A blog post on my recently completed hiking trip on the John Muir Trail.
[Author's note: my apologies in advance for the length of this post -- this is a pretty big blob. Then again, it was a long hike!]
The John Muir Trail ("JMT" for short) is a section of the Pacific Crest Trail in California that runs from Yosemite Valley and winds its way south for about 210 miles to Mount Whitney-- it covers some of the highest-elevation and most beautiful parts of the Sierras.
I've had my eye on this hike for many years now, but until recently it was a pipe dream of the most vaporous and insubstantial sort: no way that I could get off enough time from work, and even if I had the time, I wasn't going to saddle Amy with solo child-wrangling for the amount of time it would take to go on that sort of expedition.
This last fall when our youngest went off to college I started thinking about it again, and after some research I decided that I would give it a go the next summer.
By the numbers, the JMT is a pretty intimidating hike (at least for someone in his mid fifties!). It runs about 210 miles (plus more if you need to hike off-trail to resupply); there is about 40 thousand feet of elevation gain (and roughly same number for descent), and the average elevation is quite high, probably between 9 and 10 thousand feet. To add to this, there are big chunks of the trail where you are between resupply points, meaning that you have to be prepared to carry seven to eight days of food at certain stages (e.g. heavy packs). On the plus side, there are really good books and maps and websites, so you can plan and prepare well in advance for what's coming.
There are so many people who want to hike the JMT that the rangers who take care of the various parks it runs through have put a lottery-based permit system into place, to insure that the whole thing isn't swamped. There are a limited number of spots to camp along the way, and if the floodgates were left completely open it would not be a good situation.
So, a lottery: you put your name into the hat well ahead of time (almost 6 months in advance), give a range of start dates (e.g. "I'm willing to start my hike any time between July 1st and August 5th") and then each day they draw a certain number of names.
I picked out my starting range in December of 2019 and sent in my application this last January, and incredibly, my name was picked within just a couple of weeks (this represents a huge stroke of luck, since the overall acceptance rate for a given application is very low, on the order of 5%). There were whoops of joy on my part, and much anticipation of a great hike to come in the summer time.
Of course, around the time that I was receiving my good news, buried in the back sections of the newspaper were the first few articles describing some sort of new virus in Wuhan China... experts not worried however... definitely no cause for alarm... will surely be cleared up no doubt in a short amount of time, yada yada.
Fast forward to the end of March, and my earlier elation had turned into utter despair: Yosemite was completely closed (as well as all the other national parks and forests incident on the JMT); the season for the full Pacific Crest Trail hike had been cancelled, and hikers were being actively discouraged from any trips. It was clear that if things didn't change, there was no way a JMT hike could happen; I was pretty depressed about it, but resigned to try again another year.
Then the roller coaster hit bottom and began to head upwards again. At the end of May there were rumors that Yosemite would be opening again in June on a limited basis, and in the first week of June (close to my birthday) I got an email from the Yosemite rangers saying that they would be letting people onto the trailheads again starting in July: my trip was once again a "go" !!!.
My permit was for two people, so back in late Jan and Feb I had been spending time trying to recruit friends and family to come along with me on my hike. I started with my kids, but to my astonishment neither one of them was interested-- they had other things they wanted to do that summer. After casting my circle around for a bit more, I was able to recruit Stephen, a friend of my sister-in-law, who had loads of experience with long-haul hiking on the east coast, and was interesting in trying out a long hike on the west coast.
A lot of my hiking gear was pretty elderly, so I did wind up buying a new pack, tent, and sleeping bag for the trip, so as to have gear that was a bit more modern / reliable / lightweight. More on that later.
I also decided that it wouldn't be a good idea to step right off the plane and onto the JMT, better to have at least a few warm-up hikes at altitude to acclimatize. So I booked an AirBNB in Mammoth Lakes CA for a few days prior to my official JMT start date to allow for day hikes. Mammoth Lakes is known mainly as a ski destination in the winter, but you can also rent a condos pretty easily during the summer, as it turns out.
I was also able to convince Ethan to accompany me on this part of the hike, which was great. We flew out together to Reno, stayed overnight at the house of my grad school friend Ervan (of Bosnia motorcycling fame), and then drove down Highway 395 the next day.
Day hikes were fine-- we did one in Yosemite (a big loop around the May Lakes), one up to Duck Lake (from a trailhead only a 15 min drive from our condo), and then a third day hiking around the Devil's Postpile area, which was interesting.
My hiking partner Stephen flew out a bit later, arriving in Mammoth Lakes to stay with us at the condo the night before our hike was to begin. In the morning we piled into the rental car and Ethan drove us into Yosemite to the trailhead where we were scheduled to start.
After reading up and talking things over, Stephen and I had decided that we would plan the logistics (supply, etc) for our trip under the assumption that we'd be covering about 10 miles a day, so we packed up food and mailed off packages to a couple of the outfits that offered to help with resupply. Oddly, that turned out to be a bit more stressful than I had anticipated, since one key resupply place was very slow in returning emails + phone calls (so slow that I wasn't sure they were still in business). We did finally get confirmation that all the packages arrived however by the night before our start date.
