Walks A Ways

Wednesday, July 13, 2022

PCT Day 58

PCT Day 58, 09 July 2022 (Saturday)

"Bonus Day"

Start Location:	Kennedy Meadows Resort	Destination:	Wilderness Campsite At Boulder Creek
PCT Miles Day 58:	13.8	Cum PCT Miles:	1,030.7
Non-PCT Miles Day 58:	0.1	Cum All Miles:	1115.1
PCT Miles Remaining:	1,621.9
Elevation Gain Day 58:	2,452	Cum Elevation Gain:	185,466

Today was a bonus day for a couple of reasons. One, every mile I hiked today I consider to be a bonus, because I was supposed to be going to Kennedy Meadows Resort today, but instead I got there yesterday and left there this morning. Additionally, I was going to leave there this afternoon on the 2:30 PM shuttle back to Sonora pass, but because the Wi-Fi at the resort was so useless, I changed to the 10 AM shuttle.

Good move, because when I got to the pass, there was the best trail magic that I’ve had the entire hike. There were fresh cooked hotdogs, chips, donuts, cookies, cold beverages, and best of all, fresh fruit. This is the kind of thing that people who start their hike in March or April get on a pretty regular basis. But for those of us starting in mid-May, this is not very common. For the faster mid-May hikers, though, we have been catching up to people that started in April.

The advantage of getting bonus miles today is that I will have a much shorter hike on the day that I get to Lake Tahoe. I had planned for that to be a pretty long day of 27 miles, but now that day will be much shorter. And if I can make up a few more miles over the next couple days, then the hike to get to Tahoe will be that much shorter. The earlier I get to Highway 50, the easier it will be to get a ride from the highway in to South Lake Tahoe. So, this is all looking good right now.

Today’s scenery was nice, if not spectacular. But there is still lots of running water in the seasonal streams. This whole area near Sonora pass is very popular for hiking with locals and tourists. Again, another good day on the PCT.

I guess they do a few horse rides and packing trips here at Kennedy Meadows Resort

Best trail magic of the hike so far, at Sonora Pass

Misty or smoky mountains? I hope it's misty.

Typical scenery today

Sonora Peak to the far left and Stanislaus Peak, the highest in the photo

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PCT Day 57

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PCT Day 57, 08 July 2022 (Friday)

"The Past Is The Passes"

Start Location:	Kennedy Canyon Creek	Destination:	Kennedy Meadows Resort
PCT Miles Day 57:	10.9	Cum PCT Miles:	1,016.9
Non-PCT Miles Day 57:	0	Cum All Miles:	1101.2
PCT Miles Remaining:	1,635.7
Elevation Gain Day 57:	2,544	Cum Elevation Gain:	183,014

Today I completed the Southern Sierra section by getting to Kennedy Meadows North a half day early. So, instead of getting here tomorrow morning, I will be leaving here tomorrow afternoon. This will be helpful in that I should now have a much shorter day going in to South Lake Tahoe in a few days.

The PCT permit has special rules for the Southern Sierra section, one being that you have 35 days to complete it; I took 21, so I think I’m good. They really have no way of knowing, though, so not sure it really matters.

The Southern Sierra may be the section that hikers most look forward to. It is the section with the most well-known high passes (Forester, Mather, Pinchot, Muir, etc.). Today was the last of those passes, Sonora at 9,649 ft. Multiple snow patches across the trail reminded us that we were still at a high elevation. Today was also the windiest day in the past few weeks. But overall, except for the change in scenery, it was a pretty uneventful day of hiking.

The Kennedy Meadows Resort here runs several shuttles a day from the trail to the resort, which, by the way, is quite a bustling place. However, the next shuttle was not for a couple of hours. So, several of us were trying to get a hitch. It’s a a Friday, so there was decent traffic on Hwy 108, but no cars were stopping; I guess they weren’t interested in picking up some smelly hikers. Finally, an older lady named Pam stopped and gave several of us a ride. She was a nice, careful driver, which I like when I’m a passenger on windy roads. So far, I’ve had good luck with hitch drivers; you do hear of people getting some crazy drivers.

I also ran into a hiker named Cal today. He started the same day as me all the way back in Campo. I saw him last in Julian (Day 4). He is quite a bit younger than me, so I didn’t think I’d see him again, I thought he’d be at least several days ahead. But that’s just the way it works out here, you never really know where people are.

I did see something about the Electra fire, but it sounds like they are getting it pretty well contained. I hope it stays that way.

A different landscape on the way to Sonora Pass

Contrasting landscapes

A good example of why the "C" in PCT stands for Crest

One of several snow patches to cross on the trail to Sonora Pass

View from the trail to Sonora Pass

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PCT Day 56

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PCT Day 56, 07 July 2022 (Thursday)

"Mmiles"

Start Location:	Wilderness Campsite In Northern Yosemite	Destination:	Kennedy Canyon Creek
PCT Miles Day 56:	23.7	Cum PCT Miles:	1,006.0
Non-PCT Miles Day 56:	0.7	Cum All Miles:	1090.3
PCT Miles Remaining:	1,646.6
Elevation Gain Day 56:	4,039	Cum Elevation Gain:	180,470

Well, it’s a good thing I passed the 1,000 mile mark today, because I could not think of any amusing, clever, or interesting titles for today. After how yesterday went, I wasn’t sure whether I would get to 1,000 today. However, the trail today was much faster, at least 2/3 of it was nice, fast trail. As a comparison, it took me two hours less today to cover the same amount of miles I did yesterday. I am now in a good position to get to Kennedy Meadows North a half a day early.

