2023-03-06, 07:02 AM
(2023-03-05, 09:25 PM)Daymoth Wrote: Somebody posted the gps locations of the designated spots here, see if it works
https://www.google.com/maps/d/u/0/viewer...6.765&z=12
Are you doing the slit next week? Might bump into you, its on my to do list.
That map is excellent info, thanks for posting it! Looks like it is going to be pretty hard to park for a dayhike any place in lower echo without being accused by picky LEO of poaching a camp site. At least with the map one can pick a place that is not a site, but that won't keep you from getting a notice I bet. I was looking at at least one hike in there not sure what will happen now. I'm almost never around FC during normal operating hours to try to go argue about it either.
As for the Hole, my favorite spot to park for the Slit or Widowmaker Falls is just before the Hole, where the road following the wash takes a sharp left, there is a very sweet small pullout into the wash there - I would camp there if I were camping, before the designated sites. Now? Is it safe to park there? Or is it better to park just beyond the Hole where there's some flat areas, if hiking toward the Slit. Dunno.
Will we go there? I don't know. I have not been in 17 years and it's nice and don't need a great vehicle to get there, so it is on my short list. But the list has 20+ hikes for 10 days
Everything depends on the weather, and what my companions feel like doing. If I go I want to bypass the high fall after the Slit and go beyond the narrows immediately above it.As for the advice you got about Cottonwood... it may or may not have been correct at the time. I find it extremely hard to get solid answers out of the staff there. I used to take a few minutes to chat them up so they realized I was not some yahoo on his first visit to the place, but pretty much got stonewalled with, basically, if it ain't paved it ain't suitable for a sedan. Except once the senior guy who was at the desk in FC made a phone call, said they were not going to using the shooting range above Calf Creek, so we could walk the road to Nevares Spring... and when we got there they started shooting
I got really really chewed out by a ranger at SPW once when asking about the condition of the road (Death Valley Rd?) up to the Eureka Dunes - I had my young daughter and she thought I should be arrested for even thinking about going there with a kid. All I wanted to know was whether conditions were normal or washed out. And once in Panamint Valley I met a seasonal volunteer, who worked the info desk at FC, and she knew really nothing at all about PV - thought the old limestone quarry on the Nadeau Rd was the gold mine, etc. I've pretty much given up taking the time to stop except to visit the NHA gift shop.