The Great Silence

The Silence of 2025

2025-01-31T14:00:00.000-08:00

Edit: Please note as of October 22, 2025 I have shutdown my Vimeo channel.

Main Points:

1)I will continue being "on hiatus" as I pursue other things to blog about.

2)I continue my usual yearly criticism of social media, and why it is continuing to make people stupid.

Before I begin I will insert a couple of pictures of my drone flight of Ellery Lake last year. It was another drone flight I did right after I flew around the mostly iced over Tioga Lake last spring.

It has been almost twenty years since I started doing this blog. At the beginning I was trying to upload pictures and tell stories about once a week. I did that for several years, and then in 2011 I revealed that would be the last year of me doing that. Since then I have had about an average of twelve blogs per year of things I had done over the previous summer.

In the future, if I find something I really think is fun or unique I will upload pictures, or blog about it. Yeah, I did a bunch of new stuff last summer, but I decided I wanted to wait on uploading it...If I ever do. I am just not as inspired doing that right now.

There are other projects that I am working toward. I started the beginning of them last year. They are not things I can do as quickly and will take time. So, if I do not blog for the next year, five years, etc. that is the reason. These projects are more important and long term for me.

Again, social media is continuing to be a thorn in my side. I use it because I feel I have to in order to keep up with current issues in the world. However, I feel sometimes that it is making me more stupid. Over the years on this blog (most of the past beginning blogs of year in January) I have had some sort of criticism of it.

In some ways it is good because you can get almost instant information on something like X (Twitter). I have figured out some local information quicker than watching the news on tv, radio, or on other search sites. On the other hand, you can get a lot of bad information that takes a few days to uncover the truth to. This is why it is always a good idea to wait a day or two before you accept something as truth to see if it gets debunked or not.

Here is my main criticism this year of a lot of news sites or other social media sites that have articles. Typically, you see an article with an interesting title. You want to know more about what the title is talking about. You click it. You start reading the article. The next thing you know the article is all over the place, and you wonder what the whole point of the article is. You have not gotten the answer to the question the title of the article brought up.

Usually, I start scanning the article very quickly after I click it like trying to "find Waldo" if you know of those types of kid books. Welcome to the world of news articles that try to milk the algorithm to keep you unintentionally clicking ads and getting information about you. It is not about getting information to you, it is about stealing your time and keeping you online for their purposes. I would not be surprised if a lot of these articles are written by A.I. I know some of the comments I see to them are scams or A.I.

I wish all articles would start like I started this one with the main points then go into a further explanation. It helps people understand where you are going. However, the world of social media can not allow that sort of thing because it is the quest to keep you sucked in. Otherwise, you will go on to something else. Keep people stupid!

I will leave you with this. I recently encountered this article with an interesting title. One of these days I might read this in full and find out what the point of it is: clicker beware!

Flying Over "Winterlike" Tioga

2025-01-01T10:00:00.000-08:00

Happy New Year 2025!

Again, not trying to fool anyone. This was taken during the spring of 2024. It was obviously not winter, but I doubt very seriously I will ever get to my favorite lake when I was a kid during the heart of winter. So, this is probably the closest I will get to that experience.

With that said, I am sharing some of my drone pictures. So, looking toward Yosemite:

Another look toward Yosemite with Mt. Dana on the high point on the upper left:

Another shot nearby:

Then finally, looking back across the lake the other way:

Obviously, a lot more dry looking that way. However, you could not get really far going to the areas like Saddlebag Lake at that time. Right after this I did fly again at Ellery Lake. Not sure I am going to show any of that. I will think about it.

I'll link the drone flight below. Usually, I like to make my drone flights sound relaxing. This is no exception.

Okay! So, the last two blogs and videos were just me popping in and out of hiatus. I have thought about it, and I might do a "State of the Blog" in a few weeks before I get lost for some time.

Flying Over "Winterlike" Tioga (Youtube Video)

The "Winterlike" Conditions at Tioga Pass

2024-12-24T13:00:00.000-08:00

Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays!

I have two special blogs for the ending of 2024, and the beginning of 2025. So, let me get to this one to end the year!

Not trying to fool anyone here, this was done during our last spring within days of Tioga Pass opening. Yosemite was not open yet and would not be for a bunch of weeks to a month after, so there was really no one near there. We encountered a few cars going up and down, but unless you just wanted to check out the area there was no real reason to be there. I had been to Tioga Pass once before like this in a previous blog (linked at bottom).

Normally, I experience Tioga Pass during the summer, so I do not get to see it like this. I suspect that this is the same for most of the people that have been there. The reason being that unless you are able to travel from Yosemite on the western side to Tioga Pass/Lake you cannot get there during the late fall, winter, or spring. Tioga Pass is typically closed for most of the year. With that said, I have heard and seen pictures of people ice skating Tioga Lake back in the 1970's when I was a little kid.

So, when I was there it was not a "winter wonderland" with snow covering everything, but you get to see the area with some "winterlike" features. My last video showed going down Tioga Pass, but I did this one going back up it. Enjoy:

Next blog will be at the beginning of the year 2025. I will show some drone pictures and video of my flight of Tioga Lake like this.

A link to an old blog about conditions like this in 2017.

A link to an old blog from Christmas 2009 where I show another video of gloomy conditions going up Tioga Pass.

Descending Tioga Pass (and Hiatus 2024)

2024-04-28T09:10:00.000-07:00

This is the last video for a while. I am going on hiatus. A bunch of reasons, but a lot of it has to do with me being burned out of social media and its abuse. We are constantly being pounded each day with a lot of the same images and videos combined with ads. A lot of the artistic ideas and fun has been taken out of the creation process because of this. I have mentioned this over and over again in the past years. I did again at the beginning blogs of this year.

Every time I log into something I feel like saying, "Just back off a little." This is the reason I like to space stuff I do out over weeks. But that is me, and not others. The other part is I want to do other things than what I have been doing. That takes time and money. So you might see a few blog entries this year, but in the big picture of things I am taking some time off to find other things I can do in the long term for this blog and videos that I find fun.

