Trailbusting

Hi everyone, writing to you from Lone Pine, CA, right now during yet another unscheduled stop. I've been hiking with 4 other guys for the past few days (Wanderer, Dave, Straightjacket, and Smiletrain) who left Kennedy Meadows the day before me. Normally we all prefer to hike solo, but have all ended up bunching up and moving together through the tough Sierra conditions; I was only able to catch up to them due to the fact that they were breaking trail before me. The snow has been incredibly hard work, particularly seeing as we are the first group through the mountains this year. Because of this, we have to navigate through without the aid of previous footsteps and plow through the snowpack, both of which are energy and time consuming. Someone estimated that we burned around 12,000 calories a day due to the strenuous conditions, and so here we are in town resupplying yet again and bulking up on fatty foods. A traveling trail angel named Tom is here in town putting us up with all sorts of goodies as well, just continually proving the awesome capacity for generosity that people out here can have and reinforcing the need to 'pay it forward' at some point.

The route to Lone Pine was a circuitous one, involving a 9 mile detour over Kearsarge Pass and down to a lightly used trailhead parking lot where, in an incredible coincidence, a couple with a van just happened to be leaving and gave us a ride to the town of Independence. We were very worried about not having a ride down from the mountains, so the we were incredibly lucky in that regard, and I fully expect karma to catch up and kick my butt eventually. Unfortunately there isn't much in Independence, except a historically preserved Japanese internment camp in the middle of the desert. Given that none of us were in the mood for a depressing, if educational, side-trip, we hitched here to Lone Pine for some real resupply. In one of those hilarious coincidences, Smiletrain and I got a ride mere moments after Dave left to try his luck elsewhere.

For all the trouble and leg-ache, the views have been absolutely stunning. Even the drive down to town was beautiful, involving an equilibrium shattering descent from the icy heights down to the sweltering desert plain. The mountains are covered in pristine snow, and the only tracks around are those of bears, mule deer and marmots. There are gigantic canyons cut by half frozen rivers, and when the light hits the walls in the morning or afternoon, they seem to glow. The contrast between the distant, sun-soaked mountains and those still in shade is stunning, and seeing the cloud shadows racing across the huge distances is awesome. Its easy to see how John Muir and Ansel Adams could be so inspired by this landscape, though hard to see how they got out here; its difficult enough with our modern gear and prepackaged food. Only our continual luck with the weather, which has been consistently gorgeous and calm, has allowed us to continue apace. The first sight of a lake, iced over in glacial blues and aquamarines makes it all worthwhile though, as does the occasional glimpse of some wildlife picking its way up the precarious slopes or foraging in the rocks.

While it hasn't even been 100 miles since my last post, we have already passed several milestones in this section. We completed the arduous ascent of Mt. Whitney, the tallest peak in the 48 contiguous states at over 14000 feet, a 17 mile side trip that involved a lung-busting 3000 foot elevation gain up a rock scramble. The summit was crowded with a dozen or so day hikers who made the climb from the easily accessible eastern side, and, hilariously, the 'shelter' on top was completely filled with a solid block of snow from floor to ceiling. The next day we crossed over Forester Pass, the highest point actually on the PCT, and entered Kings Canyon Park, with views down to the sinuous Bubbs Creek and the occasional rock slide cracking off the craggy walls in the distance. We've already forded several rivers, running high and swift from snow-melt, though the worst are yet to come apparently; wading across a stream in your boots, then heading straight into the snow has, surprisingly, not been as bad as it sounds...yet. We've traversed blinding snowfields (and all have cracked lips and screaming suntans to prove it), and have all had a foot or two 'vacuumed' in wet afternoon snow. This frustrating phenomenon occurs when you step on an air pocket created by a hidden boulder, causing the snow to collapse and pack around your ankle into a vice-like brick of ice that no amount of pulling can break; only by digging out you whole leg can one escape it. Its obvious that one person cannot make it through all these hardships alone, and so we travel together like ducks in a row, pulling each other along.

The satisfaction of knowing we are the first to attempt the Sierras while so many thru hikers are skipping around is an incentive to struggle though all this. Not many people get to see the mountains like this, and so while it certainly is a challenge, it is also very rewarding. Knowing that everyone behind us will be following our tracks, second guessing our route-finding abilities, and laughing at our obvious missteps gives some sense of accomplishment. Its an eerily ephemeral way to leave your mark on such a mammoth landscape; our footsteps will last for but a few day, quietly melting in the sun and being trampled by the following crowd. Though the tracks may be tiny, they will be visible for miles across the snowfields, and will give comfort and peace of mind to those behind, letting them know that at least someone else is crazy enough to be out there, and that for better or worse they went that-a-way.