Upper Jamison Creek Campground

Elite '09

473

275

Mike Z.

Oakland, CA

7/21/2008

We have a group of 9 friends who are like family.  We've all known each other for a long time and we tend to spend the holidays together, and periodically see each other during the rest of the year.  We also plan an annual camping trip to some remote destination where we sleep on the ground for a few nights, partly to remind us that there are many ways to vacation which don't involve hotels, beaches and little umbrellas in drinks, and partly because it is always a lot of fun.

These trips typically involve a lot of wine and beer, an epic hike on one of the days and a visit from the park ranger sometime between 11 pm and 1 am warning us to shut the hell up.

This year was no different, except that this spot was incredibly beautiful.  It's in the pristine high alpine Plumas National Forest in the Northern Sierra.  The area was an old gold mining camp 100 years ago and many of the old structures are still standing.  The campsites are well separated and are all very private and wooded.  

Our hike on Saturday was about 7 miles round trip, the first half of it fairly steep uphill.  A couple of miles in to the hike is Grass Lake, a beautiful alpine lake nestled into the mountains.  There are many such lakes in this area and they are all spectacular. We hung out at Grass Lake and then hiked on to Jamison Lake, where some of us went for a nice swim.  It is very easy to feel like you are far far away from all civilization, and you can't help but appreciate the magnificence that is California and all it has to offer.

I find that long, beautiful hikes like this are also great for calming the mind and creating a little peace in your head where there might previously have been a little too much noise.  I think they make me a nicer, more generous person too - at least temporarily.  

However, you can always count on your best and oldest friends to correct such self-delusion.  I finished up the hike on Saturday with my friends Chris and Liz.  Liz's husband is a surgeon who does breast reconstructions for patients who have had mastectomies.  So of course we were discussing one of our favorite topics: breast enlargements.  I gave my usual speech about how I found them consistently unattractive and preferred a woman's breasts to be completely natural, even if imperfect.  Chris gave me his usual skeptical look, loosely translated as "Who do you think you're fooling Z-man? You know damn well bigger is better than smaller."  

We walked in silence a few minutes longer and finally entered the campsite area.  A cute little boy - maybe 18 months old - ran past us, giggling loudly.  I commented, "You know, when I see that, I think it would be fun to have another little one around.  I can almost see the appeal in becoming a grandparent."  

At which point, Chris couldn't take it any more.  He turned to me, shook his head, and pointed out that  "a hike in the woods and 10 minutes of introspection is not going to magically erase 20 years of being an asshole."

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