Hey, Coyote Flat... that's a radical idea!
'Coyote Flat' is on the eastern side of the Sierra, near the most 'alpine' part of the Sierra, which is called the Palisades. It's right above Bishop and Big Pine, just across the Owens Valley from Grandview Campground and White Mountain Peak.
Most of the eastern escarpment of the Sierra is a steep, fault-defined scarp, but there's this weird portion of it called the 'Coyote Warp'. That's the Coyote Flats area, kind of a big rolling tableland attached to the normally steep Sierran front.
The Palisades are an awesome area, steep alpine peaks around the Sierra's largest glacier (such as it is). Really cool. The hike to the Palisade Glacier is worth it, if a grunt.
Here's a site that's pretty good one-stop shopping for info on 4WD trails in this region:
The 4WD trail to Coyote Flat, though, is looking a little rough. Maybe there's another route, I'm not sure. Plenty of other great places to explore out there, though! Going east from the Owens Valley, one gets into the greater Death Valley region, and this is just red-lining the fun meter. Both the North Pass and South Pass routes into Saline Valley pass through long stretches of high plateaus and rolling hills, several thousand feet up. Tons of good dark country out there, that's for sure. Or, you could go into Saline Valley, soak in the hot springs, and set up your scope and give astro views to your fellow 'clothing optional use area' users.
Mark has brought up an important point, though, by mentioning Coyote Flat. I think that the big frontier in amateur astronomy is going to be in finding ways to anchor one's gear in a 4WD pickup or SUV, so that you can take it into these desert ranges without damaging it. You have to be able to carry an 18" Obsession and camping gear over 50 miles of machine-gun washboards and maybe some rockcrawling. If you can do that, then you've got the entire world opening up before you.
Heck, strap it down, drive the PanAmerican Highway, and go observe in the Atacama! Cerro Tololo, here we come!
Marek
TAC's Golden State Star Party at Mount Lassen
July 11 - 14, 2007 http://www.goldenstatestarparty.org
Received on Thu Apr 26 17:01:13 2007