This video is on the day I flew the drone at Saddlebag and Tioga Lakes. The sound was really loud, bad, and noisy. I added music, but you might want to just turn it off or listen to the radio or wherever you get music. I hope you enjoy:

Flying Over Saddlebag

2024-04-27T11:11:00.000-07:00

This is the last of this series I will be doing for a while. It is also the one I think I had the best conditions for this flight. Originally, I wanted to takeoff from a spot closer to the lake near just past the trailhead. However, when I got there I saw a sign that said "No Drone Zone." I knew something was not right about that since I know the rules of flying in areas like this. I had done my homework ahead of time. Yet, the reason I did not take off from there was I did not want a bunch of people asking me if I had seen the sign or worse calling someone on me. Basically, the sign refers to flying over the boundaries of a wilderness area. At this time, the wilderness area starts on the other side of the lake. I'll get back to this, but I had already checked my drone apps on flying in all the areas I had done so I knew I was legal.

This is Saddlebag Lake. I have shown a bunch from this area before. The conditions for this were amazing on a sunny day. About a month before this the area was covered with snow. In fact, I do not think the people connected with Saddlebag Lake ever officially opened because of the how long the winter was in 2023. So, the lake was really full. I have been here in the past (some past blog I showed early on) where the lake was really low and those times make it really sad around here.

The color of the lake was really beautiful.

Just past the end of the lake is Greenstone Lake. I have lots of good memories here. My dad, cousins, and friends have all fished this lake. If I remember correctly there is a least one big rock under the water that the water gives a green look to.

I had forgotten Mt. Conness was the one on the upper left. I thought it was the one front and just above the middle of the picture (North Peak). In any case, this was about my limit on the flight because the wilderness area boundary is right near Greenstone Lake. There was a little more I would have like to have done around this lake, but I did not want to take more chances of doing something stupid here.

If you watch the video you will see that I came back here again for a second look. The first time I took a bunch of pictures and just wanted to fly with the video uninterrupted the second time around.

On the way back, I wanted to get a few shots of Mt. Dana in the background. In the video, you can see someone hiking in the snow on the right side.

This is about half-way back.

The dam.

I was so excited about the conditions here that I told my brother we need to come back and hike the areas the following week. The next week we came back and the area was starting a major storm at the trailhead! I was so disappointed as we got closer to the trailhead. We just turned around. As I always say, nature does not play by rules!

This will be the last of the drone flights for a while. I had a few others, but maybe some other time down the road or I will redo them in different conditions.

Flying Over Saddlebag (Youtube Video)

Off-Road and Flying Over Lobdell

2024-03-29T10:33:00.000-07:00

Happy Good Friday and Easter Weekend!

We are getting near the end of everything I intend to show from what I did last summer. Over this special weekend I am releasing a bunch of videos I took on the way, at, and coming back from Lobdell Lake.

Lobdell is a slightly mysterious lake that is out in the middle of nowhere in the Eastern Sierra. It is east of HHY 395 which usually means it is going to be a lake more in a desert atmosphere. That is not totally true here. While I would not consider the lake that beautiful compared to others, it is in a beautiful isolated environment.

The reason it is isolated is you pretty much need a 4-wheel drive to get there with the dirt roads the way they are. If you don't have that type of vehicle, you will get stuck! While heading there it reminded me of something when I was younger.

I must have been around eight years old when my dad and grandfather drove me to Lobdell Lake at around 4am or so in the morning. I was pretty much scared the whole way through because I could not see anything other then what the headlights showed, and we were constantly bumping around. I had forgotten about what freaked me out on that drive until we did it again this last summer. My brother told me stories he remembers of my dad telling of some friends getting stuck at the final few hundred feet ascending to the lake during either the late 1940s or 1950s.

The lake is at about 9,300 ft. of elevation. It used to be a good fishing lake when I was younger. I could not tell you know how it is, but I will get back to this below. I do remember when I was a little kid seeing cattle wondering around the lake. There was evidence when I was there last summer of cattle eating and drinking around the lake.

I took a bunch of pictures with the drone flying around the lake. I am just going to have these two here. You can check out the video to see every angle I flew.

I got a laugh out a website that called the road to this lake "totally unpaved and pretty rough." I thought I have to used that for the titles of these two of the videos I will be releasing. Below my links I will link to an article that talks about a mysterious fish that used to be in the lake and the reason why fishing ended there for a while. I am still not sure how it is there now. We did encounter some people on the way that said they were coming back to fish.

OKAY! So this is how this weekend is going to work with my three videos. If you come here for my videos you are privileged to get them before they are coming out publicly. I will be releasing them through the weekend, but right now you can access them as unlisted. I do not care if they are shared right now or anything like that. I just did not want to created three separate blogs for this so here we go:

Video #1:

"Totally Unpaved and Pretty Rough" (aka Off-Road Drive: To Lobdell Lake) Youtube Video

This is a GoPro video that shows about fifteen minutes of video footage on the way to Lobdell. So about half the drive and not with all the crazy bumps.

Video #2:

Flying Over Lobdell

This is the drone footage I took flying all around the area. The problem with this one is the first two minutes the autofocus was stuck and not adapting. It is not bad and looks like old SD footage, but at the two minute mark I moved the camera on the drone and then the autofocus started to work correctly. This is the only time I have had this issue, and it was only something I realized when I started looking at the footage at home.

Video #3:

"Totally Unpaved and Pretty Rough Too" (aka Off-Road Drive: From Lobdell Lake)

This is the GoPro video I took on the way back. It is probably about 99% of the drive which takes about thirty minutes to get back to HWY 395. I think I might have changed batteries at one point, and we did have to move off the road to allow some off-road vehicle group get by us. It is shown in the video.

Finally, these two links are the items I referred to above:

1)Article about the road to Lobdell Lake.

2)Article about fishing at Lobdell and the grayling at Lobdell Lake.

Flying Over Tioga Lake

2024-03-17T09:02:00.000-07:00

Happy St. Patrick's Day!

During the summer of 2022 I flew an older drone at Tioga Lake. I liked it since no one was around, but it was early:

The downside was I did not have a enough light. I ended up doing a hike that morning after this, but when I got home I looked at the pictures and video. The pictures I knew could be worked on like the above, but I wanted to go back and get better pictures and video. So, I had already vowed to come back in 2023.