Our starting trailhead for the hike was Toluomne Meadows-- this cuts off an earlier section of the JMT that runs through Yosemite Valley, but from what we heard later on from other hikers, we didn't miss much. The initial section of the JMT here runs along Lyell Canyon, which is idyllic and green, with beautiful meadows and occasional glimpses of the river and no elevation gain to speak of -- a very gentle introduction to the JMT indeed. Our plan was to reach the end of the canyon and camp partway up the ascent to Donahue pass, which worked out well.
Couple of miles into the trail:
The first uphill section was a rude shock after the flat stuff earlier in the day; both Stephen and I were very winded in short order (Stephen was also feeling a bit queasy from the altitude, but he soldiered on). We eventually made it to a good campsite around 4.
We did encounter a couple of rangers about 2 or 3 miles before the end of our hike, a young man and young woman; they checked our permit and quizzed us to make sure we were carrying bear canisters, etc.
First campsite:
First dinner of the trip; I expected to be famished, but wasn't really all that hungry after all (altitude can do funny things in this regard sometimes).
The next day we were up around 6, had our breakfast, got packed up, and headed off to tackle Donahue Pass, the first of our many passes to cross.
In planning the hike I had worried a lot about the passes, since with the combination of high altitude, long ascents, and heavy packs, I assumed that these parts of the hike would be the most unpleasant -- I imagined that if I could just suffer through getting up over and down again, then I could enjoy the other parts of the hike.
In reality, hiking the passes turned out to be one of my absolute favorite parts of the JMT -- the climbing was exhilarating and not exhausting, and the views at the top were always rewarding. I think this was partly because we picked our campsites and hiking routes carefully to ensure that we crossed the passes early in the morning when we were fresh, as opposed to doing them in the later parts of the day when we were tired.
Start of the hike, sun hitting the ridge to the west:
Donahue Pass had excellent views, also an unexpected burst of cell coverage (no doubt from the cell towers at the Mammoth ski area, which was visible in the distance), so we both took a few minutes to read emails and send messages. View south:
Nice lunch break (with post-lunch siesta) at the top of Island pass (one of the lower-elevation passes), then we went past a series of lovely alpine lakes -- Shadow Lake, Emerald Lake, Ruby Lake, Thousand Island Lake, and finally made it to Garnet Lake, where we decided to camp. Longish day, 11 miles.
We had a bit of rain in the afternoon around 4:30 or so, but by that time we had already made camp, so we could just wait it out in our tents. I should add that this was very light rain (I don't think we ever got anything close to heavy rain during the hike).
Wildflowers along the trail:
Second campsite:
This picture is also a good illustration of how thin and light the walls are on this particular tent (ZPacks Duplex) -- it's a fantastically lightweight tent, but sometimes you get a sort of "sleeping inside a plastic bag" feeling when using it:
Our third day took us mostly downwards (no big passes) on our way to the Devil's Postpile area. This section of the trail also has some very nice lakes, including Shadow Lake and Rosalie Lake. The end of the hike put us within striking range of the first trailside resupply place, Red's Meadow, but we decided that it would be better to camp a bit short of Red's and then hike in to eat breakfast there in the morning.
View looking back at Garnet Lake on our hike-out in the morning:
There was also some fire damage in the area where we were hiking:
A note on water: the climate in this area of the Sierras is fiercely dry, and the combination of hot sun, dry air, and constant exercise means that you are losing moisture from your body at an alarming rate every day. This in turn means that you have to be very careful about drinking enough water (drinking even when you are not even all that thirsty, which takes some doing).
On the flip side, in spite of the very dry conditions, there is so much snowmelt in the mountains that you very seldom have to worry about finding water (you can count on encountering streams and other water sources on a very regular basis). This in turn means that you don't have to carry all that much-- except for a couple of instances toward the south end of the JMT I never carried much more than a liter and a half or so of water.
The next day (day 4) we packed up early and hit the trail with the intention of having breakfast at Red's Meadow. This section of the trail is also extremely sandy -- feels like you are walking along a beach. Took a little longer than I had anticipated, but we did finally get there around 7:30am. There was a pretty decent group of hikers there eating breakfast and reorganizing their packs.
Red's has an active horse-centric operation; lots of folks go there to take trail rides on an equine rental:
Back on the trail after breakfast:
Red's is at a low-ish point on the trail, so we had to contend with a two thousand foot climb to get back up out of the valley, but we made very good progress, and by around 1 or so we'd made it to the junction with Deer Creek. We'd originally thought about stopping to camp here, but we both felt pretty fresh, so we decided to continue on and try to camp at the Duck Lake trail junction, which added on almost another six miles (giving us a total of 14 for the day, definitely a long haul). The section from Deer Creek to Duck Lake jct was beautiful, though -- hiking mostly level down a long + windy valley with nice views to the west. We were aided by some late cloud cover as well (that made the extra 6 mile stretch a lot nicer, without being blasted by the sun).
