to forage along these berry-laden slopes before winter, and pikas give sharp warning squeaks from the talus piles bordering the path.
Reaching the Virginia Lakes Basin – Green Creek to Virginia Lakes
Overcoming the steep climbs along the mountain wall, the trail tops a final windy rise and drops smoothly into the glacial basin of Virginia Lakes. The basin opens up into a dramatic amphitheater framed by the towering summits of Dunderberg Peak and Black Mountain. Passing near the high shores of Big Virginia Lake and Little Virginia Lake, the still waters reflect the surrounding snow-dusted granite walls like polished mirrors.
Reaching the end of today’s circuit at an elevation over 10,000 feet, horse and rider pull to a halt near the shoreline. Sierra rests her legs, her warm breath pluming in the frigid air as she chews on a sparse patch of high-altitude grass. Sitting tall in the Wade saddle, looking back across the long, circuitous miles traveled from Green Creek, the absolute stillness and rugged solitude of the High Sierra settle deep into the spirit.
Historic Miner’s Cabin above Virginia Lakes – Green Creek to Virginia Lakes
Nestled at an elevation above 9,800 feet along the glacial moraines between Green Creek Basin and the Virginia Lakes watershed lies the ruins of a late 19th-century historic miner’s cabin. Built during the Eastern Sierra mining boom of the late 1870s and 1880s, the structure served as a high-altitude refuge for prospectors working small quartz and silver strikes near Dunderberg Peak and the surrounding Homer Mining District.
Constructed using hand-hewn lodgepole pine logs felled directly from adjacent timber stands, the cabin was anchored into a dry-stacked granite fieldstone foundation. This heavy structural design was essential for enduring the severe Sierra winters, characterized by gale-force mountain winds and heavy snow loads. The single-room dwelling typically housed two to four miners, featuring a simple stone fireplace, a dirt floor, and a cedar-shingle or corrugated tin roof.
As regional ore yields declined by the 1890s, the cabin was gradually abandoned to the elements. Today, the weathered log shell and collapsed stone chimney stand as silent historic markers, illustrating the extreme environmental challenges, isolation, and rugged endurance of High Sierra prospectors.
This is where we settled for the night, in the same lodgepole pine stand the cabin was built from. This is living life to its fullest.
continued in: Virginia Lakes to Mono Lake
what came before: Ragged Peak to Green Creek
from the start: High Country
Green Creek to Virginia Lakes
If I remember correctly, now, I was looking for remote cabins and historical ruins in the outback that I might explore back when I was able to do that. What a trip this would have been. Sigh!
Popi sends…
Popi’s Random Thoughts: Quick Takes & Opinions
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