Art in Baker, Nevada

 Baker, Nevada, a tiny hamlet of 150 people on the edge of the Nevada-Utah border, hosts a surprising amount of art for its size. It helps greatly that Baker is the gateway to Great Basin National Park, and the park and Great Basin National Park Foundation have a robust Artist-in Residence program. 

A good place to start your Art Walk in Baker is at the Great Basin Visitor Center. Check out the "Great Basin Triptych: by Kirsten Gjerdset, Darwin Lambert Artist in Residence in 2012, featuring water life, surface life, and cave life. I love all the detail. Just below these paintings is a beautiful wood and metal "Great Basin Table" by Joe Norman, Darwin Lambert Artist in Residence in 2011.

But wait, there's more! Across from the visitor center desk look up and see the gorgeous stained glass window, "Great Basin National Park Panorama" by Kay Malouff, Darwin Lambert Artist in Residence in 2008.

It's a short walk into "downtown" Baker from the visitor center, where you can see this beautiful night sky mural with views of Wheeler Peak and bristlecone pines done by Baker resident Kelly Eichler. 

Across the street, at the Bristlecone General Store, is the "Ring of Fire Eclipse" mural done by Jamie Vincek. This was such a fun event in Baker, and it's cool that we get to remember it this way. (Here's a blog post from that eclipse.) 

At the adjacent Stargazer Inn is one of local resident Donna Kuiper's quilt square paintings-so beautiful!

Behind the Bristlecone General Store, there's a new community/visitor art project each year. Here's the one from 2025:

Not all the art is super obvious--this one is in on main street (Highway 487) next to Soulfood Studios, a local non-profit working to do workshops and share art. How cool!

Down near the gas station is a sign painted by Jamie Vincek: "All Roads Lead to Baker,, Nevada." 

Check out the back side, too!

And guess what? There's still more art being added to the community! A Nevada Arts Council grant is making this bat by talented Meghan Dragon (a previous Arstist in Residence) possible. It's located between the Baker Community Church and Baker Hall (the big pink building in town).

Sometimes it can be hard to have much culture in a remote, tiny town, but we are very fortunate here. 

Here's hoping that the art scene continues to flourish!

Hampton Creek Hike in Winter

We've had such a warm and dry winter that we decided to go up to Hampton Creek in the North Snake Range, White PIne County, Nevada. We found no other vehicles at the trailhead and no snow on the way. Crazy for January!

We did see a dusting of snow on the north-facing slopes.

The 2014 fire has left some very interesting trees. The shrubs and forbs look like they are doing well.

Friends of Nevada Wilderness trail crew have been working on the trail throughout the summer. They started in 2024 as part of a SNPLMA project. It was fun going farther than we had last year.

Some of the burned trees are so statuesque.

It was a partly cloudy day and the color palette was rather bland. But the walking was nice!

The tiny creek is mostly frozen over.

I stopped to photograph this very seedy scat. I think the seeds are primarily from rose hips. Not sure of the animal--fox or smaller is a quick guess.

Emma was making wild gestures to point out a couple bull elk on the opposite hillside. That was unexpected!

The trail crosses a little side canyon creek.

Finn had fun sliding on the ice.

We continued just a little bit more, than realized we needed to get home. The trail kept going, though. I can't wait to go back and see more of it. Having a trail is so much nicer than what I went through when I hiked it in 2020.

The way down was fast and steep. Before long we could see the old mining structures and the parking lot.

I walked down the road to take a closer look at the mining structures. A ponderosa pine survives nearby! We were glad to see a sprinkling of baby ponderosa pines in the drainage.

On the drive back down the canyon, we saw some mini ice waterfalls high up on the cliffs. Fun!

I never thought I would be hiking Hampton Creek in January without any special gear, but it's another weird winter. 

Happy 2026!

Fave Hike: Timber-South Fork Baker, Great Basin National Park

The Timber-South Fork Baker Loop trail is so good I've already done it twice this year. It's about 5 miles (8 km) long and 1600 ft (500 m) elevation gain. It's not easy, but it's so beautiful.

The lower part is relatively flat, but then the trail starts getting into the trees and steeper.

There are always great wildflowers to admire, like this milkvetch.

We chose to go up the steeper Timber Creek side. There are some switchbacks, but we still had to take a number of breathing breaks.

On this late May trip, the aspens were just leafing out near the top.

A big limber pine has died.

Some of the aspens have weird bulges.

We even found a patch of snow!

We had intended to spend some time relaxing in the big meadow at the top, but we heard thunder!

We figured we shouldn't dawdle too long. (And we wondered at the trail signs, some with mileages and some without. It's good to take distances with a grain of salt.)

It started raining on us as we started down the South Fork Baker side, with more thunder. I had been so hot at the beginning of the hike that I had walked in the creek and wetted my shirt. Now, the rain was cooling us off.

We stopped for a selfie once we felt like we were in a safe place.

Most of the trail was tree-free, but this recently fallen one had us scrambling.

This trail is so picturesque!

The lower big meadow only had a few flowers blooming.

The Oregon grape (Mahonia repens) was impressive.

And then we were crossing the last bridges and back to the car.

We fortunately had a final wow--a yellow-bellied marmot!

Just a couple weeks later, I was up in the lower meadow (Baker-South Fork Baker loop, also a lovely hike), and the meadow was full of shooting stars!

This heart-leaf arnica made me laugh. It looks like how I feel most days--giving it my best to stand tall, but definitely a little disheveled and trying to pull it all together.

It's fun to play with the slo mo settings on phones!

A couple weeks after that, it was time to do the Timber-South Fork Baker loop again. This time we had blue skies, no  thunderstorms in the upper meadow. We had nice views of the backside of Wheeler Peak and Doso Doyabi. 

We also enjoyed seeing some very different flowers, like this Rocky Mountain columbine.

In the lower meadow, most of the shooting stars had dimmed, but the bistort was going strong.

Fresh off the Great Basin Bumble Bee BioBlitz, we were ultra-aware of bumble bees. And we saw two!

One of the first things to look for to determine if it's a bumble bee (vs. some other kind of bee or a fly mimic) is the pollen sac on the back leg. And it's really hairy, which is another feature off bumble bees. This lady has a huge yellow one! Then you look at the pattern of the tergites (6 back segments on the abdomen (remember head-thorax-abdomen as the three main body parts of an insect)). This one has some notable orange. 

You can upload photos to iNaturalist for guesses on identifications, as well as the Bumble Bee Atlas.

We spent quite a lot of time with the bees. Then we walked, and I challenged Desert Girl to find an orchid. What?! An orchid in the Great Basin desert? Well, it doesn't grow in dry areas, it certainly likes wet spots and it's rather small, but it's still an orchid.


Isn't it a beauty?

 Hopefully I'll get to hike this trail a couple more times this year and see what other changes I notice. While it's fun to hike new trails to see what's there, it's also great to repeat some faves to see how they change through the seasons.