60 Lakes Basin and Gardiner Basin via Kearsarge Pass, Charlotte Lake 

You’re most welcome. Enjoy 60 Lakes Basin. It is beautiful and well worth the hike. Kearsarge Pass to Lake Charlotte is my favorite hike in all the Sierra.

Gracias Amigo. Looking forward to Convict Creek with ya next month. Good stuff.

There must be something in the soil that’s perfect for Manzanita on that slope. It’s the most I’ve ever seen in one spot. When you run out of daylight and energy, it’s amazing where you can sleep. That rock slab by Gardiner Lakes on night 2 was the only dry-ish , semi-flat spot for miles.

Thanks!

Indeed. Take a few weeks off and go relax on the JMT.

Thanks. Hats are from a company called Sunday Afternoons. Enjoy the JMT.

Sorry about the playback. The video was shot well and color graded. Might be a playback issue. Gardiner is a beast of a hike. Not sure I would go again.

No reason. Neither of us were sure which way to go. I doubt it would make much difference had we gone the other way. We did see five hikers total, all going the other way. There could have been people going our direction too. But, we never caught, nor saw any catch us.

Thank you!

Thank you. 60 Lakes Basin is well worth the side trip from Rae Lakes. I’m not so sure about continuing onto Gardiner Basin. After we summited 60 Lakes Col the difficulty going down and around Gardiner Basin and up and over Gardiner pass back to Charlotte Lake was all a bit overwhelming. Summiting 60 Lakes Col and heading back to Rae Lakes and Arrowhead/Dollar Lake might be more enjoyable.

@@KV_Aventuras awesome, thanks so much for the help. That really was an epic trip

@@nedanother9382 My pleasure

The Class 3 section was en route to the 60 Lakes Col. There are options and it wasn’t too bad. As for trail en route to Gardiner Pass, lots of route finding. You’ll need GPS. We downloaded routes from CalTopo and Gaia. Much of the route has no trail at all between Gardiner Lakes and Gardiner Pass.

​@@KV_Aventuras Thanks for the beta! Did you plot the waypoints yourself and download to Gaia or find someone's route? Also, did you encounter much steep loose dirt on the Gardiner Basin "trail" route?

@@ccccfairfax Yes, I plotted the route on CalTopo then saved as a GPX to Gaia. This is a lollipop route from Onion Valley trailhead. We took Kearsarge Pass to Charlotte Lake (Camp1) to Glen Pass to the 60 Lakes Basin turnoff. In the steepest sections approaching the 60 Lakes Col, I used the slope angle shading feature in CalTopo to figure routes in advance. This section has some level 2, 3 ledge scrambling. Past the Col (Camp 2) is an intense Talus field for well over a mile around Gardiner Lakes. Once you get past the lakes the descent into Gardiner Basin was easier. There is a section or two with cliff scrambling a mile or two before Shorty’s cabin site (Camp 3). We carried water from the creek up to Shorty’s cabin dry-camp site to get away from the bogs and mosquitoes. The approach to Gardiner pass goes straight up the forest above Shorty’s cabin site. This was insanely steep terrain through the tree line. As the tree line thins out there will be an evident notch in Gardiner ridge line - that is the pass. Once over Gardiner pass, you’ll have a steep scree ski descent for a couple miles. Eventually you’ll end up in a two mile Manzanita lined trail back to Charlotte Lake (Camp 4). I’m glad to check this hike off my list. I doubt either of us would ever do it again. Ha ha! :-)

​@@KV_Aventuras Much appreciated! I don't mind rough terrain, but my hiking partner for this trip is more of an on-trail person and did not enjoy the steep loose dirt we had on our last off-trail adventure. Perhaps I'll explore another route out of Kearsarge. I've got 5 days. Maybe I'll just spend a few nights in 60 lakes basin

@@ccccfairfax Wise choice. That entire 60 Lakes Basin North of the Col is highly navigable and full of Great Lakes. I especially enjoy Arrowhead Lake and it’s outlet falls. You can also day hike the Col if you base camp in the 60 Lakes Basin. The view atop the Col facing NW is well worth the effort.

Indeed - By a lot! Both were wonderful hikes. But, Gardiner Basin was absolutely humbling. Baxter is a challenging pass with steep grade, high altitude with some talus scrambling and some bushwhacking. Whereas Gardiner Basin was pure survival mode and asking how the hell we were going to get up/down this ledge/cliff? Will this Talus ever stop? Are we even on the route right now?