And, I did come back a year later. Also, closer to noon than just a few hours after sunrise. No hikes were planned. Just do this!

This shot above is close to something I had uploaded on here before.

This time I wanted to be sure I got picture from all different parts of the lake.

This is close to the one I did the year before.

Another...

Finally, I had to get the top of Mt. Dana in on the upper left high point!

Tioga Lake is probably my favorite lake in the whole Eastern Sierra. I have great memories of it when I was kid when my dad and I would fish there. Years back I did scramble up to the top of Mt. Dana. I have been working on some old video footage I took from the top with the current A.I. technology. Not sure I will upload it publicly, but you never know.

The day was the best weather conditions I had last summer. It was perfect. I have another drone flight I will show sometime next month on the same day. It was my favorite flight.

As an aside, when I was here people were going into Yosemite's Eastern Entrance like usual. Then while I was flying my drone you can see on the upper right side in the video that the line started to get longer. By the time I left it was near where my brother parked at the end of the lake. Just something I wanted to point out. You will see it in another future video I will show next month.

One last thing in the video is I went by twice the area where the stream comes into Tioga Lake. I wanted to get more video footage of that, but people ended up having a picnic there! Lol! So, no I wasn't trying to "spy" on them, but I just did enough and kept going. I was going to fly lower and stick around, but decided that would seem like I was spying on them.

Flying Over Tioga Lake (Youtube Video)

Flying Over Silver Lake

2024-03-01T10:30:00.000-08:00

So after June Lake I drove over to Silver Lake. There was something special I wanted out of this one, but unfortunately I was a week or two late in getting it. Still went ahead anyways to fly around this lake.

I have shown Silver Lake in the past because it is a great spot for fall colors. I've never been quite satisfied with anything I have done here because of a sunlight. I show why in the next few pictures.

So, I have had this type of picture before in the fall. The issue in the upper left hand corner is a lot of sunlight hits this area in a way that comes across as haze or smoke. I purposely flew the drone a lot more to the left to do the best I could to avoid the angle that gets that, but you can see it is still there. I meant to come back here in October to get a shot like this again, but that did not work out this time.

Trying to get the right time of the day and best season for this shot is challenging for me in flights or just taking normal pictures on the ground. However, this shot was really secondary to what I was trying to achieve at this lake.

The above is Horsetail Falls which I have hiked by to Gem Lake back in 2010. This was sort of the goal of my flying around here. The water had been gushing out from Agnew Lake during the month of July; I believe that was controlled by man made mechanisms and not something from nature. They were releasing water that had been snow/ice back there. I saw pictures of it and hoped to get this huge amount of water gushing over on video. I was too lake and this was what I got. Still it was fun doing this. Btw, in the video, this is the reason I hang out over here for a while.

Finally, this is the other shot of June Lake I wanted from the other side:

Not bad. I took a few other pictures. Lots of water around, lots of boats fishing, etc. I was very relaxed doing this one.

Flying Over Silver Lake 4K (Youtube Video)

Flying Over June Lake

2024-02-18T09:06:00.000-08:00

(For the Love of the Eastern Sierra)

#FTLOTES

For the next two months or so I intend to put up a bunch of these drone flights I did every few weeks. They are simple flights I did last summer with my drone. This was the first one I did during the summer.

I have shown June Lake before by my drone, but this is one where I covered the whole lake rather than trying to take pictures of the just the lake. This is what I saw when flying to the end of June Lake: Gull Lake!

Then turning around I looked back on June Lake:

This is looking east to the 395. Whenever I fly my drone at June Lake I have encountered the remains of some nearby fire. There was some haze during this day in the distance in both directions. Had I been here about a week later I might have had clear conditions as you will see with some other drone flights.

Of course, I ended with this shot that I have taken a few times.

Flying Over June Lake (Youtube Video)

Do Your Own Thing!

2024-02-16T10:49:00.000-08:00

I have said something like this before and a version of this is in my FAQ. The point of this blog is not to copy me in areas you visit! That is not going to impress me. What is important is you go out and find your own areas.

Where do I figure out where I want to go or find some movie spot? I use books and watch movies. It is simple as that. I love reading history books and then trying to find out where some of the events took place.

Getting ideas off of social media is NOT something I recommend for a bunch of reasons.

One thing that has happened over the years on social media is people copying each other over and over again. I get this every time I log in to one of the sites I am on. I start seeing areas, animals, or whatever I have uploaded at one time done by other people.

It is like the algorithm thinks, "Well, if you uploaded that, then you like that and want more of it!" Which I have to laugh at because I can only handle so much of my own stuff at a time. I have to take time away from my own projects I do on here and do other things otherwise I seriously burn out.

Yet, the way the modern algorithm works seems to be programmed into overkill! I get pounded every time I log into one of those sites. They work on our worst temptations and bad habits to keep us on these sites. They want to keep us on their sites as long as possible.

The big issue is it is not art to do exact copies of others work. This is the way I feel about Ansel Adams photography. I have shown a few locations where he took photos, but I do not think it is right to copy his photo locations to take the same type of picture and then claim it as your own.

While I would not consider it social media, I get the AAA magazine as I am a member. They usually run contests for the best pictures each year. As is typical, most of the pictures are the same each year. Oh sure, there might be some photography technique used with great outdoor conditions used, but it is the same places year after. The current magazine cover is one of an area I have been to a few times on here and seen others take similar pictures.

Then just recently I saw a comment made on Instagram that on someone's channel dedicated to California. The comment was like, "The state of California should hire you to for tourism!" I did not say anything since it was not my channel, but I wanted to tell the lady that she has not tried looking enough around the internet. What I saw of this person's pictures (could be an A.I. grabber too which is another story) was really obvious places.

So people trying to stay relevant on the algorithms have to keep uploading things and that encourages the copying, but other issue is I see bad behaviors being encouraged. Like, most people are giving out directions for everything: "Here are the directions to five of my secret hikes I do." It is really bad to do this. Not everyone should be encouraged to drive to areas or do hikes so easily. How many times have we heard about "experienced hikers" getting lost somewhere out there?

