After a relaxing day at Red's Meadow, yesterday evening we set out and hiked a few miles up out of the San Joaquin river canyon and had a fine camp along a creekside with a warm, crackling campfire and sunlight to spare.
We were feeling good and satisfied with the life we've got. We were even cleaned up some after rinsing at Red's in their hot springs bath house.
Eliza and I have a lot to discuss about the future now that it looks like the job in Oakland is a sure thing. When to move there (for me), here to live, what kind of work to pursue, etc...
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Today, we were up early and the morning wind snuck in and sunk its chilly teeth right into our thin, sleepy hides before we had a chance to get our systems going. Walking was nice and easy, however, and we just plodded the morning away once our fingers came to life. We passed a couple of nice, windy lakes -- Purple Lake and Virginia Lake -- without much ado and talked very little. Down to our right, the distant Fish Creek babbled at the bottom of its great, green canyon.
Unfortunately, Eliza is once again feeling the now familiar sickness in her stomach. Whatever it is, it's here to stay for the remainder of this trek. I hate that she has to be out here struggling with something like this, when the hiking itself should be challenge enough. Not to mention, this is our final push and to be distracted from the excitement and beauty just plain stinks. She is a champ, though, and perseverence is the bottom line. She won't hear of leaving the trail at this point, or even taking days off for recovery. The good weather seems to be hanging on by a thread and neither of us want to chance a freak monster snow storm while we're up in the high passes -- Muir, Mather, Pinchot, Forester -- above 12,000 ft, or anywhere for that matter.
Lately, we are thankful for every day of sunny, clear skies we can get. It has been our main concern all summer long as we made our mad dash for the Sierras that winter would hit early and hard and render our completion impossible. The locals and all the resort and national forest workers are in agreement that things are unseasonably warm and pleasant up here now, but you never know how it might change -- unxpected and on a dime.
The afternoon was spent climbing to Silver Pass, our high goal for the day. It was an easy enough ascent, not too rocky, not too steep. On the way up -- I believe we were in the middle of going through in detail each and every concert we had ever attended -- we were both utterly amazed to see a familiar face coming down the trail towards us. It was Pygmy, another hiker whom we had last seen all the way down in this neck of the woods three long months ago in June, walking down the street in Lone Pine. My mother and Kathie even had the chance to meet him. We had hiked near him throughout Southern CA and it turns out that once he got this far, he never left the Owens Valley. His girlfriend came to California from Hawaii, they rented a little guest house in Lone Pine, and even rented out a storefront to sell their own crafts and photographs. We laughed and stopped and caught up and got to meet his girlfriend, Mini-Me. They are on a hike up to Tuolumne but plan on being back in Lone Pine by the 1st. We were kindly invited to stop in and be their guests when we finish the trail and clean up/crash at their place for a day before heading back on down the road to wherever we go next.
Our run-in with Pygmy and Mini-Me coincidentally solved a big logistical dilemma for Eliza and me as well. This section of trail -- the John Muir Trail -- is unique in that it is the longest section on the PCT across which not a single road does pass. We come near to roads and there are certainly ample access routes onto and of from the trail, but no pavement actually crosses our path. The gist of all this is isolation. Just as there are no roads to be seen, coming across a town just doesn't happen and getting into and out of the mountains by foot is very very difficult. Our dilemma, and most other hikers as well, is how to resupply on the JMT?
What it boils down to at this point is: do we hike out 9 miles over Keersarge Pass and then try to score a really tough hitch down to Independence to resupply for the last 70 miles and an extra day to climb Whitney? Or: do we hike 6 miles off trail to the Vermillion Valley Resort where we've heard the management is sketchy and swindle prone and the atmosphere very lame (a truckstop with resort prices and lots of diesel and generator noise) to resupply for a very long final push of closer to 150 miles?
We've been going back and forth on this for a week now. We'd prefer, of course, to not have to get off trail at all. The stops in Tuolumne and at Red's were so convenient and turned out to have ample enough food selections to resupply at both places comfortably. We had been unsure of this prior to making those stops and were pleasantly surprised and relieved by both stops. Many people will send packages to these resorts but they charge pretty substantial holding fees and we didn't want to be held to anything -- dates, locations, or otherwise -- on this stretch.
Pygmy has informd us that another option does in fact exist -- the Muir Trail Ranch. It's not a store or a public resort. It sounds more like a fancy bed and breakfast. But apparently they have an enormous hiker box out of which we may be able to pull some supplimentary items to help us get down to Whitney without ever leaving trail. Pygmy says that the proprietor likes to keep it word of mouth and certainly doesn't want a non-stop flood of through-hikers inundating the place all summer, but is very friendly and follows hikers on trailjournals.com and will probably even know who we are when we arrive just from our blog.
So, that's what we'll do. No VVR, no Keersarge Pass. Muir Trail Ranch is a solid day's hike farther south than VVR so that cuts the final leg down by 20+ miles as well.
We were tickled to run into Pygmy and Mini-Me. After all this way, this trail still feels like a small, familiar place.
The end of the day took us up and over Silver Pass at 10,900 ft. The passes are incredible. We came down and camped shortly after crosing over and built a huge fire as the cold, high winds set in.
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