Well, if the goal is to prevent people from hiking into wilderness areas, it would actually be more effective to block off all major trailheads completely.
National Forests contain many resources, developed at government expense, that can still be safely accessed today. The portion of Mosquito Flats above the next gate below the trailhead provides parking, restrooms, great views, picnicing and fishing. The stream hosts abundant wild brook trout, a few wild brown trout and, most years, hatchery rainbows. Why should these safe opportunities be closed?
Stating that a trail head is open (which is clearly stated on the Little Lakes Valley Trailhead page within the Inyo NF website) is only inviting folks to hike into areas where they should not be hiking.
Only willful criminals and incompetent map readers.
And the "better map" that was posted by Ian B was just a zoomed in section of a CalTopo map, showing the boundary of the Inyo NF.
Yes, a "MapBuilder Topo" base layer. A forest service topo base layer is also available there with the same information. Ian B seems to have been careful enough to include a section on the left that clearly labels the wilderness boundary to those who read maps.
It didn't help in trying to decipher where the unclosed area was located in the map posted by the Inyo NF Service, which clealry shows a section of unclosed wilderness bisecting the entire closed section of Inyo NF.
I find it hard to accept any suggestion that the map posted with the Forest Order shows anything clearly, but the text in the order is accurate and higher resolution maps clearly show the boundries.
Bottom line, no reason for you to act like grumpy smurf here in the message board...
I was not aware that the grumpy smurfs had come out against ignorant map reading. Thank you for that information. I'm sure that they too hope that anyone who intends to travel in wilderness will acquire map reading capability first. There are already a number of well organized hiking groups that also make this suggestion.
Dale B. Dalrymple