It has been a few years, but I saw something that was obviously influenced by something I had done on here. It was one of those that I warned that the average person should not take this place and hike lightly. What did the person do? "I highly recommend this hike to everyone!" When I heard about this I just wanted to slam my head into the ground.

There are other issues with social media giving out information too easily, but my main points are: (1) find something unique to visit and share. Also, (2) be responsible with the rules, both written and unwritten, and what your audience will understand. Remember, social media caters to the lowest of intelligence and wisdom of all ages.

With that said, I intend to start sharing more of my drone flights about every other week or so for the next two or three months. It is my "Flying Over..." series, but I like to think of them as "For the Love of the Eastern Sierra" (#FTLOTES).

Adding Rumble Account

2024-02-08T14:20:00.000-08:00

So I am finally adding my Rumble account as an official part of this blog:

TheGreatSilence Rumble Channel

In the past I decided it is a good idea to branch out to a few other sites to give YouTube some competition and also make sure some of my older content is not deleted for whatever reason.

In this case, my Rumble channel has only my last 16+ videos that I have shot in GoPro. My other 1080p videos can be found on YouTube and Odysee. Those go back to 2009 or so. My Bitchute channel has just the past few years on it.

As I see it right now, Youtube is still clearly the best when it comes to videos. The closest competition is Rumble that allows 4K (2160p). Odysee and Bitchute are stuck in 720p and 1080p respectively. My GoPro cameras can go as high as 5k video, but no one is doing that right now. As it is with big tv's, 4K is pretty much the standard I see for now.

Again, I think my old 1080p videos are okay to watch, but they are good at smaller screens or cell phones. When you watch on smaller screen or at smaller box on a web browser they work the best. However, my recent GoPro videos are designed for bigger screens.

In any case, follow me on this blog, or one of the other channels. Whatever is easiest for you and fits how you like to view things. The one thing I always mention is this blog is basically my main area where I let people know what I am doing and shows links to everything else I do. It is true that I have some other sites I have done side experiments on or use to communicate with family, friends, or business partners in the real world. However, those are not part of what I do here on the blog. Please do not try to contact me on other sites not listed here if you see me on them. You would think this is common sense, but...I have had people try doing this before that could just as easily leave a comment below on my most recent blog, but for some reason want to communicate with me somewhere else. Of course, my e-mail connected to this blog is always listed.

As an aside, I purchased a 4K UHD blu-ray player for myself during Christmas. I ended up buying a bunch of 4k movies I mostly already had as dvd or blu ray. There is a whole other set of reasons I do this instead of watching streaming channels which I will not go into here, but I am at the stage in life where this will probably be the last time I purchase movies I have already purchased before. If in ten years we are at 8K or something higher we will see, but I think I am pretty much done repurchasing movies. I have hundreds of rare movies on dvd and blu-ray I have watched, but some I have watched maybe once in the last 15 years or so. That takes up space.

Slowing Moving into 2024

2024-01-31T12:08:00.000-08:00

I do not have very much that is "new" to say right now. I am starting to think of things I want to do this year. I do have a bunch of simple drone flights that I want to edit and upload.

One note is that I have added my video channel on Rumble.com to my link section. I will explain more on that on some other blog post in a week or two.

What I said a year ago in my "Housekeeping 2023" blog pretty much covers the same ground as I feel right now. Refer to that, but I just want to emphasize again the following because I have had people still asking me something I do not do anymore.

That is, I do not give out GPS coordinates or specific directions to locations anymore.

I'm sorry, but it is not 2006 anymore. For many years I felt okay in doing this, but I do not like what I am seeing. Vandalism, taking things from the land, leaving trash, and just too many people going to what are meant to be isolated areas with limited traffic.

What I have seen this last year, and for about ten years before, is that I will probably be on the losing side on this issue. I have seen official social media accounts encouraging certain behaviors that in the long run I fear are going to cause more harm than good.

One thing hundreds of people have told me over the years and I have seen comments for social media sites is something like, "My family and I have been going to 'X' since 'P'.

X = some location (for example, Yosemite)

P= some date or era (for example, the 1960's)

This is a way people try to establish common ground (no pun intend) with each other. I have done it on this blog several times as a way of letting the reader know that I have the knowledge and experience of the area over the years. A good percentage of what I have talked about on this blog goes back many decades. However, if you were to meet me out in the wild I probably would not mention this unless someone asked.

When people tell me they have been going to a certain area since some date in time I am usually not very impressed, nor I am really snotty about it either. However, if they have some good insights about the area, or explain things that they do to benefit the area then that will impress me a little more.

That is kind of the goal that I have set for this year. I've done this in the past, but I want to make it known publicly as well. Let me state it this way:

What can I do to make the area I spend my time at better than when I got there?

Taking bags with you to pick up trash is a good start. I have done this several times over the years. Lots of things can be said, but many people take what may seem "free" for granted. I am not going to get into property taxes, insurance, and other fees that many of us locals deal with, but maybe donating money to the places you visit helps.

Just some ideas. I am going to come back and again talk about the problems I see with social media in my next blog post.

Thanks and Looking Back at 2023!

2023-12-31T08:00:00.000-08:00

I just want to give a "Thank You!" for those who have followed this blog or my work on Youtube (or other video sites). It is not important to me to have thousands of people following what I do. If I only get a handful of people that enjoy what I do that is fine. With that said, I do appreciate those that share what I do with others. My motivations for doing this are a lot different than many other content creators. I do it for the love of it, not for money or as an instrument for something else.

I have learned a lot in the past six months or so. I kind of know the direction I would like to take this blog going further. Yet, at the same time, to do this takes a lot of my own time. It feels like since August I have been working on videos every few days, correcting mistakes in them, and then I wonder where the time has gone.

So, I intend to take a few weeks off from this. I still have a bunch of drone footage I want to show and some other things in the next couple of months.

In the meantime, please check out my last video of the year (and any others I did this year if you have not seen them):

Flying Over Aurora (Youtube video)

Have a Happy 2024!

