So, I have inexplicably gotten 3 emails (two from people I don’t know) asking about the Circle of Solitude trip. Generally just asking for the basic route/information on it. I am going to use this sentence here to plug the usefulness of the comment box in cases like this, instead of email please feel free to use either but comments are cool!

Now onto the subject at hand. The Solitude Circle is generally as follows and I do plan on wearing my brand new Adama for President T-shirt out there, hopefully on the summit of Triple Divide peak.  There are many options as is always the case in the Sierra Nevada, this is just a general outline.

This one launches from the Bubbs Creek trail head, right at Road’s End in Sequoia/Kings Canyon.  This is one of the more popular trail heads on the west side of the Sierra Nevada, partially because of the easy access to the Rae Lakes loop from here.  So from Bubbs creek you head to the Sphinx creek junction and head south over Avalanche pass.

Options: from here you can head into either Deadman or Cloud canyon.  From Deadman Canyon you can cross Copper Mine pass (just north of peak 12,2345) into Cloud Canyon or take Elizabeth pass trail (we’ll ignore this one for the CoS).  Either way you go, you have to get over to the south-east side of the Colby Pass trail near Gallats Lake.  For this trip, I’d like to hit Triple Divide Peak, seeing it from the High Sierra Trail was inspirational and intimidating.

From Gallats lake you head east towards Junction Meadow, bypassing Milestone Bowl and Kern Point.  Once you get to Junction meadow you’re on the High Sierra Trail for just a few marvelous minutes as you head north.  The HST then breaks East up to join the Pacific Crest Trail, but on the Circle of Solitude you keep heading north, staying away from the highway of people that the PCT is comparatively.   Heading north, you’ll eventually come to Lake South America.

At LSA you have another good set of options.  You can head south and east towards the PCT and when you hit that you head north again over Forrester pass.  You stay on the PCT for quite a bit, until you get to Vidette Meadow where you head back west towards the Bubbs creek trail head and completion.  The disadvantage to this PCT option being that you have so much time on the PCT with all those people.

I think the true spirit of a hike entitled the Circle of Solitude almost requires you to head straight north from Lake South America instead.  Heading north you’ll cross over Harrison pass, which is lower in elevation than Forrester, but less maintained (if at all).  From Harrison pass you start heading north-west from here to Lake Reflection and then straight north to the Bubbs creek junction and then again west, back towards the trail head and completion.

So that in summary is the Circle of Solitude.  Quite a bit of it is off trail, or at least has the option of being off trail, it’s all remote and lightly used.  I’m looking forward to it and recently found out that Gant has been successful in getting time off for the trip, but that Jared won’t be attending this time.

PS. Adama for president.

How to end this story?

It was successful. It was a learning experience and a remembering experience.

The good:

Weather never even looked menacing,

No one forgot anything,

Good company,

Sierra Nevada is stunningly beautiful,

The trip was great overall, basically everything was good, except for the following minor quibbles.

The not so good:

Lunches, taco and prepackaged meats need some work to be edible.

Weight is not only an immediate issue, as in it’s heavy on my back now, but a cumulative one. It breaks you down over time, my pack should have been lighter, which is easy and hard all at once. Easy to drop 9 pounds of camera gear, but hard not to bring it to places like this.

We need to either have a definate plan and stick with it or none at all and play it all by ear. Every morning, afternoon and evening we’d replan everything for the following days.

Need more class 3 experience so we are all more comfortable cruising up and down climbs.

Afterwards:

My truck never made it back to Gorman, it died on I5 near Bakersfield, but it got us all safely to where we needed to split up before it died. It has been a good truck (here it is on the highest point you can drive any vehicle in California… and likely in the entire US, White Mt). and I look forward to many more adventures with it. My feet have mainly healed up, but I’m still voraciously hungry all the time. So far no signs of Giardia from any of us, so that’s a good thing. I didn’t filter or treat my water when we were in the remotest areas, so I was kinda worrying, but I’m past the gestation period by now I think.

Good job to everyone who went, thanks for your time and see you guys on the next one.

