Type of trip: Backpacking
Date: Jul. 24-27, 2020
People: Preston Quilici, David Krawitz
This was a great weekend backpacking trip with Dave and Preston in July 2020. We met up on a Friday night at a campsite close to Bloomfield Campground. It was all of our first time on Ebbett’s Pass road.
Saturday morning we drove up to Garner Meadow Trailhead which was filled with cars. Teslas indicated this was a popular Bay Area day hiking destination.
We began hiking and after posing for a quick photo by the wilderness sign, Preston found a large mushroom that he claimed to be edible. Dave and I did not trust him, even though Preston had recently started working at a wild mushroom store front. The mushroom turned out to be a king bolete.
Near Asa lake, a group of ladies day hiking asked us if we were hiking the PCT. We said yes, not understanding that they meant the whole thing. They commended us, and later we laughed when we figured out the misunderstanding. Or maybe we were just too flattered by the question to say no.
We stopped at the popular Nobel Lake and then headed to Bull Lake. There was one other group at the lake. We ate an obscene amount of trout that night, which paired well with some rice pilaf that Preston brought.
The next day, we planned to finish our lollipop loop by going up the Wolf Creek drainage. At the Bull Canyon intersection, we ran into a couple ranchers on horseback. One wore a purple button up and the other had a nose ring. They were a genus we had never seen before in the backcountry. I think David’s awe of the ranchers played a part in him getting a nose piercing soon after.
Wolf Creek Falls and the meadow above it were amazing highlights on the hike back to the trailhead. When we arrived at around 6 pm, the parking lot was empty other than our cars.
(Date posted: 2026-06-23)