-previous-

After breakfast, I struck out on my own, heading for Goddard.  Before the sunlight reached the ground, I skirted the north shore of Lake Martha and headed up toward Goddard Col.  Above Lake Martha the rocks turned into a kaleidoscope of colors, with greens, purples and blues. I continued up as the walls grew a little closer together and I had to navigate around some narrow snowfields. I didn’t have crampons, so I hoped this wouldn’t continue further up.  I passed around a small pond on the north side, scrambling over some rock where the shore was still under water.  My scrambling continued up to what I thought was the low point on the ridge, Goddard Col, but I missed it and gained maybe 50 ft that was unnecessary. Alas, the loss of efficiency!

After the col I descended to the lake to take a solid look at the west ridge of Goddard. There was one broad chute on the left and a narrow chute on the right. I could see a switchbacking path on the broad chute, but Secor’s picture clearly showed a line up the right chute, which still had a small snowfield at the top. I preferred the broad chute, but it seems every time I go against trip report recommendations, I find out the reason for the recommendation. Trust the experience of those who have gone before.  Well, I grinded up the right narrow chute over loose head-sized talus. When I got into the narrow section I began to scale and traverse the east wall of the chute just over the talus for added stability and a little fun. Then I reached the snowfield, and the best route was to come off the wall and cross over the snow to the west, then attain the main west ridge.  Well, getting across that snow was rather nerve-racking. It was entirely too hard to kick steps into, and the ice axe wasn’t really gaining that much purchase when I tried to thrust it into the snow. Very careful footwork led me to the other side, perhaps only 40 steps, without incident.

What remained was merely a trudge up the talus, but I found some paths that had been worn into the rock. For my effort I was rewarded with a clear day and a long view all around.  Looking back down the San Joaquin I could follow the LeConte Divide from Finger back to Reinstein and out to Mt. Henry. Peter, McGee and Emerald stretched away from me back down to Evolution Junction.  Evolution Basin was open below me, with views of the Hermit, Darwin, Mendel, and others.  The Ionian Basin, which I had crossed yesterday, was pitted with lakes until reaching Scylla and Charybdis.  What impressed me the most about the landscape was the ridges.  The Goddard Divide, while not as striking as the LeConte Divide, nevertheless was captivating as it flowed away from me.

On the return, I chose the the broad chute down, and fairly skied my way down through the switchbacks in the scree.  This would be a much better and safer route, in my opinion. After pulling into the lake at Goddard Col, I continued to retrace my steps back to Lake Martha and our camp. It was only mid-afternoon, and Derik and Jan had not yet returned from Reinstein.  I fixed myself a snack and just laid out in the sun until their return.

They came back a few hours later, having had a much easier ascent and descent than I had.  I must have missed the secret passage. The next morning we three headed down the meadowy beginnings of the San Joaquin, back toward Lake Florence.  Derik eventually pulled away from us for good, since he had to be back in the Bay a day earlier than Jan and me. Now just two, we crossed over the bridge, leaving Kings Canyon National Park behind. When the John Muir Trail regained the river’s edge, Jan and I set up camp nearby.  It certainly felt like we were getting back into civilization as we saw considerably more people on the JMT than we has seen off of it.  From the time we moved our base camp from Evolution Junction to the time we returned to it, about 4 days, we only saw two people in Goddard Canyon.

-next-