On the way, view ahead is of the Red Cones:
This was the first day that I tried using my solar charger, which was a late addition to my gear for the trip. I decided to go low-budget, ordering a bare-bones anonymous charger from a Chinese "electronics marketplace" website, then tied haphazardly to the top of my backpack with a cable running to a battery in a side pocket. My gamble apparently paid off-- after a day of sunshine I was able to use the battery to recharge my phone, yay.
Next day (day 5), we had our first couple of mishaps: Stephen managed to misplace his JMT "Pocket Atlas" book of maps. We looked around for it at the campsite and on the trail nearby, but no luck. We still had my paper maps (Tom Harrison) and Stephen had his cellphone app (Guthook), so we were still in ok shape map-wise even with the loss. In addition, he also managed to bruise a couple of his ribs on a rock during a fall (I've had bruised ribs from playing soccer, they are definitely no fun).
We eventually were our way, however. Nice hike past Lake Virginia, then a big descent down to Tully Hole. This was one of those trail sections where you thank your lucky stars you are going down and not up-- endless switchbacks one after the other, very dry and dusty. Once we got down the bottom of the "Hole" however then we had to hike back up on the other side of the valley, so a steep hike up to regain altitude again. We decided not to try to cross Silver Pass (next big one coming up) but instead camp just a bit short at Squaw Lake.
Morning sun just before we got started for the day:
In the evening, a second equipment-related mishap: I discovered while getting ready for bed that my sleeping pad was not holding air once inflated (eek). I made a hasty inspection of it (at this point the light was already fading) and did manage to find one small hole, which I went ahead and patched (this particular pad had a patch kit tucked inside the cover). Alas, this did not do the trick, pad didn't hold air even after the patch. I gave up and slept on hard ground for the night.
The source of the holes in the pad is still something of a mystery to me. I certainly wasn't doing anything horrible/abusive to the pad, just putting my sleeping bag on it and occasionally lying on it in my hiking clothes while resting in the afternoon. The inside of my tent wasn't perfectly clean, but there wasn't any sharp debris aside from a bit of sand and a few pine needles.
Our camping spot the previous night at Squaw Lake had put us within striking range of our next resupply point along the trail, Vermilion Valley Ranch ("VVR"). VVR is known as one of the most hiker-friendly spots along the way, and features a cafe, a store, showers, and places for JMT hikers to camp (all the reviews are good). It is located at the western end of Lake Edison, a fairly largish man-made lake.
To encourage visit from hikers, VVR runs a ferry service, so if you arrive at the appointed time in the afternoon you can step on the ferry and then save yourself a four mile hike on the trail to the resort, so we decided we would go with this option,
Start of the hike, view back to the north from Silver Pass:
After crossing Silver Pass we made good time on the descent, and wound up parked at the ferry dock in plenty of time. Lots of other hikers there; we had time to chat and ask people about which trails they had been on.
I had a refreshing swim in Mono Creek (which flows into the lake at that point) and spent a half hour or so inflating and dunking my misbehaving sleeping pad in the creek to try to find any additional leaks. I located two additional holes (which explained why it didn't hold air after my first patching job).
The ferry boat (a not-especially-large pontoon boat) did eventually turn up, and thankfully all of the assembled hikers were able to squeeze on. Pile of packs on the ferry deck:
Here is a photo of my miserable malfunctioning sleeping pad (just before I started applying patches to the second and third holes):
While dinner at VVR was tasty, the so-called "hiker's campground" was located quite close to the "hiker's campfire", an area set up for people to stay up and socialize. This turned out to be problematic, since folks were still congregating at the campfire talking and making noise well into the evening (these were not hikers, but other people who were using the car-camping spots at the resort and had brought along coolers of beer, etc).
I did my best to get to sleep in spite of the racket but was unsuccessful-- eventually around 11:30 I got up and went out to read them the riot act. It took about a half hour after that for things to really wind down. To make matters worse, my patched sleeping pad was still not staying inflated -- instead of a flat pad after 10 minutes, I now had a flat pad after an hour (meaning that I must have missed a hole), so I spent another night sleeping on hard ground, ugh.
In the morning, a piece of good luck however: a couple from New Hampshire that we'd met along the trail mentioned to Stephen that they were ending the hike at VVR. At breakfast I bumped into them and asked if they would sell me one of their sleeping pads for cash, which they agreed to. I was pretty happy about that, and I quickly handed over a wad of bills in exchange for nice Thermarest pad (a lightweight model too, yay). Whew!
The breakfast at VVR was quite good -- I ordered a breakfast burrito, and it was so tasty that I went back and ordered a second one.
Then another mishap (not equipment related this time) -- Stephen managed to break a tooth while eating his breakfast. It was a pretty clean break (large chunk separated off); as best as he could tell it didn't have anything to do with the meal, the break must have been developing for a while. After much discussion and consultation with the guy running the VVR store, he decided that it wouldn't make sense to try to get it looked at right away. Seeing a dentist would have meant a very lengthy drive back into Fresno... and even if he made Fresno ok, there was no guarantee that any of the dentists there would see him (given that he could still eat while chewing carefully, it probably didn't constitute a dental "emergency"). So he made the decision to keep going and get the tooth looked at after we were back in MA.
