PHOTOS BY JOHN DITTLI
As a young ranger, Randy wrote about
his relationship with the outdoors while
on patrol, and now, as Rick led the way off-
trail, the words Randy wrote in his 1973
McClure Meadow log came back to me:
All of your life, someone is pointing the way,
directing you this way and that, determin-
ing for you which road is best traveled. Here
is your chance to... be adventuresome. Don’t
forever seek the easiest way. Take the way
you find. Don’t demand trail signs and sturdy
bridges. Don’t demand we show you the moun-
tains. Seek them and find them yourself...
This is your birthright as an animal, most
commonly denied you. Be free enough from
intentions to find goodness wherever you are
and in whatever is happening. Here for once in
your life you... can now live by whim... Here’s
your one chance to get lost, fall in the creek,
find a beautiful place.
A place just like the ridge on which Rick
and I stood gazing at Mt. Morgenson, Rick
still catching his breath after his spirited
charge to spear the balloons. Rising majes-
tically over Wallace Lake, the cragg y peak
dominates the skyline, appearing taller than
Whitney. That’s when Laura Pilewski, the
Tyndall Creek backcountry ranger, with 16
seasons as a wilderness ranger and 24 years
as a National Park Service employee, came
trotting up toward us from the other side.
Her pants were soaked from the thighs down
from crossing the outlet of the lake whilechasing after the same bunch of balloons.
“Rick Sanger, fancy seeing you here,” she
joked, g iving him a hug.
“Those balloons didn’t stand a chance,”
Rick said, as the three of us picked our
way down the other side of the ridge to join
Laura’s husband, Rob, the Crabtree Meadow
ranger, as well as eastern Sierra legend John
Dittli, a former park ranger himself, who’s
spent nea rly four decades exploring a nd pho-
tographing these mountains. On this trip, he
was nearing the end of a journey he’d dubbed
the Grand Traverse—he intended to travel
the park from top to bottom, both the crests
and the canyons.
John said this solo cross-country trek had
been instigated by his 60th bir thday, a nd that
he couldn’t decide if “GT” stood for “grand
traverse,” “geezer tour,” or simply a “good
time.” It was a two-week, 100-plus-mile trip,
and if he kept to his schedule he’d meet us on
his eleventh day out: July 26. He had.
Rick had proposed that the five of us
come together on the shores of Wallace
Lake on this date so we’d be here during the
Pilewskis’ scheduled days off. It was some-
thing of a f luke that it all came together, for
in addition to John’s mileage, both Rob and
Laura’s “days off ” had been filled with back-
country emergencies for five consecutive
weeks, including one ca rdiac a rrest, a climb-
ing fatality, and numerous rescue requests.
One “emergency,” however, had proven to be
two 20-something backpackers hiking a sec-
tion of the John Muir Trail, who had become
“trapped” at a creek they felt was too perilous
to cross and activated their emergency loca-
tor beacon. Not knowing the nature of the
emergency, Laura had hiked several miles
carrying oxygen and a full trauma kit. With
a deep breath, she explained to them what a
legitimate emergency is and directed them to
a n easier crossing nea rby. Such is the life of a
backcountry ranger.
Our plan for the following day was to
scramble up the summit of Mt. Morgenson
to pay homage to Randy. The prospect
of seeing the view from “his” peak was
something I’d anticipated for years, and it
reminded me of something A lden Na sh once
told me. When you reach a summit for the
first time and spin that slow 360 degrees, heFrom top: Show time at an unnamed lake between
Randy’s last patrol and Mt. Morgenson; Rick
Sanger and the author on the hike outI hoped this trip would
help him discover a
route, not only to Mt.
Morgenson, but for a
way forward in life.
SPONSORED CONTENTSPONSORED CONTENTTrail by Design
Presents:
Nikki Frumkin
backpacker.com/trailbydesign
@drawntohighplaces | drawntohighplaces.com
The sweeping views make me feel
so small, yet incredibly strong
and connected to the earth.
I love being in these wild places
as alpenglow turns the landscape
pink, illuminating my favorite
mountains and calling me
further into the wild.These magical places exist deep in
the backcountry, in local state
parks, or maybe even in a nearby
park at sunset. The more connections
we make to the places we care about
and to each other, the more likely
we are to act to take care of them.
I hope my art can remind people of
what they know about themselves and
how they belong to the wild. In
this way, we can work together to
protect the places we play in.”My favorite trails
are the ones that take me
past mountain ridges,
summits, and alpine lakes.VOTE FOR NIKKI:
“