Bill and I had a really good night’s sleep last night, and commented as we were packing up this morning, “You know, that’s the first campsite we’ve had in quite awhile where we weren’t within sound of rushing water!”  And we hadn’t gone far this morning, when whom should we meet heading SOBO but Wyoming! We had not seen her for weeks. Turns out that she and some friends had flipped up to Ashland and were headed south. It was great to see her!  Wyoming said that as it turned out, they may not have saved themselves much “snow grief”, because the Siskyous, Marbles and Trinities were full of snow AND lots of blowdowns on the trail, which made for awfully tough going.  We were so relieved to see she was OK!

We reached Ebbett’s Pass just as a sweet old guy came driving by.  He stopped his car to talk to us, and we told him about hiking the PCT.  He was fascinated, and wished us well before heading on.   There was a sign beside the trail at the road which said there was a trail angel 300 yards to the west, so we walked up to check it out, hoping for maybe a nice breakfast??   But no luck.  There was no sign of anybody. 

 So we headed back to the PCT and started out on what I call “The Vulcan Geology Walk.” For miles we walked along the base of a row of amazing volcanic pinnacles and domes. We could see the Carson valley in the distance– the wildflowers were awesome.  Eventually the trail turned left and headed right through the volcanics and into a land of what I can only call “pumice hills”, where there were still some snow traverses to do on northfacing hillsides.  We were leapfrogging with Granite and Terrapin most of the day.

As the morning went on, it became increasingly hot, and we were very glad that the trail sometimes wound through dark groves of huge trees, where the shade was very welcome!  But in the afternoon, the PCT settled into a long uphill winding through big boulders in a forest with no views till finally we were out in the open again, walking through open pumice fields, around a peak called “The Nipple”, with a stiff wind blowing.   My right ankle began to ache very badly from all the rocky trail, so when we stopped for supper in the lee of a single gnarly tree, I took some Motrin to help.

But sore ankle and gusty wind could not take away from the fact that our views of the Blue Lakes down below were awesome. We finally reached the top of the climb, and of course there were more snowfields to cross as we went down, but they weren’t too bad.  Good!  Trying to walk on snow with a sore ankle isn’t fun!  When we were still up fairly high, we met Terrapin filtering water from a creek by the trail.  She said she and Granite had stopped for the day, and that they’d located “marginal” camping in the trees nearby.  She said there was room for us, too, but Bill wanted to keep going and camp lower down.  Despite taking 2 Motrin, my ankle was really bothering me, so I was sort of limping along behind Bill as best I could.   

We kept on going till we found a nice quiet spot in a little grove of trees, with a tolerable mosquito level.  “I think I shall call today ‘Lava Day’, ”  I said.  “We sure have been in the lava!  And the best wildflower display yet, too!”  Actually, this section of the trail after Ebbett’s Pass really is very beautiful and interesting, with its gnarly trees, awesome flowers of every color, lava formations and beautiful lakes.  But I was also thinking, “Echo Lake tomorrow!  No more bear cans!”

Walk to Rauros:  Boromir grows increasingly anxious, Gollum is spotted with a log

No mosquitoes last night! And none till this afternoon! And for a good several hours this morning, the trail just cruised along through gorgeous scenery. It was a total joy to be hiking on such a morning! I was thinking, “Wow! At this rate we might make 27 miles!”

We spent a good while this morning walking along the Carson River canyon.  It’s a very pretty place–very forested, but with occasional open spots where the views were wonderful. And the trail was easy, too.  But alas, all good things do come to an end.  The PCT made a left turn and began to seriously CLIMB!  From that point on, it felt as if we were climbing for the whole rest of the day (not really true–there were some downhills!).  But what makes uphills hard for us is that our packs are so heavy with the bear cans, ice axe, etc.  Bill and I are SO looking forward to getting back to  “regular ol’ base weight”.

But uphill grind or not, there is no denying that the scenery was gorgeous–what a mixture of granitic and volcanic!  You can be walking along a trail that winds through big granite boulders, then suddenly you’re on pumice-y stuff, or looking at what’s obviously a volcano.  Peak 9500 is a prime example, and the PCT gets up close ‘n personal with that extinct volcano cone.  We saw other formations that looked like Devil’s Postpile.  Also amazing was the effect of the orange-colored lichen growing on the gnarly, twisted lava boulders–it made them look as if they were still molten lava!  And the higher we got, the more open the forest was, and there were stunning views of snowclad peaks all along the horizon.  Every meadow we came to was a deep, intense green, and wildflowers were everywhere.