Thank god, I can see the truck! Day 7

We all woke up pretty early and got moving with no breakfast in order to get going quickly. We had a ton of mileage and work to do today. We would be breaching 14,000 feet and be above that for miles, then we’d have to lose about 6,000 feet of elevation and hike about 11 more miles. It was going to be a long day and it started nice and early. We were all ready for this last monster of a day, Gant, Jared, Josh, Jared even managed the strength to smile.

So, this is the steepest part of the trip, the jaunt up to Kgap was tough, because we had full packs, but this one is just plain mean. It’s at a much higher elevation so your lungs are straining, it’s steeper so your muscles are begging for more oxygen and despite this it’s still the most beautiful place in California. So, by now you know the deal; stunning alpine lakes, gorgeous granite monoliths, and views to all of eternity it seemed like. So, for the last time we went up and up and up.

Eventually, we were done with the up and were sitting pretty on top of Mt Whitney. Time for the ridiculous hero poses, which I think were well deserved after a week long trip to the top, so get ready. Since I am putting this stupid story together, screw the alphabetical order, I’m going first. Josh(I miss those dark blue skies) 1(what a doosh, seriously), 2,(one handed pushup, whatsup!?) , Gant 1 I’m not sure what happened, if he forgot or if I screwed up somehow but I don’t have a picture of Gant’s historical Vitamin Water hero pose. Jared, 1, 2. Group hardcore, with Gant celebrating Brokeback Mountain’s emmy win with a W symbol. Group smiles, with all of us absorbing too much UV light into our sensitive little eyes because Gant doesn’t like to wear sunglasses for pictures.

After almost three hours on top for me, the other two had about 1.5 hours up top, we were ready to get to the truck and finish the last 11 miles or so. Down we hiked, Gant and I made a valiant attempt on Mt Muir, but were rebuffed. We’ll be back for that one with a better description of the route, or maybe someone to guide us, like Gant’s future self who we happened to run into on the trail later that day.

Again, down we hiked, past the needles, through snow and through switchback after switchback. The people that summit Whitney from the portal, which is 95% of them I’d guess, are just sick in the head. That’s a slog on a scale that only a masochist would enjoy.

We left trailcamp around 3:30 from what I remember. I didn’t break until I saw the most welcome sight mine eyes have looked upon (my big stupid red truck),which was a little after 6:00.

Thus ended the trip, Gant, Jared and Josh had successfully traversed the Sierra Nevada from West to East. Traveling 90+ miles and gaining over 20,000 feet over seven days.

After shots, contrasted to before shots:

Gant (Contrast),

Jared(Contrast),

Josh (Contrast).

Raggedy men, Day 6.

We didn’t leave our tents until about 9. We didn’t leave our campsite until around 11. This is horrendously late for those not used to backpacking. We didn’t have nearly enough water for everyone to get to the first creek. We were already fighting some mild dehydration problems and not having enough water for the first couple hours of hiking was going to hurt. As a group we were pretty well worn out and down. We decided to bypass the optional trip we had setup to get into the Wallace lake basin and just go for broke, to try to get to the truck by day 7. If that was to have a chance of happening, we had to take our blistered, bruised and battered feet another ten or eleven miles to Guitar Lake today.

At least we were back in the granite majesty of the Sierra range. If you’ve never been to the Sierra Nevada, I urge you to at least go to the town of Big Pine and drive west on the street between the only two gas stations. That road turns into glacier lodge road and get you into the area of the Palisades, if that doesn’t turn your heart into a soft, supple mess then you truly deserve the city that you live in.

By this time my camera batteries are low, my feet are too tired to take me anywhere but the trail and my eyes aren’t seeing the shots anymore, so my pictures get fewer and fewer, but the area is no less than magnificent still. Creeks, meadows and the backside of the highest mountain in the continental US.

Well, you should have no doubt that despite our diminished physical capacity, due to sleep deprivation, elevation and nutritional degradation we made the mileage and hit Guitar lake by sundown. It was an ungodly cold camp there on the shore of that little lake.

Day 6 was over.

