Camp2 - on Hoist Ridge, and short hike to Chicago Stump

After driving about 3 miles along Hoist Ridge from Cherry Gap towards the Chicago Stump parking area, the road started looking a little iffy, and it was late in the afternoon. I came across a nice clearing on the side of the road .. a juncture with an old secondary road, and decided to camp there. Even tho I was right next to a the main service road, I only saw one more car that afternoon (leaving Chicago Stump) and none at all during the whole night. So I had a nice isolated campspot, probably 3 or more miles from anyone, yet only 5 or so miles from Grant Grove.

I had fun gathering firewood, making a fire and cooking some food, drinking beers and strummeing a little guitar "to keep the bears away" :-)

The next morning I slept in, and someone must have gone down the road while I was asleep, because this white 4wd Van comes up the road from Chicago Stump and I hadn't seen anyone go down there. I waved as they went by. A short time later, I decided to go for a short walk (up the road, away from the stump), and came across the Van about 1/3 mile up the road. They had pulled off and were making breakfast.

I stopped to chat with them, I particularly wanted to ask how the road to the stump was (which it turned out was ok), but they turned out to be the nicest people. Bob Kolbrener and his wife. Turns out that he is a noted Yosemite Photographer ... he's taken seminars from the master himself and was in fact an instructor at Ansel Adams Yosemite workshop in 1977. They thanked me, of all things, for reminding them that they could just camp on the side of the road. They gave me a very nice book, professionally bound, by Bob, of some absolutely lovely photos of Yosemite. I was astounded but accepted the eye-candy humbly. Note that right after this trip I indeed went on a trip to Yosemite.

That day however, I thanked them for the book, went back to the Van, and drove down to the Chicago Stump parking area, then hiked to stump and around the beautiful meadow there. The story about the stump goes like this. The tree was hollowed, then cut down in pieces, and shipped to Chicago to be re-assembled at the 1893 Chicago Worlds Fair. When they set up the exhibit everyone called it "The California Hoax" because they thought it was a fake ... trees couldn't possibly get that big :-)

Continue onto the next page of my Sequoia Trip ..