As we were hiking along near Peak 9500, we met a whole group of Boy Scouts and their fearless leaders, taking a break beside the trail.  “Hi!” sang out one of the leaders.  “You guys want some ice cream?”   Ice cream!!??  How on earth could they possibly have ice cream?  But we weren’t about to turn down an ice cream opportunity.  “We sure do want ice cream!” I said.  “Do you have some?”   “Weeeelll, actually not,” said the leader.  “But we know where you can get some.”   “OK, where is it?”  (I had visions of maybe a trail angel up ahead at a road crossing).  “Weeelll, actually we just heard a rumor that there’s a Mc D’s up ahead a couple of miles off the trail.”   

OK, OK, so these Scouts were a bunch of practical jokers.  But that wasn’t all.  It turned out that the group we’d just been talking to was only half the Scout troop.  After we’d walked on for just a couple of minutes, we met the other half of the Scouts, hiking right along, but grinning evilly and carrying big snowballs!  We had no problem figuring out what they planned to do with those snowy missiles when they caught up with the rest of their gang.  It was actually rather tempting to turn around and follow them, just to watch the fun!

As we continued our climb, the trail unfortunately did have some issues. Periodically we went through stretches of deep woods, where snow lingered, plus every northfacing slope had plenty of snow left.  This did slow us down (my fault, as usual).  We stopped for lunch in a clump of determined trees that were clinging way up high on a sagebrushy hillside.  No mosquitoes!  We could eat in peace!  Then we spent the afternoon on a long, tiring climb up to the saddle by Tryon Peak.  There were many remnants of old cow fence–slowly rotting old posts, but no barbed wire.   There were still a few old cow pies, too.  When we reached the top of the saddle and looked down the other side, we groaned–it was northfacing, and full of snow.  The PCT headed off to the right, into a snow-piled white fir forest.  But–we could see Noble Lake down in the valley below.

 So we said “Phooey!” and went straight down, aiming at the lake, where we knew we could find the PCT again.  It worked!  We got to the lakeshore in time to eat supper, and only a few mosquitoes joined us!  Granite and Terrapin passed us while we were eating, and we were soon after them, following the long series of switchbacks down the lava field mountainside with its dramatic volcanic outcrops.

Then– oh my! The outlet creek of Noble Lake (which we had to cross) was a roaring whitewater torrent, charging all over the trail. Yikes! But we knew that Granite and Terrapin had made it through, so surely we could, too.  Bill went first, very carefully, and immediately found that though it LOOKED very roaring and impressive, it actually wasn’t deep at all.  “That wasn’t  too bad,” he said.   So I waded across without a problem.  Whew!  “Next flat place we get to, we camp!” we vowed. We were very tired.  

But after the outlet creek crossing, the trail headed up and up on more steep mountainsides–no flat places available!  I went into what I call “hike ‘n scan” mode, where I am hiking at less than full speed, while simultaneously looking everywhere for someplace with camping potential.  After a little while, I noticed a possibility up ahead and was very happy–but when we got there, oh dear!  Granite and Terrapin had beat us to it, and there was only room for them on the tiny bit of “flat”.  We waved and pushed on for awhile longer before I spotted a tiny bit of a campsite in a grove of trees perched on the rocky mountainside.  The mossies were waiting to welcome us, but Bill said,  “No putting up the net tent.  I am too tired.”  So we just threw down a cowboy camp and crawled into our sleeping bags.  We were totally wiped out.

Walk to Rauros:  Still in Brown Lands, river broadens

Well, I guess you could say today was “snow day”–lots and lots of it, including plenty of  traverses across STEEP snow on mountainsides!  But yahoo!   We made it up and over Sonora Pass, our last big pass.

Last night the mossies stayed up all night, humming around our net tent.  When I had to get up and go to “the bathroom” at 4:45 am,  they swarmed me and I got lots of bites.  Grrrr!  When it was time to pack up this morning, we had to wear full raingear plus headnets to protect ourselves from the mossie squadrons.   Well, we did expect this, having heard from other thruhiker journals that this is typical Sierras-in-July.

The hiking today began with a nice walk through the forest, then the climbing began.  The higher we went, the more the terrain opened up, and the views were increasingly gorgeous.  Not only that, but once we were up above timberline and out in the breeze–no more mosquitoes!  We began to meet other hikers, and began another day of leapfrogging with Barak and Uri, two guys from Israel. It took a bit of hunting for trail in the snow going up, but there were no steep traverses.  Everything on this side of Sonora Pass is very rounded and sort of mellow.  We took the “shortcut trail” , though, which goes straight up, and OK, that was steep, and I had the ice axe out again.  As usual, Bill just headed right up, and I was slow.  But wow, the views from the top were stupendous! Sierra peaks, all snowy, dominated the horizon to the south, and the dramatic volcanics of the Sonora Pass area were everywhere else.  Many hikers say (and I am inclined to agree) that Sonora Pass is the “best” of all the High Sierra passes.