Mileage Slogging, Day 5

We awoke, kinda early and tried to get moving as we had alot of mileage to cover, just under sixteen to be exact. At least our packs were getting lighter, and all of our scented gear finally fit into the bear canisters, which was nice. After a quick and tiring game of catch with the Aerobie, we set off. We had to drop down into the Kern canyon, losing 2600 feet of elevation which is a great way to rupture your fragile feet. After that, we had to travel up the Kern canyon 9 miles and find somewhere to camp.

By this point, Jared looked more muslim than man with his overgrowth of a beard.

So, we hiked and began to run into more people than we’d been seeing the last bunch of days and got more oxygen than we’d been used to as well with the drop in elevation, unfortunately this also meant more heat. I’m a colder weather person, and adding 40 something pounds to haul makes me appreciate the chilly high elevation air even more. The Kern canyon is neat in its own way. You’ll see not many better examples of a glacially carved valley than that, lots of creeks and streams and even hot springs feeding the mighty Kern River.

At the bottom of the canyon, I knew my feet had blistered. I think the others had the same problem, that’s a steep drop. I can’t imagine climbing up that with a pack, you got to be nuts to try that kind of tomfoolery. Also at the bottom was this weird little gate with a sign that said, “Close this gate to protect wilderness”. I’m still not quite sure what to make of that gate.

Now that we were in the bottom of this canyon, water crossings came up every mile or so it seemed like. From immense to fast moving to the more mundane ones.

For this next picture, keep in mind that we are hundreds of miles from any urban centers. Your balloons travel a looong way when they go, so try to keep them in check.

Eventually, the day ended, many blisters and miles later. We setup a little fire ring, found some bear poop and a bear cave right next to our site, but decided to chance it. I slept very well that night, knowing that we were getting back into the highlands now.

Thus ended day 5, about 16 miles down and a very, very tired crew.

More Mileage, Day 4

Day 4 dawned on us and my personal dream faded. We decided to get back to the actual trail rather than risk any more offtrail adventure by heading north over either of the two passes that were available to us. I think Gant’s expression in this picture sums up his feelings about taking on pants pass with packs (it is coincidentally in the background, on the left side of the notch behind his right shoulder), or maybe it was just indigestion, I guess we’ll never know. The pass could have been so easily renamed posthumously to Gants’ pass too, by just changing one letter on maps. Ahh well, there will be another time for pants pass I suppose, here it is with Jared wearing his hairnet for some reason.

So we packed up, (Gant, Jared) looking a little more grim after three full days of high elevation packing and not a whole lot of great deep sleep as of yet. The whole tent + sleeping bag/pad + elevation + exhaustion + dehydration + rocks/hard ground == crappy sleep in general, add in Gant’s bathroom trips twice a night and he apparently got less/worse sleep than Jared and I. Nonetheless, we had work to do and so we headed south, to join back up with the High Sierra Trail in all it’s glory. It is indeed beautiful, though in a different way than the higher elevations of the Sierra.

We hiked through the most glorious meadow that I have ever imagined as we headed south. I knew I couldn’t capture its beauty with my camera so I didn’t even try. I do believe that it is our version of Andelain, for anyone who gets that reference. I could spend years there, drinking in the mountains and breathing the grasses, truly a heaven on earth in that meadow just south of the Kaweah Gap on the High Sierra Trail.

All too soon we came to a magnificent stream crossing with a stunning backdrop of Sierra granite. We did our first laundry here, and despite the fact that Gant is the darkest of us all, he was the only one to get sunburnt here, shocking considering how white Jared is and I’m not much different.

So, after this stunning meadow and creek we continued on. We had alot of miles to cover to get to Moraine lake by nightfall, a good portion of it uphill again. So, on we went, clean(er) clothes and all, though within the hour they stank again. Really at this point it was turning into a mileage slog, trying to get miles down and done to get to a spot to camp. Nothing challenging or technical; just mileage, mileage, mileage. The lower elevations turned into a deep forest and some nice cliffs overlooking the forest. Then it turned into a deep, old, lonely forest with not much of a trail to follow, just a few footsteps in the dirt ahead of you to follow.

Eventually we got to Moraine lake and setup camp and our first fire since night one, which was nice.

So ended Day 4, about 12 miles after it began.