At that point we hit the trail. We had missed the shuttle bus out to the trailhead, so we had to walk from the resort (no big deal, just added to the mileage for the day). From VVR if you are not taking the ferry, there are two trails you can take that will bring you back up and onto the JMT: the "Bear Ridge" trail, and the "Bear Creek" trail. The latter is a tiny bit shorter, and we had heard slightly scary stories about Bear Ridge, so we opted for the second choice.
To get to the Bear Creek trail from VVR, you have to take a short spur trail called the "Bear Creek Cutoff". This hike is about 3 miles, and has a climb (8 or 9 hundred feet) followed by the similar descent. It was a straightforward hike, but impressively dry -- felt as though we were hiking through the desert. The Bear Creek trail is still quite dry at the lower elevations, but the creek is quite large and lovely. The trail gets progressively steeper and wetter as you hike along, until towards the end of the trail when approaching the JMT it almost seems like something out of New England. Wet territory also means bugs, however, and I was having to swat a lot of insects as we went along.
Just as we were almost to the JMT junction, I had had enough and decided to put on long pants and a bug net, so I set my pack down and started fishing for my longer clothes. At that point I was absolutely attacked by mosquitoes -- huge clouds of them gathered and zoomed in for the kill while I was frantically wrestling with my pack (Stephen later on said that it looked like a scene out of a horror movie).
One thing I should add at this point: Stephen is about the most mosquito-resistant person I have ever met. For one thing, the bugs don't seem to be all that interested in him in the first place-- for every bug that actually decided to land on him, five or ten would decide to visit me. Then when he does get bitten, the bites didn't really bother him (he said that they don't itch for the most part, nor do the bites swell up). Very handy super-power to have if you like to go hiking...
Once I was geared up and we started hiking again, the bugs slacked off appreciably, which was a relief for me. We were both pretty tired-- long mileage day and lots of elevation gain, so we did our best to find a campsite as soon as we could. Found a suitable spot before too long and were happy to pitch our tents at that point.
Day 8: broke camp on the early side and get set to cross Selden Pass. The hike up was not too difficult, and the views on top were decent, although not quite as nice as Silver or Donahue. From there it was a pretty easy downhill hike for the remainder of the day.
En route:
On the way, photo of Marie Lakes:
At the pass, looking back to the north:
Looking south after descending a bit from the pass. I believe this is Heart Lake:
The next set of lakes was quite lovely, the Sally Keyes lakes. I was thinking about a swim at this point but when we started to get closer I realized that the sides of the lakes were lined with people fishing, so I held off. When we looked a little closer at the folks fishing something seemed a little odd: they didn't look like hikers at all (in spite of the elevation and remote location of the lakes), then it eventually dawned on us that they must have been clients/customers at Muir Trail Ranch, and that they arrived at the lake on top of a horse or a mule as opposed to on foot.
We eventually found a campsite not too far from where the trail crosses Senger Creek, which put us in good striking distance of Muir Trail Ranch the next day. MTR was an important stop for us, since we were picking up our first and largest resupply package there.
Relaxing in the tent after dinner:
At this point in the trip my knees and ankles were holding up ok, but I did manage to pick up one blister. Kind of a tricky spot for it, too, since the tape doesn't hold very well. I just did my best with it.
Day 9: big descent down to Muir Trail Ranch in the morning.
On the trail:
Visiting Muir Trail Ranch is about as different from visiting Vermillion Valley Resort as you can imagine. VVR rolls out the red carpet for hikers and does their best to make you feel at home, whereas at MTR they actively try to hold you at arms length. [NB: given that MTR's main paying clientele are the older folks who visit in order to be carried mule-back up to the lakes to fish, I suppose it makes sense to keep hikers separate, but it still had a very unfriendly vibe to it.]
The cold shoulder starts even before you actually arrive there-- about a quarter mile or so before you hit the place, you come upon a hand-written sign attached to a trail marker telling you that "For hiker resupply, take the Blaney Hot Springs trail. Do not use the trail to MTR, if you hike down you will need to hike back up", or something to this effect. We dutifully took the side trail and in a few minutes came up on what looked like a large purpose-built shed.
We did as instructed, collected our resupply buckets and began packing food into our bear canisters. There was a pretty decent crowd of other hikers, and in fact there was plenty of food sharing going on. Both Stephen and I had extra food which we were able to unload into the arms of several other hikers who were running short.
My trusty backpack with a now stuffed-to-the-brim bear canister. The packs at this point were as heavy as they were going to get for this trip.
We finished up in a half hour or so and hit the trail-- no reason to hang around any longer than needed.
Encountered on the JMT a couple of miles from MTR, a team of two horses and four mules:
Couple of bridge crossings:
Around the point where Piute Creek joins the San Joaquin the trail starts to head upwards a bit (most of the first part of the hike had been pretty flat) and at that point the scenery gets even more beautiful -- rivers a little fiercer, canyon walls a little steeper.
