Mono Lake is a majestic body of water covering about 65 square miles. It is an ancient lake, over 1 million years old -- one of the oldest in North America. It has no outlet.
Throughout its long existence, salts and minerals have washed into the lake from Eastern Sierra streams. Freshwater evaporating from the lake each year has left the salts and minerals behind so that the lake is now about 2 1/2 times as salty and 80 times as alkaline as the ocean.
The Mono Lake Tufa State Reserve was established to preserve the spectacular "tufa towers," calcium-carbonate spires and knobs formed by interaction of freshwater springs and alkaline lake water. The most popular area for visitors is "South Tufa". However, by venturing down sandy 4WD trails followed by a little hiking and bushwacking it is possible to find totally secluded and even more beautiful areas. Many of the photos here were taken at a more easterly section of the lake, where both the large 'carbonate' tufa and the fantastically delicate and intricate sand tufa can be found.
The water level in Mono Lake reached its lowest level for 20 years in 2015 (6379 ft above sea level), only 7 ft higher than its historic low before the legal settlements curtailed diversion of inflows by LA DWP.
With the miniscule snowpack and continuing drought the water will likely drop further, but an additional fall of only 2 ft will trigger a clause requiring DWP to suspend diversion of all waters flowing into the lake. [See here for a recent discussion.] The low water level made the South Tufa area look rather scruffy, with a wide 'bathtub' ring of wet mud and broken fragments of tufa, but the level is now rising.. |