A field atlas for Tioga Pass
A ridge decides where water goes. Ice can overrun that decision. Infrastructure can rewrite it. And every morning, you climb against it.
A schematic, source-linked model of flow — not a navigation map.
00 / ORIENTATION
Every trace in this atlas answers the same question: what sends what to whom? Natural water follows slope. Electrical energy follows wire. Municipal water follows a licensed conduit. A crossed arrow means a published interpretation was rejected.
01 / HOME AT THE SINK
Mono Lake — Kootzabaa’a — receives snowmelt from the eastern Sierra. In the modern natural system, water leaves chiefly by evaporation. This terminal lake is also the physical, cultural, and spiritual center of the Kootzaduka’a people.
02 / AGAINST GRAVITY
From Lee Vining, the road climbs west toward Tioga Pass. Trail days continue upward to headwater lakes and high divides. Each evening reverses the trace: downhill, downstream, back toward the terminal basin.
03 / CREST AS ROUTER
Elizabeth Lake drains through Unicorn Creek toward the Tuolumne. Cathedral Creek feeds Tenaya Lake, whose outlet continues toward the Merced. The ridge is not scenery behind the system. It is the switch.
04 / ICE OVERRIDES TOPOLOGY
At the Tioga glacial maximum, ice crossed and filled present drainages. But one famous map arrow needed correction: field evidence does not support northeast flow from the Kuna-side basin through Tioga Pass.
05 / NATURAL RECEIVERS
Water from Tioga Lake joins Glacier Creek, upper Lee Vining Creek, and ultimately Mono Lake. The terminal lake’s receiver is the atmosphere: evaporation closes the natural loop.
06 / THE ARTIFICIAL OUTLET
A conduit, reservoir, tunnel, river system, and aqueduct make Los Angeles reachable from a naturally closed basin. That path is possible, not perpetual: every segment is controlled by licenses, lake level, runoff, and operating rules.
07 / SAME WATER, DIFFERENT PAYLOAD
Ellery Lake sends water through a flowline and penstock to Poole Powerhouse. The receiver splits: electricity goes to the grid; water returns to Lee Vining Creek. Hydropower and municipal export are not the same edge.
08 / RULES CHANGE THE GRAPH
The physical conduit stays put. Its operational meaning changes. Choose a date to see which edges are inactive, historical, capped, restored, bypassed, or under review.
09 / HIKES AS DEBUG TRACES
Each destination is both a human effort profile and a watershed query. Select a hike to compare your route with the water’s route away from it.
10 / FREE TRACE
Tap a map node or select a named trace below. The system will expose its verbs, receivers, evidence, and uncertainty.
OBLIQUE FIELD MODEL
Personal journey · Against gravity
Personal journey
Named traces
11 / RETURN
The landscape becomes legible when each lake, creek, cable, conduit, and traveler is treated as part of a routed system — and when uncertainty stays visible.