Return to Great Basin National Park

Return to Great Basin National Park

[Music] today on rock the park that is really incredible we’re back in the land of one of our most challenging adventures that’s amazing to check up on a past mission the data loggers you installed provided data that we can use and for a rematch with a beast of a mountain along rocky and grueling stretch this is Great Basin National Park I can feel it literally I can feel it in my lungs it is just so awesome up here and it all starts right now this is exciting [Music] I’m Jack Stewart this is the real deal and I’m Colton Smith we’ve been buddies for years always in search of the next adventure dude what was that we share a passion for our national parks and other wild places around the world I am heading off the beaten path pushing our limits and experiencing nature’s best kept secret it’s how we rock the park [Music] one of the things we love about our national parks is no matter how many times we visit we’re guaranteed to have a completely different experience every time all right we are back in Great Basin National Park Great Basin is bursting with natural treasures from the oldest trees on earth – spectacular caverns below ground and Nevada second tallest mountain soaring above we love Great Basin this park is absolutely amazing but we’ve got some unfinished business with this place two years ago we tried to summit the 13,000 foot we were peak but early snow cover and the clock worked against us we’re not gonna make it man we’re so close we just ran out of daylight if we were to go up this we’d be coming down in the dark and that’s not safe it’s the right call it really is this time around we’re determined to reach the summit Great Basin National Park is in eastern Nevada about 300 miles north of Las Vegas it gets its name from the high desert between the Sierra Nevadas and the Wasatch Mountains but before we start climbing we’ve got a date in the opposite direction so we’re here bright and early before really the park is even open to meet up with an old friend an old friend who sent us on quite the adventure last time we installed climate data recorders in a cave with barely enough room to crawl through and it was the adventure of a lifetime we’ve done some serious caving that cave was terrifying I still wake up with the cold sweats thinking about it push it you got it push it yeah you did it we got lost and almost got stuck a few times but in the end we accomplished our mission I think this is it this is number two all right yes we had a pretty harrowing experience in there but we placed some data loggers deep within the cave so one of the things we’re gonna do while we’re back here you see if we actually were able to do any good hijack we’re catching back up with ecologist Gretchen Baker who tells us those thermometers have been doing their job the data loggers you installed provided data that we can use so we actually did it right something yeah that is cool today hello though let’s go into Lehman caves and it’s a beautiful cave very different experience than little muddy alright today we’re exploring one of the highlights of the park a cavern that was discovered by a local rancher named Absalom Lehman in 1885 and he came down into here and it kept going that’s what I love about caves it’s so funny to me how there could be no hole or there could be a hole this big but then if you get through that it opens up to just these massive rooms Leeman is what’s called a solution cave because it’s been formed by chemicals in water slowly dissolving the rock to create these openings two miles of passageways and caverns make this the longest known cave in Nevada let me test my cave terminology I could use a refresher myself stalactites are the ones that hang tight to the ceiling and come down to spike mites might reach the ceiling exactly so if the waters dripping slowly then the calcite has more time to deposit at the top but if it’s dripping faster it’s going down to the bottom and then that calcite is building up from the bottom up and then if they do connect then it’s a column correct that’s right and that’s just for starters check out these formations in what looks like the underside of a garden believe it or not scientists aren’t really sure how these forms we call these turnip stalactites and they have that big bulge in the middle we haven’t really seen these forms we have a couple times though seeing a bubble at the end of a stalactite and so possibly if there’s a bubble that stays long enough the calcite will form on the outside part of the bubble and so that’s one hypothesis interesting but ecologists do know what causes this 50-foot tall flowing feature we’re in the music room is that because it looks like organ pipes it does these are actually called draperies created when calcite rich water runs down an overhanging wall and the water just flows along the wall and slowly deposits of calcite and look at this when a drapery is striped by different levels of mineral deposits it’s called cave bacon for obvious reasons no but among all these formations Lehman is best known for its hundreds of cave shields this is an area called the Grand Palace oh wow yeah so that’s our parachute shield one of the most famous shields in this cave shields are huge discs that form when calcite rich water is forced under pressure through a cave wall or ceiling there’s extra water that comes out from that crack then it can run over the cave shield and decorate it even more with stalactites and draperies yeah you can definitely see the circular shape up there but then all of the stalactites are just so beautiful that is really incredible that’s amazing since you two helped out with the