We made the climb up into Evolution Valley (heavy packs, ugh) and in spite of it being late in the day we decided to push on for a couple of miles, so as to leave ourselves better positioned for the pass the next day. We found a spot a mile or two short of McClure Meadow and made camp there.
We were not quite sure what campsite to target -- we wanted to get close to Muir Pass, but we had some conflicting information about which lakes were suitable, so I thought we might try to stop in at the McClure Meadow ranger station and ask for advice.
Also this sign. Have to say, this guy had a heck of a lot of nerve, heading out to hike/ski the Sierra High route at the end of February.
On the trail:
Trail was pretty dry, but the river at the bottom of the valley (San Joaquin) was very lovely.
Leaving the John Muir Wilderness and entering King's Canyon National Park:
In many of the "high snow" years folks who hike the JMT have to do dozens and dozens of stream crossings-- the summer that we hiked the JMT, the snowpack was about a third below average, so we didn't have to do a lot of that. We did have one crossing around lunchtime that day:
You can't see it very well from the photo above, but there is sort of hole or deep section in the middle that makes for a good place to swim, so I took advantage of that.
We also had our first of several encounters here with a big group of women from L.A. who were doing a section hike in the area (we ran into them a bunch of times over the next few days, since they were hiking at about the same rate we were). They were a lively bunch.
Day 10: Today we hiked most of the length of Evolution Valley. It has a very glacial look and feel to it -- when you look at the valley/canyon walls you can kind of imagine a big lump of ice sitting on top and grinding away the pointy bits.
We were not quite sure what campsite to target -- we wanted to get close to Muir Pass, but we had some conflicting information about which lakes were suitable, so I thought we might try to stop in at the McClure Meadow ranger station and ask for advice.
Photos of the meadow along the way. Lots of deer here, many of them quite tame (not afraid of humans at least):
When we got to the ranger station, however, we encountered this sign (first of several of this sort that we saw along the hike):
Evolution Lake:
Finally we made it to Sapphire Lake and made camp on the eastern bank. Not much cover, but at least there was some flat ground.
I had visions of having a nice 2 hour long nap after lunch, but this turned out to be more difficult than I thought. At mid-day the sun is so strong you really want to be under some sort of cover, but at a campsite like this (above treeline) your only option is your tent (which was uncomfortably warm inside). I wound up packing myself into a slice of shade created by a large boulder... kind of weird, but it worked.
Both Stephen and I took advantage of the extra time to do some laundry (as usual for me, my hat and my hiking shirt, which really needed it). Annoyingly an hour or so later in the afternoon it began to rain, so we had to hustle out to grab the laundry off the line. The rain at a certain point turned to hail-- that was a first for me on a hiking trip (been rained on and snowed on, but I don't think I've ever been hailed on while hiking).
After dinner I hiked up the wall of the valley a bit to get some better views. Here's a shot of our campsite from above (looking roughly west):
Mount Huxley to the south:
Mid point of the trip about now.
At this point it's worth adding a note about what was happening mentally on the trip, as opposed to just the physical stuff and the day to day detail.
A hike of this length is not just about physical exercise and experiencing the outdoors, it's also a sort of mental journey. You are leaving behind a lot of "stuff" from your normal life for one thing, and you have a tremendous amount of time on your hand to think and be introspective.
I spent a good deal of time thinking about the things that I was taking a break from in my "normal" life: no driving, no bicycling, no cooking, no internet, no computers, no writing of computer software, no commuting, no alcohol, no caffeine, no housework, no NPR, no visits to the library, no reading of novels/books, no New York Times, no dog walking... it was a long list. I also thought about the things that I missed, the things I didn't miss, and the things I expected to miss but didn't.
I missed Amy a lot, she was at the top of the list of things that I wanted to get back to. I missed cooking (a bit odd, since when you have to do it, cooking can be a bit of a chore). I missed gardening, and I missed talking with my kids. But I really didn't miss a lot of the other things in my usual routine (driving? youtube? sorry, nope).
I had expected that the complete disconnect from the things that normally keep my brain active (work on the one hand, and various media sources like books/newspapers/magazines/videos on the other hand) would bring about a lot of boredom and longing for those forms of mental stimulation. Oddly however, this didn't really happen for the most part -- there were certainly times on the trip where I was bored, but I was able to shift pretty easily to a mode where the the primary brain activities were thinking by myself (did a whole lot of that) and occasionally writing (in my journal).
In retrospect the experience makes me wonder if I should try to do this sort of thing more regularly, e.g. completely detach/withdraw from my normal pattern of existence for a while, as opposed to the sort of "vacation" where really the only things you are changing are the locale and the entertainments.
Day 11: up early and on the trail to tackle Muir Pass. At the next lake up (Wanda) we ran into the L.A. women again, who were having breakfast (they had decided to camp higher up).
The hike up to the pass was not too bad, took a while but as usual very rewarding in terms of the views. At the top of the pass is the iconic John Muir hut, so we had to stop and take a few photos there.