Ghosts of the Past: Flying Over Aurora (Part 2)

2023-12-29T11:48:00.000-08:00

Again, the Wild West Mine would have been here. I have never walked up here. This is the nice advantage of drones. You can see what remains here:

Now turning around where my drone was hovering over the Wild West Mine site:

It is nice to see some of the other roads. The following is looking toward the north:

Somewhat northeast here:

This one is a little out of place since it should have been in Part 1. This is hovering near Lover's Leap. Looking west and those roads are supposed to go Bodie.

So, this ends my "Ghosts of the Past" series where I have returned to a bunch of places I have talked about on this blog before. I felt the need for an update in video and pictures. Will I come back in ten years for 8K footage? Lol! I love these areas so I probably will return, but not for quite some time. There are other areas I need to get to.

Flying Over Aurora (Youtube video)

Ghosts of the Past: Flying Over Aurora (Part 1)

2023-12-28T11:45:00.000-08:00

Hey everyone! I hope you are having a great holiday season!

Long story short, I was supposed to have these next flew blogs up by Christmas for the ending of the "Ghosts of the Past" series, but I got sick and then my internet provider went out on me for over a week. With that said, let's get to it:

After I did the GoPro footage and did two drone flights over the area. The first flight started at the where the Daly Gang house would have been. I flew over to the other side near the peak of Lover's Leap. I knew that is where the most popular picture from 1890 was taken looking down on the town. I tried to emulate it, but was much higher up. If I had come down a little lower and moved the drone to my left I might have been a little closer:

A slightly different picture. You can see how the water really "carved" into the where the town would have been. It turns out the town was prepared for this, and I have seen how water would have come down almost like in some of the maps.

This is trying is looking out where Pine St. would have gone east to west (or vice versa).

For comparison this is from my previous drone during 2020. This lacks the water "carving" drainage of 2023.

Finally, this is crossing over to the eastern side. Where the Wild West Mine would have been:

I will continue with this one in Part 2.

Flying Over Aurora (Youtube video)

R.I.P. Gunfighter William E. Carder

2023-12-10T09:55:00.000-08:00

So one-hundred and fifty-nine years ago, either a justifiable homicide or a murder took place. This is one of the big reasons I (and others) enjoy reading about the Wild West (aka Western Americana): we get to see what happens in areas where there is little law enforcement or rule of law, and how the areas evolve as time goes on until they get proper law enforcement and rule of law.

I have talked about William E. Carder before. More than likely, he would have been commonly known as Billy. In the video I give a short biography; this is mostly a transcript of what I said. This is a bit different, but consistent with my old blog about him that I will link below.

Interesting enough a bunch more about Carder has come out in the past ten years or so. I was reading an old book on the Western Sierra and Carder's name came up several times. That is something fun when you can start tracing names over various places and see how they all connect to each other. I mention one of these odd coindences in the video.

Carder was born in Tennessee In 1832, and by the age of 18 he was motivated by the gold rush to travel on his own to Placerville, CA. By 1855, he was the town marshal of Columbia, CA for 2 years. Right away he ended up killing a vagrant by the name of Martin Hennessy who had an outstanding warrant on him. On July 4th, 1857 he was part of a posse to capture a murderer of a man called John Leary. Carder ended up being the one who captured the guy. By September 1858 he started working for a local newspaper. He ended up getting in a shootout with a John Carinelli. No one was seriously injured. In 1861, Carder was down in Sorona, CA working for a local newspaper. He got into a feud with a rival newspaper editor H.C. Bennett. Bennett would constantly insult Carder in Bennett's newspaper. Carder challenged him to a duel. No duel ever happened but Carder eventually confronted Bennett in a gunfight where they both shot each other in the shoulder. Judge Wheaton examined Carder and dismissed him.

Sometime after this Carder came to Aurora, NV. He got into a shooting scrap with Thomas Greely. An innocent bystander E.J. Warren was killed during this fight. He married Ann Davis in 1863. He tried to run for city marshal that year, but was defeated. He was not part of the Daly Gang. He did have some interaction with them drinking and gambling, but he was clearly opposed to them by the time the town formed a vigilante group against them. Finally, he was out of town on business with a man named Moses Brockman in the fall of 1864. Carder came back to Aurora and was expecting Brockman to bring a specific horse with him for Carder. Brockman came back to Aurora without the horse. Carder was angry and eventually let it be known that he intended to kill Brockman. More than likely this was idle words of a drunken man, but Brockman believed him.

This is where the following takes place so on the night of December 10th, 1864. Brockman was right around here hidden in an unused doorway on the outside of the Exchange Saloon. Carder walked out at 11:30 that night and Brockman shot Carder point blank range. Carder never knew what hit him. The buck shot tore through his neck and his right shoulder instantly killing him. Due to Carder's reputation and Brockman being known as a peaceful miner, he was let go with a justifiable homicide. The thinking was while it was a surprise attack, was Brockman just supposed to sit around and wait until an expert gunfighter was ready to fight? One person disagreed with this assessment.

So out here in the middle of nowhere at the Aurora Cemetery we find his grave:

Then...it takes a little work to find it because it is what you might call the "Boot Hill" section of Aurora. It is a little off and away from the other obvious graves.

It is interesting to note that there are some other graves nearby without names, headstones, or markers, but surrounded by rocks. I have seen an old picture in one of my books that says that one right next to Carder's grave would be a member of the Daly Gang. It had a wooden marker that would obviously not be there anymore.

That person that disagreed with the justifiable homicide verdict was his wife Ann.

William E. Carder
Native of Tennessee
Aged 33 Years
was assassinated
in Aurora on
the night of
Dec. 10, 1864
I will avenge saith
The Lord
Erected by his wife Annie E.

The video:

R.I.P. Gunfighter William E. Carder (Youtube)

My old blogs:

The old Auora Ghost Town (William E. Carder) blog

All my Aurora Cemetery blogs

The following books contain most of the information about Carder: 1)McGrath, Roger D. Gunfighters Highwaymen & Vigilantes: Violence on the Frontier. University of California Press, 1984. Amazon link: https://tinyurl.com/3ejduebr McGrath's book is the classic for all the "wild west" information regarding Aurora and Bodie ghost towns. There is a page or two about Carder. 2)Silver Sue. Mineral County Nevada. Museum Ass. of Mineral County, 2011. Amazon link: https://tinyurl.com/wzjknjwa In the chapter about Aurora there is a short biography about Carder. It mentions his days in Western and Eastern Sierra. 3)Silver Sue. Aurora Nevada's Silent City on the Hill: An Historical Perspective. S. Silver 2011. Amazon link: https://tinyurl.com/bdhdwmew This is the book you want for learning about the graves at the cemetery. There is an entry and short biography for Carder.