But large snowfields were everywhere (in fact, we walked by the place where we camped in 2005, and it was covered with snow).  All the trail signs were buried.  As we started down the far side of the pass, we caught up with Uri and Barak, who were worried and frustrated.  They desperately wanted to take pictures of the spectacular scenery, but weren’t sure if their camera was working.  It seems that on the last big creek crossing (where even Bill had trouble with the current),  Uri was knocked down by the river and though he managed to swim ashore, his camera got soaked.  Mostly he and Barak were worried about the camera memory card, because it had ALL their pics starting all the way back in Campo!  So we did a test.  They took the memory card out of Uri’s camera and we put it in ours and checked to see if it was working.  Hallelujah!   It worked! Uri and Barak practically did a victory dance right there on the trail.  They were able to take pics of Sonora Pass, and everything was OK. 

Leaving a very happy Israeli duo, Bill and I headed on into the snow.  We immediately saw that  the PCT is routed (of course) to go on the shadiest, snowiest slopes. So much of today was snow traversing on (thank God!) nice snow, perfect for walking.  We met lots of people–a bunch of SOBO’s, who had skipped up to Ashland and headed south from there, to give the Sierras more time to melt.  It was fun to see them all, and an amazing sight to see so many hikers, after days of being “just us.”  Since I am slow on snow, a number of other hikers finally caught up with us–Dude & Trouble, and Granite & Terrapin.

We ate lunch hunkered down behind some stunted trees, and  that was our last meal of the day, because we both agreed that we did not want to stop and camp till we were “below snow and above mosquitoes”, as Bill put it.  By 3:15pm, we reached the road at Sonora Pass, and there was Thomas, a trail angel with carrots, water, snacks, offer of a ride to town, AND a big black plastic garbage bag. “Give me your garbage!” he said, and we were very glad to hand it over!

Many hikers go off the trail here and into town, but we pushed on, headed up our last climb of the day.  The snow was not bad, since it was on the south side of the mountain, and the views were great!  So were the wildflowers–blooming in every crack and cranny.  The rocks are no longer “granitic” but “volcanic”, so we knew we were making progress north!  We climbed past the dramatic “Pinnacles”, then a little while later and we were at the top, cheering because it was our last time at 10,000 feet!   While we were standing around taking pictures and cheering, some other hikers came along and asked why we were celebrating so much.  We explained that this was the last time the PCT goes up to 10,000 feet.  “Oh!” they said, and out came the camera phone.  “Tell us about it–we’ll film you!”  So we did a rerun of cheering and celebrating–“Last time at 10,000! (wave all 10 fingers)  Last time at 10,000!”

But from that point, the PCT route down to the Carson River stayed on the NORTH side of the valley.  The south side was snowfree, but we were back to hunting for trail in the snow (slow and frustrating!) until we finally stopped at about 7:30.  We had succeeded in getting below the snow, and there were only a few mosquitoes.  We were very tired and a bit hungry, since we skipped eating supper in order to reach the “no snow zone”.  It was very cold, so we set up the tarp and enjoyed a beautiful alpenglow sunset view after we were snuggled into our sleeping bags.  All the other hikers have passed us, since I am so slow on snow.  But if we can just get back to “regular trail”, I think we will catch up again!  And I am very grateful that the snow at least was nice to us today–no icy stuff and no postholing!

Walk to Rauros:  North of the Field of Celebrant in the Brown Lands

If yesterday was “big canyon day”, today was lake, pond, mud and mosquito day!  We had to hike in headnets almost all day, and put on full raingear to protect us from the starving hordes of mossies every time we took a break, but yahoo, we passed the 1,000 mile mark, and we made it out of Yosemite!

Getting up was hard– our clothes were still wet from last night’s late ford, and we hadn’t slept well because the mosquitoes didn’t go to bed last night.  Usually they do, and we can sleep in peace even without a net tent.  Not last night!  And as soon as we started to get up, hungry mosquitoes pounced on us as fast as they could. But the long climb up to Macomb Pass took care of any shivers, the wildflowers were lovely, and we were amused by the fact that PCT’s scenic lakeshore route by Wilma Lake was actually underwater, in the lake. (We had to bushwhack another route).

Again, a comment on Yosemite trails.  We early season hikers hardly ever get to use them!  They are either so muddy and wet that we have to make our own trail, or so rough and rocky that it’s slow going–or even (as this morning) completely underwater!  I think that the folks who plan trail routes ought to come up into the mountains this time of year and take a look at the conditions! 

There was a long, viewless uphill-through-forest section of the PCT, enlivened somewhat by the good-size nearby creek that occasionally went into cascades and falls that were quite impressive.  We also started leapfrogging with some other hikers (some of them were slower–we caught up with Uri, Jaybird and Alex–and some were faster–they caught up with us!)  We stopped for lunch in Grace Meadow, and enjoyed the lovely view there. 

