CA 4 Ebbetts Pass, CA 207, CA 89 Monitor Pass, and CA 108 Sonora Pass

[Max Rockatansky]

Yesterday I took an approximately 360 mile day trip through the Sierra Nevada Mountains.  My path of travel took me over some of California's most scenic mountain passes; CA 4 through Calaveras Big Trees State Park/Pacific Grade Summit/Ebbetts Pass, CA 207, CA 89 over Monitor Pass, and CA 108 over Sonora Pass.  Below is an abridged version of yesterday's pictures (the 24% and 26% grades are real) but the Flickr Album contains the full 756 photo set. 

https://flic.kr/s/aHsmQxsJSs

Some of the non-pictured connecting routes I took were; J59, E15, and CA 49.  I did a similar trip back in 2016 but with lesser camera technology and know how.  That being the case I wanted to get a bunch of new photos to expand on existing highway articles on Gribblenation and do something that was fun.  I did make some observations while I was out and about:

-  CA 207 does have a reassurance shield on-route.  From CA 4 the CA 207 reassurance shields approaching Bear Valley Ski Resort are all overhead on street lamps.
-  I noticed what appeared to be a wagon road just north of Ebbetts Pass north of Silver Creek.  From one of the Division of Highways Maps I looked at it seems that this might have been the original wagon route that serviced Silver Mountain City.  Silver Mountain City was located about five miles east of Ebbetts Pass and was the Alpine County Seat from 1864 to 1875.
-  I found a pretty cool vantage point just south of Monitor Pass which overlooks the sweeping switchbacks.  The only problem was that the fires in Coleville were obscuring the view.
-  Caltrans was repaving the eastern ascent to Sonora Pass on CA 108.  It wouldn't have been all that bad if the pilot car didn't keep stopping on inclines to let people out and pick up other workers.  The old button copy Sonora Pass sign has been replaced with an almost identical vinyl version. 

[Max Rockatansky]

Found an article in the September 1950 CHPW called "Crossing the Sierra" which goes into a deep dive into the history of Trans-Sierra Highway passes.  In particular there is substantial details like the original Ebbetts Pass route before Big Trees Toll Road (modern Ebbetts Pass) was built:

https://archive.org/details/californiahighwa195051calirich/page/n317/mode/2up?q=Ebbetts

[Max Rockatansky]

The opening of Monitor Pass in the September/October 1954 CHPW.

https://archive.org/details/californiahighwa195455calirich/page/n293/mode/2up?q=ebbetts