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Don's
Meathead May 2009 Hunt Story

 Well I knew before we started that we wouldn't be up at Cajon Sumitt unless Bob had something in mind, and that he wouldn't be able to get a signal back down into the normal start point. He almost didn't get a signal to Cajon Sumitt! When we finally got a bearing, it was 358.5 (it should of been 352).

It was nice to see some of the old timers come out on the hunt,. We had 6 teams hunting. I think that the team of GQ/LAJ was the first to leave the start point, and we headed up 395, the bearing being mostly in front of us all the time. Until we got to the Trona Rd. turn off, there hadn't been much in the way of choices to make.

Now we had to decide if we thought he was up the 395, or somewhere in the western part of Death Valley. We choose 395. A little before Little Lake we started to hear a second T, it sounded similar to the main T. As we approached Olancha, we could tell that it was coming from the west side of Owens Lake, up by Lone Pine (1st. fatal Mistake)! We went after the main T.

It soon became obvious that the T was up at Cerro Gordo Peak. We took the road up and met Bob & Cathy coming down. They told us we would have to go to Bishop to get on the other side to get to the T, yea right!

Well the area is so photogenic, that Steve was having me stop every few feet to get pictures. When we rounded a curve and could see Mt. Whintey, he asked if I could get a picture out my side of the car. So I took his camera and shot a picture right out ovr some rocks, and in the lower portion of the picture was a long antenna! What? you mean it;s here not near the top? Surprise! So we found the 1st. T without having to use any sniffing, or guessing. And best of all, we had 1/32 of a tank above 1/2 full of gas!

We took many pictures, started down. We met Jippy and Deryl who where on the way up, and indicated that this wasn't the first one they had found, hmmm? Well the other T's must be close then.

As we came out into the lower flat lands, we coud hear two T's, One the one we heard earlier, and the other a nauseating Froggy T, that was on too often and not pleasant to listen to. We had them both on the west side of the lake, The froggie at 270 & the other at 260. This is where I'm starting to think about getting a new naviguesser.

Steve suggested going straight across the dry lake, which now isn't that dry, but look on my map it shows a road! Forget that, we will go up to Lone Pine and go from there.

Once there it seem that the Frog T was coming from somewhere along Horseshoe Mdws Rd. Okay Steve how to get there? Go up to Lone Pine and go in till we get to Turttle Cheek Rd. Well this was a nice picturesque trip, but by far not the shortest!

Well it finally did get to Horseshoe rd. Just when the sky was opening up with rain and wind! We found the froggie T, and took a bearing on the last T we needed to find.

From the previous bearings and this really strong signal bearing, it looked like it was down near the lake's edge, near a place called Permanente. So how to get there? After we got down to 395, Steve spotted a road that went into the lake area. I told him that I thought a road that showed on my map had a better chance of getting there than his way, but I followed his advice.

Well, we went down this long dirt road (did I mention that all the roads here are dirt)? We passed by some Kilns and some homeless families camped down at the end of the road. We got on another road (did I say dirt?) which had some really soft sand in which I though we where going to get stuck. We finally got to the real edge of the lake bed, and the signal had gotten weaker and nowhere to be seen! Steve thought we should cross the lake again and just follow the bearing. Not! Going back, now in 4X4 we got ourselves back to 395. Went back to 190, and noticed that the bearing on this T was coming off the mountains to the west of the lake. So how do we find this T?

At a couple of locations, we did get bearings that went NE of us. We needed to find a road that goes that way. We finally came across one that looked well traveled, and had some recent activity on it. So off we went (did I mention that this also was a dirt road?). Twenty minutes later, and about 8 miles into this road, it became a motorcycle trail, but my map did show it going all the way through to the 190 towards Death Valley, and the bearing and signal strength was enough to keep us on the trail.

It did finally come out onto the 190, and from there to the final T was about 2 miles up the hill to the T. When we signed in at 5 something, with 245 miles, we noticed that we where the second team to sign in, MI/VCR were the only others!

Hey! Deryl, what about you? I never saw any other sign ins's at any of the other T's, where were you?.

Well now it's time to get to the closest gas station,and fill  up, since the low gas light has come on, so on back to Olancha. All in all it was a good hunt, nice new places that I have never been to, but most of the time was driving up 395 or down 395! I wonder if any of the hunters went up through Death Valley?  

Don KF6GQ