Leaving Sapphire Lake:
We were enjoying the hike and making good progress so we basically just kept on going. I think we must have hiked 13 or 14 miles or so.
We bumped into a couple of park service rangers a mile or so before the Leconte ranger station-- they also asked to see our permit, but the inspection was a good deal more perfunctory this time (as compared with the rangers we met outside Donahue).
Hour or so of rain later in the afternoon (lots of thunder this time around).
Day 11: Another "short but intense" hiking session today; we made it from our previous campsite to a new spot on upper Palisade Lake, in preparation for hiking Mather Pass the next day.
The first couple of hours were interesting; we were hiking directly east into the rising sun, which was interesting in that the angled light did a really good job of highlighting animal tracks on the path, which was fairly sandy. Lots of deer hoofprints and tracks from other smaller critters (plenty of deer sightings along the way as well).
Also encountered a mama grouse with her chicks, which was pretty neat:
Making progress:
At a certain point as you are hiking along you get to a point where the trail meets what looks like the end of the valley, and you start thinking, "Hmm, the trail can't possibly go up that big wall of rock, can it?". The answer is of course, "Yes, the trail does indeed go up that thing".
Looking back on a section of the staircase:
This was the famous JMT "Golden Staircase", a series of tight switchbacks set into the rock face at the end of the valley that brings the JMT up and over the seemingly insurmountable wall. It reminded me a lot of the kinds of stonework that you see in the Grand Canyon, up near the top of the south rim.
Steep climb, but we did eventually make it up to the first of the Palisade Lakes, which was a nice reward.
Here instead of tracking right along the edge of the lakes, the JMT steers away from the shore and runs along a few hundred yards up from the water (which may be one reason why the lakes are so nice and unspoiled).
We arrived at our selected campsite about 1:30, another "early finish" day. This time we had some decent tree cover however, which was something to be thankful for.
I scrambled down to the lake to have a swim, very refreshing. The campsite area proved to be very popular; throughout the rest of the afternoon a sizable collection of other hikers filtered in and picked out spots nearby.
Day 12: Late start in the morning -- I set my alarm and then slept through it (I think at that point I had rolled over on top of it, or something). We had a nice hike up to Mather Pass, very cool/cold, slight breeze.
The trail running up to Mather is one of those that is nestled into the rock in a way that makes it almost impossible to see from below, so we had to guess as to which way it was going to go. Some really drop-dead amazingly beautiful views from the top this time -- this was one of the better passes.
This morning we were hiking at about the same pace as another couple we'd seen over the past few days. Up at the top of the pass we encountered them again, and the woman was in the process of taking off her sock to inspect one of her ankles, which to my surprise was all taped up. She had apparently sprained it the first week, but decided to keep going. When I commented on it, her response was something along the lines of "Whitney or bust!" (tough customer).
The descent on the other side of the pass was equally steep, but as with some of the others the rock was much softer and crumblier, so the trail had a lot more of a tenuous feeling. The trail eventually wound down to a huge 10-12km squarish bowl or basin aptly named "Upper Basin" -- very exposed, mostly flat. We hiked through that for what seemed like ages.
Lengthy descent down to around 9600 feet, then another climb back up into the next valley approaching Pinchot Pass. We eventually found a nice place to camp there.
Couple of strange encounters along the trail today-- first was a middle aged couple hiking along with their large black dog, looked like a standard poodle (dogs are in fact not allowed in Kings Canyon NP so I'm not sure what happened there). Then later on an even weirder run-in with a small group of mules-- they were just sort of wandering around, no saddle or bridle, but each was wearing a bell. They weren't interested in socializing and moved off as soon as they got close to us.
Starting our climb up in the morning:
Day 13: Today we hiked Pinchot Pass, and it was another pretty substantial mileage day. Start of the hike, just leaving the lake:
At the top of the pass we encountered a solo hiker who said that he was doing the PCT in sections, and that he was en route to Lake Tahoe during this stint. From his description it sounded as though he was covering huge distances each day (20+ miles).
Day 14: Today we tackled Glen Pass, definitely one of the tougher hikes in the JMT.
From our campsite it was about a seven mile hike to get up to Glen, passing by the Rae Lakes area, which is very beautiful indeed (not hard to see why it is such a popular spot for hikers and fishermen). Saw several signs (written by the ranger no doubt) about an "active bear" in the area, with the usual warnings about keeping your food safe.
The "Fin Dome" above the lakes:
After leaving Rae Lakes the climbing started in earnest, so we buckled down and got busy putting on the elevation. The trail up to Glen Pass is another one of those sections of the JMT where it is very difficult to see the trail from below, so we did a lot of puzzling about that.
There was a particularly memorable moment where we were sitting at the side of the trail taking a snack break, and the two of us were debating over whether the trail was about to cut to the left or head to the right (since those looked like the only possible scenarios). At that point a descending hiker appeared coming around the bend, so we immediately asked him to point out which way the trail ran. He turned around and with one of his hiking poles pointed straight up, leaving us flummoxed (he was right, of course).
