The Trek over Tobin Ridge!

It was a doozy, I can tell ya!  My characteristic grumpiness towards the end was in direct contrast with Brenda's effervescent cheeriness.  I don't know how she does it.  But, despite feeling sore, I really did enjoy the journey every step of the way, and it was a treat to have 9 hours alone with my good friend.  We took a wrong turn early on, which added an hour/a mile to our journey, so we are saying that we accomplished a Half Marathon yesterday.  13. 2 miles.  Woo-whee!

First, I must show you Kathleen's next generations; Jennie, Bianca, and Odin

glad to be with them!  I've seen them again since, but didn't take photos.

a startling sight!  It seems too early for this place just below Rock Creek Dam  to already be coloring up

Okay, here we go! Selfie-titled: The Journey over Tobin Ridge Begins.

wild grapes

This is where we saw that we'd gone wrong; plus I'd not actually activated my pedometer.  So..... we had to go back down to the actual road we wanted, which clocked in at .57 miles when we reached it from the top.

This is what we walked up and then down during our wrong turn.  At one place it seemed to have an 80 degree slope!

The view as we continued to trudge down.  Eventually, we got on the right road and journeyed on. Just as we began the next real tough climb, two P.G.&E. fellow drove along the road, and though they didn't really understand our desire to do what we were doing, they wished us well.  We wondered at them driving their poor truck on the rubble rock surface.

lovely colored grape leaves

lizard, so primeval

we reached a natural over-look/photo moment, so we availed ourselves of it.  That's Cresta Dam you can see

The area of black rock cliffs.  We'd been here before in our previous attempts to surmount the hill. You think the top is near, but then, it takes a lot of switch-backs to climb up the darn hill.  We'd find out just how many as we went on.

Blazing Stars!

We reach the first place where we can see both sides of the Ridge!  That's the Other Side behind me in this view.

Looking towards the Canyon

Looking southwards, along the way we'd just come.  When I later saw that it had reached 95 degrees during the day, I understood why we suffered so from the reflective sand.

After walking futher along the spine of the Ridge, we looked toward where we'd been before we could no longer see it.

From that same place, we looked back and out toward the "other side", which Brenda thought was the Lot's Lake area.

Bottom rock (or could it be the Death Moon?)

We've traversed the Ridge and are now coming down towards Tobin.  This view shows a familiar sight on the mountain in the center, the "Y" above the Buck's Creek Powerhouse.

We began to somewhat desperately seek shade where-ever possible, to escape the glare, which seemed to go on forever in that one stretch.  We'd rest and cool off, then we'd try to hurry to more shade.  After we got lower down, the mountain provided the shade we needed.

The first distant mountain, with knob and spine, is the mountain where Tobin is located.  It's very cool to see how interesting the spiny ridge is where we walk when we hike from Tobin to Bucks Creek.  That's the Hogsback right there!  Beyond that, next in the background, is Bald Eagle Mountain, which looks different from this angle.

You can see the Tobin Bridges in the low-center of the photo; which we live right above.  I think I see Tobin Resort, too.  Wonder if the Tobin knob and spine is actually connected to Rodger's Saddle.  Can't see from this angle.

Sturdy little wild-flowers. Most likely a monkey-flower.