Then came a slog up to Dorothy Lake on a rough, steep trail, but hooray!  At the lake, the WIND was blowing.  No mosquitoes! When we finished the walk around the lake and the  final climb to the top of Dorothy Lake Pass  (which is the exit from Yosemite) we were standing in the snow by the almost-buried sign at the Yosemite border, cheering and yelling “Throw the bear cans in the lake!” when Jaybird came along and wondered what was going on.

“We’re so done with Yosemite!” we told him. Then we hiked happily along the nice, smooth dirt trail… till it disappeared into the snow, and we were back to hunting for the trail.  Sigh. But eventually we located it again and made it all the way down to Walker Meadow, where at last we got to put up the net tent and sleep in peace! (We put up the tarp, too–it was getting cloudy)   The alpenglow on the mountains across the way as we were setting up camp amid swarms of mosquitoes was very beautiful, though.  It feels so good to know we’ve reached the 1,000 mile mark, and there’s only one more big pass to go!

Walk to Rauros:  Trees begin thinning on either side of the river

Today was “big canyon” day, and it was pretty brutal. The trail and the terrain threw everything they had at us and by the end of the day, we were pretty “wore out”! We had to deal with finding trail in the snow, crossing steep snow, long uphills so steep that I could only plod along, trail so rough and rocky that sometimes we had a hard time figuring out which was the trail and which was just rocks, trail that was one long mudhole, trail that was a creek, and increasingly difficult creek crossings. And there were the mosquitoes– clouds of them.

OK, to start, we were up at 5 am, with the idea of “Let’s beat the mossies and try to get big miles!”  But the trail wasted no time in showing who was boss–and it wasn’t us!  Just after we left our campsite, we were into snow that hid the trail and reduced us to wandering around trying to figure out where to go.  When we did locate the right path, that final climb to the top of Benson Pass was so steep that all I could do was plod.  On the other side of the pass, the terrain & trail were so rough and rocky that again, I could not walk fast.  GRRRR!  Frustrating!  

To add to the fun, by our best estimate, besides the repeated multi-thousand foot ascents and descents, at least half the time today the PCT was just one long mudhole that we couldn’t even walk on.  Trying to walk along rough terrain on the EDGE of a trail is tricky!  By noon, we had only done 4.5 miles!  Considering we started at 5:30 am, that’s pretty pathetic! 

But finally we were  down into Kerrick Canyon (it took awhile because of having to climb over snow), and finally we could really HIKE along a nice trail with minimal snow issues.  Kerrick Canyon is a lovely forested valley, and we enjoyed the views as much as the trail.  But finally we came to the ford of Kerrick Creek.   Scaaaary! I had to go behind Bill, holding on to his pack.  It was a much more difficult crossing than Return Creek! 

 Then came another huge, steep climb up (I cheered myself by looking at the lovely wildflowers along the way) and another long downhill to Stubblefield Creek.  Partway down into the canyon, a roaring river basically took over the trail and we stood there wondering how to proceed.  It was not a “normal ford”, but a situation where we were on a steep mountainside and the trail itself had become a roaring cascade.  But we tackled it and got through.  Whew! 

At the canyon bottom, though, we faced our worst ford yet–Stubblefield Creek.  The guidebook described it as “wide and placid”. Wide it was, but not very placid.  It was moving right along and deep (waistdeep on me, as it turned out).  When we were standing on the near bank making plans for where and how to cross, though, it didn’t look TOO bad, so Bill and I crossed side by side, with Bill in the lead.  When we were about 3/4 of the way across, Bill shouted, “I’m losing it, Monty!   Don’t count on me for help!”   Sure enough, the creek was starting to push him backwards.  All I could do was say, “Oh Lord, please help me!” and continue to “move one thing at a time” (trek pole or foot), fighting to stay upright and not be knocked over.  What a relief when we made the other side!  By this time, it was 7 pm, and we were exhausted.  We sort of staggered up from the river, soaking wet, and walked to a nearby lovely grove of trees, saying, “That’s it!  We’ll just camp here!  And wow, what a blessing!  There were lots of nice, dry, flat campsites!                                                

 Too cold, wet and tired to set up the net tent, all we could do was get out of our wet things ASAP  (the mosquitoes were swarming us)  throw on dry sleeping clothes, burrow into our sleeping bags with headnets draped over them, and call it a day!  But hallelujah!   Stubblefield was our last big creek crossing, AND tomorrow, hopefully, we will be OUT of Yosemite with its awful trails.  I am so glad that we did the PCT in 2005, because that’s when I discovered that the minute you leave Yosemite National Park, the trails become very nice.  I am SO looking forward to those trails!

Walk to Rauros:  Bare winter trees on both sides of river