R.I.P. Marden Kids

2023-12-08T10:41:00.000-08:00

I went over a lot of the Cemtery at Aurora back in 2011. I did not really feel the need to do this one over again so I will link to that one below.

I do want to go over two of the grave areas that are important to me. The one I am focusing on in this blog will be the Marden family kids.

I am going to refer you to the video below that covers everything I want to say about this family. It is the mark of living in the olden days when you have big families because you never know how many kids will survive into adulthood. These days with medical technology it is a lot different.

The obelisk on the left represents four kids. There is a name on each of the four sides of it. I have taken pictures of each side since I was there since I did not in 2011. I show the sides in the video.

I might come back and edit this blog at a later time if there is something else I want to say about this family. I will probably reread the books I mention in the video sometime next year.

The one thing I did in the original video is I was emphasizing the diphtheria outbreak on members of the family that had it so I said one of the kids of the family survived the outbreak. Yet, there were two others that never had it so the total family kids of the Marden's that survived into the 20th century were three. In other words, all the kids that had diphtheria died, but one. Yet, there were two others that never had diphtheria at all. So, a total of three Marden kids were still alive after the outbreak. I made something more complicated than it should have been, but what you do?

I think this is something we need to keep in mind when we talk to others and read what others say on the internet. There is a tendency to emphasize something and leave out other things depending on how important they are. I always see people respond to others, "You forgot to mention..." which is probably not true at all. I had this issue when making the Streets of Aurora video. I had to remind myself to keep things simple because a lot more could be said for just about everything I said in that video. Like a lot of videos I do that I talk in, I have to narrow down what I say. My rule of thumb is if I talk to much I ruin the video. The Streets of Aurora video was an exception I felt I really needed to speak in that one.

R.I.P. Marden Kids (Youtube Video)

R.I.P. Aurora Blogs

Ghosts of the Past: Mark Twain's Cabin Again

2023-12-06T12:15:00.000-08:00

In almost every blog entry I have written on here there have been mistakes. Some are not really important. I would put stuff like I went left when I went right, words left out or not making sense, etc. I have had stuff up for years only to find out, "Did I say that?! Good grief! I never meant that at all!" For the most part, my readers have been forgiving about those sort of things.

I have had a few contact me over a few things over the years were my locations were off. In one or two situations I was not trying to show the location of what they thought. Lol! In others there was a good reason that I was mistaken, and I just had not gotten around to updating what I had done. I have few like that I still want to take care of.

This is one of those situations that no one has said anything to me about, but I have known I have been a bit off for quite some time.

My original blog on this cabin: Aurora Ghost Town (Mark Twain)

Here is the reality of this situation...I don't care.

Samuel Clemens (aka Mark Twain) lived at a variety of places in Aurora during his six months there. He lived with friends while there. There is a story that some woman took a piece of wood for this cabin and presented it to Mark Twain. His reply was something to the effect that he never owned a cabin in Aurora.

So, in the blog above I ended up going a little further than I should have. At the time I did not have access to the older picture shown in this photo:

The above picture was taken in 2020. It is a little closer to where this cabin would have been. Notice that Lover's Leap can be seen in the background. That is key.

When I went this last summer in 2023 I had forgotten I had taken the above picture. So I ended up a little further on East Pine St. than I should have. It is in the video that I note the mistake.

Again, it is a situation that I just do not care enough about. My apologies to any Mark Twain fans that this is important to them. There are certain things I bring up on this blog that are really important to me and others that are nice tidbits, but I just don't care that much about this compared to other things about Aurora. If you do care about this then let me link you to this article:

Mark Twain's Aurora Cabins - Site of his First Success

Heading back down west to Pine St. we see this:

Again, this would have been in 2020 when it was a lot less green and road eroded than in 2020. The Esmeralda Hotel and Courthouse would have been the building on the left.

In the next blog or two I will be heading back to the cemetery.

The Streets of Aurora 2.0 (Youtube)

Ghosts of the Past: The Streets of Aurora

2023-12-03T08:00:00.000-08:00

The video I link below gives you the two main streets that would have been the main intersection of Aurora: Antelope and Pine Streets. Those two streets are where most of the business, drinking, and gambling would have taken place. There were other streets around the town. On those streets there would have been cabins and houses people would have lived. After the years of the first mining boom and until the 20th century, most people that lived in Aurora would have lived peaceful lives. I tend to focus on the "wild west" era so just about everything I talk about in the video is from the early 1860s when there was a lawless element at Aurora.

Now a reminder about the town, there is nothing really there in the town anymore. Around the time of World War 2 many people came to Aurora to take the bricks of the buildings for use elsewhere. You can find some of the foundations of the buildings while looking at the remains. However, some of the fun is trying to recreate the town from the pictures we have.

For example, looking east on Pine Street:

This picture taken from 2020 combined with the black and white picture gives you an idea of how the buildings would have been on the Pine Street looking east. The Exchange Saloon would have been right next to where two adults and kid are on the right side of the picture. That was the most important saloon in town and most of the "wild west" action happened there.

At this point, I want to mention the mistake I back in 2011. I assumed the name "Exchange" was the name of something called the "Merchants Exchange Hotel" which would have been a few hundred feet behind me on West Pine Street. I had seen the name "exchange" in print so many times that I assumed they were all the same. Recently, I read there was another "exchange "saloon on the lower level/basement of the courthouse. Each time I come to Aurora I learn something new.

Going up the road one eventually encounters this:

This is The Last Chance Saloon foundations.

The road eventually splits. The side of the road on the left continues Pine Street. If one goes right then it is Wide West Street that takes you here:

This is where the Daly Gang house would have been. The Daly Gang was hired by one of the mining companies to protect their claims while they were settled in court. The gang of professional gunfighters eventually became deputy marshals in town due to one of the gang members being elected City Marshall. So, for about a year the gang controlled the town.

