Fall Color Spotting

Fall color spotting is accessible and magical for folks of all ages and abilities. Good paved roads wind up into the mountains of the Eastern Sierra, where deciduous trees line the roadway and large groves spread out along the mountainside. Trails add an opportunity to get up close and personal with the foliage of the forests. Some are easy and others require a little more time and effort, but all are greatly rewarding.

This is one of the most spectacular places for fall colors in California – if not the country. It is a large area of about 30 square miles where perennial creeks flow into large, high-altitude lakes surrounded by evergreen and deciduous forests laced with hiking trails.

Visit this lakes basin from early to mid-September and, as the days shorten, spend time in the groves that line the roads to these lakes and on the paths into the adjacent wilderness. Exploration on foot from any of the turnouts and trailheads will take you deep into the explosion of color.

Look at our website to find out more about Bishop. The small town with the big backyard.

Fall color spills abundantly down all the canyons of the Eastern Sierra. Within 20-miles of Bishop two wonderful and very different canyons offer everchanging views of the mountains and valleys in colorful fall foliage. Lower Rock Creek canyon is a narrow, riparian canyon with a hiking and biking trail that slices down the escarpment dropping 2,000-feet in under 8-miles. Pine Creek Canyon is a monumental, steep-sided canyon that cuts deep into the tall crest of the Sierra Nevada.

Both canyons have good, paved roads that provide great views of fall colors and other interesting aspects of autumn life in the Eastern Sierra.

Find out more about Fall activities in our big backyard on our website. Click the button below.

Lower down, where the canyons open up to the broad Owens Valley below, the trees are sparse, but the color creeps relentlessly through the ubiquitous high desert scrub. Experience a magical blend of autumnal color with other aspects of this rural community. Take drive through Round Valley and perhaps picnic at Millpond Recration Area. Head back to town along W. Line Street and then pop out to the Bishop Country Club—it’s a lovely spot for breakfast or lunch on their outdoor patio or indoor dining room. Cruise the Warm Springs Rd. loop for a magnificent view of the Sierra Nevada, White Mountains, and Owens River in the splendor of fall.

Here's everything you always wanted to know about fall. Click the button below.

There are signs and sounds of life everywhere. There are deer in the canyon and birds in the trees. Stand quietly and feel the energy of life as is shifts from one season to the next.