We finally did make it up to the top (I kind of ran out of gas with about a half mile to go and had to rest, while Stephen chugged along past me). After taking a look at it close up, I have to say that Glen Pass is not really a pass, it's more like a knife-edge ridge that some crazy bunch of engineers managed to run a trail over-- it's insanely steep on both sides.
Partway up:
Very steep descent at that point to make it down to the Charlotte Lake area. This is a shot looking down to the south, switchbacks and all (it's hard to see from the photo, but this is a really steep trail):
We hadn't picked out a campsite in advance, because it wasn't clear how far we would get or what the campsites looked like; when we did get to Charlotte Lake it seemed pretty clear that we would have to take a substantial detour if we wanted to camp there, so instead we decided to try to get partway down the Kearsarge Pass trail and camp along there. That turned out to be a good move, in retrospect, since the lakes there wound up being a nice spot, and it put us in a good position for the next day.
Along the way we met a couple of young guys doing a southbound hike-- turns out they were hiking all the way from MTR to Whitney on a single resupply (yikes). Hope they were not going to go hungry towards the end...
- fill up the bag from water source (brook or stream), then walk a good ways (100ft or more) away from the water.
- add clothing and some soap to the bag, then agitate by hand (while thinking longingly about how nice it is to have an actual washing machine at home)
- when the water looks like coca cola, take the clothes out, squeeze out as much water as possible, then dump the cola safely away from the stream/lake
- repeat steps 1-3 a couple more times (but with no soap, and hopefully nicer looking rinse water)
At this point in the trip I had been putting off washing my hiking socks, but it was getting to the point where I had to grit my teeth to put them on in the morning, so I bolstered my courage and went ahead with the wash. Whew.
Day 15: This was our day to pick up our second resupply at Onion Valley.
At this stage in the game we were ahead of schedule by almost a day (no rest/downtime at either MTR or VVR, and we'd been picking up "extra" miles on many of our long hiking days). We decided to pack up and hike down with our gear in case the Onion Valley campground turned out to be nice.
Start of the hike:
We had to gain about a thousand feet to reach Kearsarge Pass, then a big descent to get down to the trailhead (maybe 2700 feet). Full parking lot when we arrived, there were a lot more hikers and cars than I expected (very active spot for hikers).
The pass (kind of cool rock formations):
We didn't really know what to expect, since SKPT has a very minimal (almost nonexistent) presence on the web, and they are really hard to get on the phone, but when we walked down to the end of the gravel drive, we found a modest sized cabin with a couple of nice older folks (retired couple I assume) minding the store.
They produced our resupply box in short order, thank goodness (that is always a very nervous moment when you are waiting for them to locate your drop in the back room) and we got busy packing the food into our bear canisters. We were also happy to hear that the hiker's shower in the back of the cabin was working, so we paid our $10 each and had a good scrub. We chatted a bit with the caretaker couple-- it sounded as though things had been a bit slow this summer, no surprise.
I had been hoping that they would have some sort of camp store that I could raid for extras (would have loved to buy some more sunscreen and maybe a few chocolate bars), but this was not an option unfortunately (it is a pretty minimalist operation).
It was a pretty grueling hike (2700 ft elevation gain, then another 1000 down), but we did eventually make it back by around five or so (our camping spot from the previous night was available, so we grabbed it). Whew.
Shot of the Kearsarge Pinnacles, south of our camp:
Day 16: At this point with the quick down and back resupply complete, we realized that it would be pretty easy for us to pull up our schedule and finish a day early, so we adjusted our plans and went ahead.
The revised plan called for us to hike partway to Forester pass, then find a campsite close enough that we could do the pass easily in the morning. We got a leisurely start, hiked back to the JMT in the morning, then hiked for another 5 or 6 miles until we found a good place to camp in the early afternoon.
View of East Vidette Peak along the trail:
Junction:
Near Vidette Meadow:
Campsite:
This campsite had enough shade that the tents were not too hot in the afternoon -- finally got a chance to have a nice afternoon nap for a change.
This spot was pretty close to the trail, so we had a good view of folks hiking by -- there was a surprising amount of late traffic. At one point about 8:30pm when I was just about to doze off I could hear a couple of hikers arrive at the tentsite right next to mine. Thankfully they decided to move on to another spot, however.
I also made the unpleasant discovery at this point that I had lost my bottle of camping soap (!). I think it must have fallen out of my pocket when I washed my socks back at Kearsarge Lakes... oh well.
Day 17: Forester Pass today -- we had heard stories from other hikers about Forester, definitely one of the tough ones, so we got an early start and headed off while the air was still nice and cold.
Start of the hike looking south towards the pass. Interesting sort of turret-like formation partway up:
We chatted a bit with some of the other hikers camping nearby-- it was interesting to hear the stories. Stephen also discovered that one of the couples was running short on food, so we took the opportunity to dig through our bear cans and hand over various food items that we would not be needing (an advantage of being "ahead of schedule").
Day 18: Our plan today was to hike in and get as close as we could to Mount Whitney in preparation for the final hike of the peak -- from the north, really the only option is Guitar Lake, which is where we went (and as it turns out, where everyone else went as well).
