Colby Pass and the Black Kaweah 



135 



Between our camp and Giant Forest lay three days of travel 

 through as fine, beautiful, interesting, and exciting country as can 

 be found in the Sierra, but I must hurry through. One day took us 

 to a group of little lakes below Black Rock Pass. From here, with 

 our glasses looking far across the Big Arroyo, we could see the white 

 flag fluttering in the sunlight on the summit of our mountain. The 

 next day took us across Black Rock Pass (elevation, 11,500 ft.). 

 This is a strange and unusual pass, and should always be ascended 

 from the east, for by so doing you will save one thousand feet in 

 elevation. If you doubt this, look at the contour map. From this 

 pass we went down, down, down Cliff Creek, more than six thousand 

 feet in eight miles, through Redwood Meadow to the Kaweah River 

 for the night, and then, the next day, across the deep gorge of Buck 

 Canon and up and up an old, unused, overgrown trail to Alta Mead- 

 ow, where, at sunset, from that wondrously beautiful meadow, we 

 gazed long and intently at the Black Kaweah towering six thousand 

 feet apparently out of the deep abyss of Buck Canon at our very feet. 

 A few hours the next morning brought us to Giant Forest and the 

 end of the trail. 



And now five months have passed, and we still lift our eyes unto 

 the mountains from whence cometh our help, and what do we see ? — 

 the wondrous afterglow lighting the high points of the trip — Silli- 

 man, Brewer, Triple Divide ; the inspiring camps of Roaring River, 

 Kern-Kaweah, and Big Arroyo; the unmapped lake; Colby Pass; 

 and last, but not least, the once defiant Black Kaweah floating the 

 white flag. 