data loggers and little muddy would you like to go deeper into the cave and see a data logger site we have that’s fairly comparable to what we found in little muddy of course early Darney tight squeezes for this guy are there oh we could make one no we don’t have to okay actually we’re heading to a spot few visitors ever get to see this is incredible [Music] we’re in Nevada’s Great Basin National Park getting an update on some cave research we helped with a few years ago and we’re learning about some of the creatures that live underground in places like Lehmann cave here packrat mid-pack rats or wood rats and a midden is a gnarly pile of leaves animal bone seeds and other debris that rats collect in store by their nests and they build it up over time don’t they pass it on like the new generation to generation to generation and some of them the area have been dated to thousands of years old yeah this cave dweller is unique to Great Basin this is the Lehmann cave pseudoscorpion the one on the cave wall is dead but this video shows a living scorpion and it’s the top and vertebrate predator in the cave you can see it’s pretty small and it’s called a pseudo scorpion because it doesn’t have a stinging tail they’re not harmful to humans but they’re still deadly to their prey it’ll inject venom into its prey and that paralyzes it that venom comes from poison glands in their pincers from here we’re heading to a spot that’s been closed to most visitors since 1981 we are gonna be going off trail that’s why we need the helmets the lights and the gloves we just need to take precautions on our footing mainly okay okay we’re gonna go down this long passage and then take a climb up into the Telus Room which is the biggest room in liman cave the thallus room gets its name from the loose rocks called talas under our feet so here are our data loggers in the talus room this little research device is measuring the atmospheric conditions in this part of Liman cave so I actually have the ones that you guys set up these are the exact data loggers that we placed deep within a little muddy cave so let me show you what those data loggers did okay yes the temperature which is this red line and the relative humidity which is this green line and they recorded that every hour from November until June of the next year Wow this temperature is about 52 point one degrees Fahrenheit and that’s the same that we’re getting with these data loggers here in the Telus room and what you collected with these data loggers was our baseline data so we’re gonna keep collecting that data and then when we look at it and analyze it in the future we can see if it’s changing so if you did see a variation in the temperature what exactly would that mean so we’re expecting that over time that the temperature in the caves are gonna be getting warmer because of climate change so that can affect what lives in the cave because they’re adapted to a very steady climate with little alterations since we’re in the talus room do you want to see some more of it oh yeah yes absolutely Wow check it out this is incredible here we are in the big part of the Tallis room we’re over a hundred feet underground and is this the biggest cavern in the entire cave that’s right this room is over 1 football field long well this is enormous I said we’ve got some writing down here some big writing we have some inscriptions on here from 1885 oh my gosh this is actually done with charcoal those will be there for a long long time that’s right early visitors saw these messages as a point of pride nowadays this kind of writing isn’t just discouraged it’s illegal that’s a good reminder to not leave your own mark on these caves because it’ll stick around for so long exactly now before we leave can we turn off our lights just to get the full dark experience sure all right guys here we go three two one Wow imagine trying to crawl out of here with that you couldn’t and luckily we don’t have to it’s time to trade the underground for the Alpine yes we’ve got a date with destiny we’re climbing a mountain now [Music] we’re on a return visit to Great Basin National Park for a rematch with wheeler P the tallest mountain in the park and the second tallest in the entire state of Nevada we were here a few years ago as you guys know and we did not make it to the summit last time we had a rough go of things is it not poking someone’s don’t work in our water filter froze on us that delayed us and then it was slow going and we ran out of daylight things went wrong and we couldn’t make it so we’re back and we’re gonna get to the top of this thing yeah this is gonna be amazing this is it we are ready to go we’re looking at a little over four miles to get up to the summit so I got trekking poles plenty of water plenty of food we’re just prepared for anything because one way or another we’re making it to the top of wheeler peak we’re setting off in a grove of quaking Aspen’s trees that get their nickname from the way their leaves seemed to tremble in the breeze Great Basin is best known for its Bristlecone pines the oldest trees on earth they can survive thousands of years in very harsh conditions we get to hike through some spectacular forests and this one is no different we often forget how just incredibly important our trees and forests are toh really our way of living and life on this planet our forests are considered the lungs of our earth these trees absorb enormous amounts of carbon dioxide and they act as almost a purification system taking that carbon dioxide out of the air and producing this clean oxygen that we need to wake up to take that deep breath to climb mountains it’s amazing and we’re not the only ones enjoying this there’s a ton