On the trail:
The Mount Whitney area has some interesting rules that you have to follow hygiene wise -- because there is so little topsoil at the higher altitudes, "answering the call of nature" in the usual way (dig a hole, etc) is forbidden. Instead you have to use a "wag bag", which is basically a plastic bag filled with some sort of high tech desiccant. You open the bag, do your business into it, and then pack it out.
On our way to the Crabtree Meadow ranger station to pick up our wag bags (maybe a half mile out) there was a whirring noise and overhead came a helicopter, skimming right along just above the treetops-- we could see it set down (presumably at the ranger station to pick up someone for an evacuation).
When we got there there they were loading up (no stretcher, so that was encouraging). A few minutes later we watched it take off -- I don't normally think of helicopter flights as beautiful, but the person piloting this thing was really an artist, it was fun to watch.
Mount Whitney ahead...
By the end of the day there must have been a good 15 or 20 tents pitched along the lake, so we had plenty of company.
Day 19: Mount Whitney! The big enchilada today, very exciting.
Tradition along the JMT has it that if you really want the full experience, you get up super early and hike all the way up to the summit in the dark, then watch the sun rise from the summit. Stephen and I decided that this option was not really for us, and that it would be better to just wake at a reasonable hour (say, 4:45am) and then start hiking once it began to get light, as opposed to getting out the headlamp and hiking in the dark.
Unbeknownst to us, virtually everyone else camping at the lake that night was planning on doing the "view the dawn" option, so there was a succession of people packing up and tromping out pretty much all night (I was able to sleep through most of this, but Stephen was not quite so lucky). By the time we had eaten breakfast and were putting on our packs, we could only see one or two other tents.
Still, I am glad we did the 5:30am start instead of the 2:00am start myself. At the very start of the hike we could see the little dots of headlamps way up high along one section of Whitney (hikers coming down from the summit) which was interesting.
Start of the hike:
We had kind of a weird moment partway along the summit trail where we came around a bend in the trail and stumbled on another hiker who was making use of her "wag bag" more or less right in the middle of the trail (there really wasn't any other option at that point, too steep on either side). We had to sort of avert our gaze and wait for her to finish up before we headed on.
The last mile or so of the summit hike is very gradual and ascends extremely gently, but you still have to hike it pretty carefully. As Stephen put it, your legs are saying, "Hey, no heavy pack to lift, I can go faster" but your heart and lungs are saying "Not so fast there legs, whoa".
At the top:
We picked up our cached gear and reloaded our packs, then started the big descent.
The descent from Whitney was kind of a grind -- starts off with a huge set of switchbacks (almost a hundred I think) and then finally settles down and becomes a bit more linear. I didn't take a lot of photos on this stretch, I was just keeping my head down and trying to get through it. Very hot and dry as well to boot.
Outpost Camp had a fair number of other hikers, but at least there was decent tree cover and a good water supply, so we were happy with that. We camped next to a trio of other hikers that we'd seen a couple of times the last few days; it was fun to chat with them (a couple from the Pacific Northwest and a guy from Ohio). They were apparently die-hard hikers (even going so far as to buy their own freeze drying machine to prepare food).
One cool thing about this campsite is the view to the north. There is a very steep rock wall that has a sort of shoulder or ridge in the middle where it is merely steep and not vertical, and on this ridge there are actually pine trees growing (basically out of the rock):
Day 20: The final hike out. We got up around 6 and decided that we would forgo breakfast and instead eat at the Whitney Portal cafe at the trailhead. The hike down to Whitney Portal was an easy 2 hour descent; we saw lots of other hikers who were on the way in (Whitney is a very popular destination).
Partway down the trail -- this view gave me the odd sensation that we were coming down out of the pristine high country and descending back into a sort of miasma of civilization again:
The portal cafe was open when we got there, so we ordered our meal and tucked in. The portions at breakfast are a bit ridiculous-- I think we could have fed three people from the plate of pancakes that they served to Stephen (I could not finish everything on my plate either).
At that point we just had to wait until noon for our taxi ride. The fact that we were a day early was a bit tricky, since I had made hotel and taxi reservations ahead of time, but I was able to send a text message to Amy earlier and explain our situation, and she got on the phone and redid them for us, which was a huge help.
The taxi ride took us to the Mount Williamson motel in Independence, which was a nice post-hike destination. Our driver was an older guy who proved to be full of interesting stories and bits of history about the area, especially as relates to the "water wars" and the fraught relationship between Owens Valley and the city of Los Angeles.
Postcript:
All in all, it was a fabulous trip, one for the bucket list. I am even more jealous now of the folks who live in cities like L.A., who have these beautiful mountains more or less in their back yards (it is really only a 4 hour drive for them), and I am already starting to think about how I can plan a return to the area to hike.
[Author's note: I think I could probably write a good deal more, but at this point I am going to summarily declare "blog post complete"! I'll maybe write another entry later on with post-hike observations on maps, gear, and other such things.]