I am going to stop here for now. I will come back in a day or two for another blog entry on this town.

The Streets of Aurora 2.0 (Youtube)

My old blogs I did during 2011:

For my blog on the Daly Gang go HERE.

My old blogs on Aurora during 2011 go HERE.

More blogs I did on Aurora during 2011 go HERE.

Some of the books that are important about Aurora:

1)McGrath, Roger D. Gunfighters Highwaymen & Vigilantes: Violence on the Frontier. University of California Press, 1984. Amazon link: https://tinyurl.com/3ejduebr McGrath's book is the classic for all the "wild west" information regarding Aurora and Bodie ghost towns. 2)Shaw, Clifford Alpheus. Aurora Nevada 1860-1960 : Mining Camp Frontier City Ghost Town. Second ed. CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform, 2018. Amazon link: https://tinyurl.com/bdd4pzeh Most people will want to get the paperback edition in the above link. This the best handbook for trying to "recreate" the town of Aurora. LOTS of pictures through the book. In fact, using this book and pausing my video might be the best way to appreciate the town! :) 3)Silver, Sue. Mineral County Nevada. Museum Ass. of Mineral County, 2011. Amazon link: https://tinyurl.com/wzjknjwa This book has a chapter on Aurora that was useful. 4)Shaw, Clifford Alpheus. The Last Days of the Daly Gang at Aurora Nevada. CreateSpace, 2014. Amazon link: https://tinyurl.com/bdd4pzeh This small book gives most of testimony people had in the days following the final murder committed by the gang up until they were hanged. I would recommend the McGrath book with the chapter on the gang first, then getting this one if you are looking for more information. It does include some of the location pictures of where things happened (kind of like what I did in the video).

Ghosts of the Past: Aurora, Nevada

2023-12-01T08:00:00.000-08:00

So my series I have been calling Ghosts of the Past was not really meant to be just a October/Halloween series. It kind of worked out that way, but I knew I was going to be doing something that would take me into December. So here we are. This series was mostly me going back to places I have shown before on the blog and them being ghost towns or mines. It was primarily me updating a few things and adding a more up to date GoPro video.

With that said, I love Aurora Ghost Town in Nevada, but I think I said most of what I wanted to say about the town back in 2011. I will link all those old blogs below in the next blog entry. So let me update you on what has happened.

Overlooking the town in 2023:

First, I did make some big mistakes that I tried to correct during that time. I have not looked, but I think Youtube took down the annotations I did to correct the errors I made. This was a big motivation for me to do another video and make things right. I will note them as we come to them.

Second, a few more books about the town have come out since I was last there. I will note those in the next blog or two, but it was really great getting lots of new information about the town and people that had inhabited it.

Third, I was in Aurora back in 2020. I am going to actually admit to you that I was much sharper in finding what I was after during that time than when I came in 2023. There is a reason for that. In 2020, I was still using my old-style camcorder, and it was about that time I was seriously thinking of shifting to GoPro. One thing I did not really want to give up was my ability to zoom in and out of places, but I knew it was time for me to switch video technology. This is one of the reasons I delayed talking about Aurora again. I meant to, but I knew I would probably be coming back.

I am going to use this blog to point out a few things, maybe a few more blogs to clarify some of the errors I made in 2011, and show what I did on the recent trips.

So what made 2023 a much different year that 2020 or any other time I had been there in the past? Check out this picture of me looking towards the east of Pine Street.

Due to the winter/spring of 2023 the whole entire Eastern Sierra was much different looking than I was used to. I was walking around where this picture was taken and having a hard time identifying things as easily as I did in 2020. All the bushy plant life of Aurora was much bigger and green than I had ever seen before! Not only did I have a hard time walking around, but I had a harder time seeing where the roads would have been.

Then just walking past the main intersection you could see parts of the road were washed out by the water that had come through here. The above picture is looking at where the Exchange Saloon would have been on the corner of Pine and Antelope Streets. You can see where the water came and washed this part out. It is shown more in the video I took as I mention it a few times.

In the past I would see maps of where two areas of water would come through the town, and how they must have dug out parts of the area to allow for this. This time I could clearly see where an overwhelming amount of water had gone through the town earlier in 2023. There was a small stream going through the town during the summer. That I had never seen before.

You will see this in the video. So, I was a little disappointed in how that turned out. I truly hope that there is some repair work done on the roads since there was quite a bit of erosion that took place this past year. There were parts of these roads were there were big holes in.

Okay, I am going to stop here for the time being. I'll get back to this tomorrow.

Driving By Nine-Mile Ranch

2023-11-28T13:03:00.000-08:00

Hope you all had a good weekend. So, my "Ghosts of the Past" series will continue and end in December. It was not just a October/Halloween series.

The following video is the prelude to where we just drive by "Nine-Mile Ranch". It is all driving and nothing is said:

Driving By Nine-Mile Ranch, NV (Youtube)

Taken from https://www.hmdb.org/m.asp?m=191201: "The history of the Nine Mile Ranch has a long and interesting past, beginning with the Paiute Indians who inhabited this area long before John C. Fremont’s expedition into Nevada in 1843-1844. According to Fremont’s journal he camped in this area along a little creek now known as 'Rough Creek' in January 1844 on his way to California. Fremont’s camp was in the approximate location of the Nine Mile Ranch today. With the discovery of gold in Aurora in 1860, this area was destined to become a main route from Carson City to the booming mining camps of the Esmerelda Mining District, of which Aurora and later Bodie were featured destinations. Along this route stage stops were established for the convenience of travelers. Over the years, the Nine Mile has been known as Cobb’s Rancho, Nine Mile House, Nine Mile Station, Green’s Station, etc., but Nine Mile Ranch is what shows on most modern maps. Notable people in history are known to have visited the area, including John C. Fremont, Kit Carson, Mark Twain, Governor James Nye, and J. Ross Browne, to name a few." An article about this place: https://mcindependentnews.com/2018/07/history-of-nine-mile-ranch-dates-back-to-the-1860s-2/

An Awesome View of Mono Lake Two

2023-11-01T10:53:00.005-07:00

Happy All-Saints' Day! I think it is amusing how our traditions have evolved and what people think of as Halloween and such. I have people I follow that are really into Halloween that will say stuff like, "Happy Halloween Eve" on Oct. 30th so now we have an "Eve" for an "Eve" day for today. What we know of as our modern Halloween really goes back to the early twentieth century...about a hundred years ago. I know you will have tons of people that will say stuff like it goes back to Samhain the Celtic pagan day, but no one knows really when that day was other than a guess that it was at the end of October. I am just saying that most of what people think of today as Halloween has a lot of mixed traditions in it.