I am still in the Southern Sierra, so there was, of course, another high pass. Today’s was Dorothy Lake Pass at 9,526 ft. This is just above Dorothy Lake, a very nice lake.

Today I also left the Yosemite Wilderness. You didn’t need to see the sign to notice that there is a distinct change in landscape. From here on out, I will be in areas with which I am not as familiar. So, it should be interesting.

I must have had my headlights on, because when that deer saw me, it froze

Wilmer Lake

Falls Creek, another legs wet crossing

Falls Creek

More Falls Creek

Dorothy Lake

More Dorothy Lake

Dorothy Lake Pass

1,000 Mile mark

Walker River with bridge

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PCT Day 55

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PCT Day 55, 06 July 2022 (Wednesday)

"Taking A Brake"

Start Location:	Wilderness Campsite Near Wilson Creek	Destination:	Wilderness Campsite In Northern Yosemite
PCT Miles Day 55:	17.0	Cum PCT Miles:	982.3
Non-PCT Miles Day 55:	0.4	Cum All Miles:	1065.9
PCT Miles Remaining:	1,670.3
Elevation Gain Day 55:	3,804	Cum Elevation Gain:	176,431

I’m glad I didn’t plan big miles today, because the trail was having none of it. This was unexpectedly a very hard day. The trail was putting on the brakes whether you liked it or not. I’m not going to say it was the hardest day, I’m not even going to say that mile for mile it was the hardest day. I think that would be a case of recency bias, where in the latest thing is foremost in the mind. I’m just saying it was hard.

It felt like dog miles today, where every mile hiked felt more like seven. It was just straight up and straight down, then more straight up and straight down, and so on. There was very little flat (NOTE: I purposely don't post photos for the sole purpose of trying to show how hard or sketchy a trail is, because pictures rarely capture accurately the difficulty, steepness or sketchiness and they just seem to indicate I'm over exaggerating.). And the trail was very rocky and uneven. Just a very difficult trail on which to get any momentum. I ran into a couple of park rangers today, and they said everyone underestimates how difficult this part of the trail is.

I’m not complaining, it’s the nature of the trail. I’m just trying to accurately describe the experience I had on the trail. On any long-distance hike, you have to expect days like this that aren’t maybe what you expected. In a way, you just have to embrace days like this as part of the challenge. I mean, if every day was easy, and there were no challenges, I might as well just camp at the beach for 4.5 months.

I did go over two more high passes today, Benson at 10,107 feet and Seavey at 9,129 feet. Despite the difficult trail, there was still a lot of good scenery today.

By the way, this is the first time in the whole hike that I’ve had a ranger actually check my permit, and they also checked to make sure that I had a bear canister.

Deer near my campsite

On the way up to Benson Pass

Top of Benson Pass

Smedberg Lake

Scenery from the trail

Scenery from the trail

A small lake in Northern Yosemite, one of many small, unnamed lakes (BTW, unnamed lakes are identified by the elevation of the water level "WL")

Seavey Pass

Snowy, Craig, and Tower Peaks

Larkspur, I think

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PCT Day 54

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PCT Day 54, 05 July 2022 (Tuesday)

“Miller Time”

Start Location:	Glen Aulin Backpacker Campground	Destination:	Wilderness Campsite Near Wilson Creek
PCT Miles Day 54:	17.0	Cum PCT Miles:	965.3
Non-PCT Miles Day 54:	0.4	Cum All Miles:	1048.5
PCT Miles Remaining:	1,687.3
Elevation Gain Day 54:	3,861	Cum Elevation Gain:	172,627

Since I wanted today to be a more relaxing, shorter day, I got up much later, and started much later than usual. I also set up my campsite a little earlier than usual. I very intentionally took slow easy steps on the steeper, rockier portions of the trail; my feet were very happy about that. I also did not skimp on any of the breaks today. Even so, I still did over 2 miles more than my target. It just goes to show, when you keep putting one foot in front of the other how far you can go.

An unexpected highlight today was Miller Lake. It is a special lake. It is a very serene place. The kind of place you feel like you could hang out at all day drinking tropical drinks. So if you come here, bring the blender. It is not day-hikeable unless you are an ultra-marathon runner. However, it is worth doing a one or two night backpack trip from Tuolumne Meadows to get here.

There were also multiple, notable northern Yosemite creek crossings today (McCabe, Return, Spiller, Matterhorn, and Wilson). I am camped right by Wilson Creek, so more good white noise tonight.

Another good day on the PCT.