of wildlife out here right now we’re keeping an eye and ear out for elk they’re heading into the rut their mating season so it’s not uncommon to hear their bugle call which they use to challenge other males and organize their herds we’re getting close to where we’re gonna break out a tree line and from there things are gonna get more and more dramatic and a hike is gonna get much more challenging we’ve already got about a mile covered and three more to go all right we’re getting closer to breaking out a tree line this is where we start to go up this hike has three distinct sections you’ve got the forest then you break out of the tree line and make your way up to the ridge then it’s the long push along rocky and grueling stretch but it is a straight shot you know it’s determined as we are to make it to the top you never know what’s gonna happen that’s why to me it’s always important to just enjoy the journey and one of the things that I love about this park is you can see all the way down into the valley and that is a long drop I mean thousands of feet and it’s what really gives this park its name the Great Basin which is down there I’m an ridgeline here we go only gets harder from here think about this for join is if you look up top you can see that way way up there and once we reach that point not even quotes that’s what’s crazy about this the ridge has all these different humps that are deceiving so it’s all about just taking it one step at a time when we hit this point on our last trip it wasn’t the fall summit slowing us down the snow is making every step just so much harder the moment your foot hits the ground it just sinks just like that and that lift and sink and a lift and sink it just wears on you thankfully we’ve got a fairly clear path ahead today we’re climbing the mountain now we are making great progress we just hit the top of that major fall summit we’re basically at the point where last time we had to look at one another and at you and say that’s the end of this trip yeah it’s about a high point we are up probably now at about 12,000 feet but man I’ve got energy for days you know we’re feeling good we’re making good timing but I gotta say that final stretch up the ridge to the summit looks steep now we can see it what do you think onward it’s the final round in our rematch with this mountain we are getting so close to the summit I can feel it literally I can feel it in my lungs this is excited we’re closing in on 13,000 feet in our second attempt to touch the top of we were peak in Great Basin National Park we are getting so close to the summit I can feel it literally I can feel it in my lungs it is just so awesome up here this was a mountain that when we came up short we knew we were gonna come back and we’re gonna climb this thing almost there this is excited never had so much energy gonna have to somebody in my life it could be a final ridge Wow look at that we are literally like 50 feet below the summit on the final Ridgeline we’ve been looking this way the entire day and now we finally have a view of what is on the other side of this mountain and it is epic it’s another epic Ridgeline this is just phenomenal that’s why climbing mountains is so rewarding all right last 50 feet haha yes wheeler peak we’re back we made it man oh man was that worth the wait look at this view unbelievable I think it’s incredible to stand on the summit right now but I also feel really good about stopping last time you know yeah mountains are powerful places having the guts to make the decision to stop I think was such a wise choice because you live to climb another day here we are we got back and to tell you the truth it makes it so much more reward totally these places are so incredibly special because of what they bring out in you and that drive that we had today waking up and just saying like there’s no way we are standing on that mountain peak today there’s no buts about it these places just they pump life into you Great Basin National Park is a special place I love this state so much and I Drive through it all the time so now looking up at this peak I’m gonna be able to say I stood on top of that the nice feeling to finally be able to say that and this is a reminder of why we fight to preserve these amazing places so we can keep coming back time and time again to experience them in new ways hey if we can do it so can you so the next chance you get go out and rock the party [Music] you everybody thanks for watching make sure to leave any questions or comments that you have and please subscribe to the channel there’s a lot more to come you

Great Basin National Park is in eastern Nevada and about 300 miles north of Las Vegas. It gets it name from the high deserts between Sierra Nevada and the Wasatch Range. Great Basin National Park is best from its bristlecone pines which are on of the oldest trees on earth. In this episode of Rock The Park, Jack and Colton are back for a rematch with Wheeler Peak – 13,000 ft summit. Don’t fret. This time around, the guys are determined to reach the summit.

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Rock the Park is an Emmy award-winning adventure series seen every Saturday on ABC featuring our national parks and other public lands across America and the world. Now in its 6th season, Jack Steward and Colton Smith go off the beaten path to explore magnificent landscapes, incredible wildlife and all the exciting ways to immerse yourself in and around nature. Whether it’s swimming with sea turtles, climbing to the top of a volcano or repelling into a glacier, Jack and Colton are living life to the fullest and inspiring others to do the same.

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