Anyways we are done until next year(?) with that, but my series "Ghosts of the Past" is still live as I will start my next project soon.

In the meantime, here is another look at Mono Lake:

It was kind of gloomy due to the clouds and rain coming down. I was once here taking pictures when I started the blog back in 2006. I will link that below. Those pictures were during really nice conditions, but I liked this because it worked as part of what I was trying to do as an October/Halloween type of video. Yeah, the above is in the new "Ghost Mine..." video. Let me take this time to link all three videos I did for this series:

This is the off-road drive that gets you up there:

Off-road Drive: "Ascending Log Cabin Mine Road" (Youtube)

This is the main video that is the most important of the bunch to watch. It is about twenty-three minutes long:

The Ghost Mine Above Lee Vining 2.0 (Youtube)

Finally, this is sort of a throwaway video, and not really needed. However, if you do want to see the drive back down the same road we came up on it is here. It is unlisted because I do not care about it too much.

Off-road Drive: "Descending Log Cabin Mine Road"

This is the blog from 2006 that shows the same spot with nicer conditions:

The old blog: An Awesome View of Mono Lake

Ghosts of the Past: The Simpson Mine (Part 3)

2023-10-31T09:46:00.004-07:00

Happy Halloween!

Continuing from the last blog entry, this is the same room I showed the newspaper article. I am standing with my back to where the newspaper was.

A room nearby that had some beds in it. One thing to think about is how did these people live during the winter?! There were heaters used, but being up at almost ten thousand feet on a mountain side can be very cold. I walked around these rooms and some were pitch black and spooky. You can see what I am talking about if you watch the video.

These buildings had more machinery in them for use with the mine.

For example, this is what is in the building above:

I do not recall the gate being up last time I was there. I believe this has been added to keep people away from the mining hole that appeared to be collapsing some and sinking...the best I can describe it...from last time I was there.

Okay! I want to emphasize that this series of blogs about this mine was to build to this GoPro video. It is long at about 23 minutes. So you might want to save it until you have the right time to watch it all at once. If you have a fast connection, can watch it at 4K on a bigger TV screen, then I would suggest turning off the lights and enjoy. Originally, I had music playing through most of the video, but decided it did not work. So, I hope you enjoy this video as much as I did making it:

The Ghost Mine Above Lee Vining 2.0 (Youtube)

I will keep the prior video up which might be a good thing seeing how this one had a different weather condition to it. Tomorrow I will link to an unlisted video for the drive down. My unlisted videos are sort of "throw away" videos that I put up as extras, but do not put as much time into nor care as much about. Kind of like Blu-Rays or Dvds that have extras on them.

Ghosts of the Past: The Simpson Mine (Part 2)

2023-10-30T09:51:00.005-07:00

Continuing my "Ghosts" series with part two of the Simpson Mine. In the past most of my pictures were showing the exteriors of the mine. This time I wanted to show more of the insides of the structures.

The following building is the lower building of two others. This structure is connected by stairs.

As you can see here the stairs lead into darker rooms. The first room is a bathroom and shower area.

Then after some more stairs there are a bunch of open rooms.

I assume that this would be living quarters or recreation rooms for some of the workers.

The following is in a totally different building below than this building I am showing, but it has an odd story. I ran across this newspaper from circa 1990ish someone appeared to be reading.

It was a twilight zone moment for me because it was talking about a high school game three hundred miles away near my home. At where I am typing this out right now I am within walking distance of both the schools and the stadium it was played out. It is always weird to me when two things that appear to have no connection to each other create a coincidence like that.

This is the room I found the paper in. The newspaper was being used, by that article above was put aside as if someone was reading it. The Twilight Zone theme was playing in my head.

Again, if you have want to watch the drive to the mine go here:

Offroad Drive (Ascending Log Cabin Mine Road)

I will continue this in Part 3 tomorrow.

Ghosts of the Past: The Simpson Mine (Part 1)

2023-10-29T09:47:00.011-07:00

We are a few days within Halloween so I decided to get this part up of the "Ghosts of the Past" series. Again, this is another area I have shown on this blog before. The emphasis is really on the GoPro video that will be public on Oct. 31st., but I do have a lot of pictures I want to show so let's go...

I have talked about the history of the Simpson mine before so I will not do that here, but link to a blog I did before that talks about it below. The deal with this mine it is on a mountain above the town of Lee Vining and Mono Lake. It is really isolated, and the time I was there I was the only one exploring the mine. Getting to the mine is difficult because you do need a 4-wheel drive or high clearance vehicle. This year was a little tougher because of the snow melt that made the roads a lot messier at certain places.

When I arrived the weather was overcast, and it would start raining on the way down. I was sort of disappointed at the time, but then realized it would probably be the best atmosphere for a Halloween video. I walked down the road and soon came across the main structure of the mine.

Turning to my right:

The following pictures emphasize part of the main structure:

Notice the part of the structure that is lifted up:

This would be the inside. In the video I walk all the way up and back. I was careful, but wondered how dangerous it really was. It appeared safe for what I do. Standard disclaimer that I am not responsible for what others do. If someone does go up this thing make sure someone else is nearby.

I walked further down the road. There is a series of buildings that are connected on the left side that I entered. That will be the next blog entry.

One of things I did was take GoPro video of the drive up to the mine. This video is almost twenty minutes long. It covers just about all of the drive except for a minute or so. If you are into offroad driving videos here it is:

Offroad Drive (Ascending Log Cabin Mine Road)

The Ghost Mine Above Lee Vining (Blog with the history of the Simpson Mine)