A most beautiful failure, Day 3

Day 3 was supposed to be the first of a few days off trail. It was kind of a rest day, with only a small amount of mileage and not much elevation gain. There would be time to attempt a peak or just relax and give the feet some time off with the schedule that we had for that day. We didn’t start early or fast. We woke up and listened to Jared talk about how he could climb the Kaweah range with just one hand.

After that inspiring speech from Jared we got started. We were headed north to try to get a closer look at our options to get to where we wanted to go. Basically there were two choices; either pants pass (hard) or lion rock/lion lake pass (longer but easier). So we left the trail, which was headed south to the chagoopa plateau and tried our luck to the north to the land of glory and adventure.

The first obstacle to cross was a large talus field. Next was a large snowfield. Once we got to the top there, it was time for a break. As we looked around, we all came to the conclusion that it would be a good idea to drop our packs somewhere and make an attempt on Lawson peak for some reason. I’d never even heard of Lawson before that morning when I noticed it on the map and saw it on the horizon. It’s nothing special, but it looked doable, so we had a new plan for the day. It’s the far left peak in this picture, the center right one is Black Kaweah again.

So, yeah, lets go bag a peak. Either way, it was going to be nice to take 50 pounds off my back and just hike for a while, instead of hauling the weight around. So, we crossed the outlet of lake 10,725, which is just mind-numbingly spectacular both to the north and the south.

We dropped our packs in some random meadowy area and started moving up to Lawson. We should have paid more attention to where we left our packs; but that wouldn’t be a problem until much later in the day. Up we went, cruising without the crushing weight of those packs it was really nice. The route started off pretty easy being just a big boulder hop. It got a bit tricky; we had some sections of easy, but unexpected class 3 climbing, above yet another gorgeous alpine lake. This continued up for quite a bit as we were off trail trying to take a shortcut from what I remember (Later in the day, on the descent I took this overview picture of the route we took. The red line is the general path Jared and I took, Gant was a bit lower and then angled up more steeply at the end).

Looking back to the West, produced the usual spectacular views that after three days you don’t grow accustomed to but you do come to expect. Eventually after all this climbing and straining we stopped in various places and ate some food. Gant did so in the shadow of Black Kaweah(*nice pic, but large). It kind of looks like a Condor, wings spread and warming itself in the afternoon sun from here. Jared seemed more interested in posing for the camera, since he’d already talked trash on the BK and was starting to feel hypoxic.

Feeling refreshed after a lunchbreak, we rushed up what was left of our ascent, but unfortunately I didn’t read the map as well as I could have and… well, to put it bluntly, I lead us up to the wrong peak, which I have named false Lawson. It was Jared’s new personal high point, as in he’d never been to that elevation before and wasn’t feeling any ill effects, so that was a great thing, he was just slightly new to the hypoxic feeling which is the fun part of elevation. For those that’ haven’t experienced it, it’s like a mild buzz. Gant wasn’t that thrilled and I was quite down as well, you can see the real Lawson over my head there.

Since we were already running out of daylight, we began our descent as the moon rose over Pyramid Pinnacle 1 2. Jared was trying to explain to us how to get back, but Gant and I had more faith in the map. What we were trying to do was decide what to do for the rest of the trip, since we had essentially lost a day with this attempt on Lawson that took much longer than expected. We decided to think it about it more, as the shadows were getting long and the air was growing chilly.

We had decided earlier in the day to take the longer, more circuitous route back, because none of us wanted to climb down what we had climbed up in the light, let alone now that the sun was down. This longer route went well for the most part, except when we came to one lake’s outlet and couldn’t find any way across it. It was too cold and dark to cross in the running water, we needed some sort of bridge or path, but there was none. So, we built a rock bridge. This took the three of us about fifteen minutes, picking up big rocks, throwing them into the cold running water, splashing the others when possible with the rocks and then eventually getting across and moving on to where we thought we had left our packs. By now we needed to turn on our headlamps and don all of our layers of clothing, 11,000 feet is cold at night.

This was a terrifically long day, time wise, mileage wise, elevation gain/loss, the disappointment of expending all that effort and getting to the wrong peak. I was beat and we couldn’t find our packs. I was done mentally and physically and this day just kept on going. It was around 9:40 pm when Jared finally started whistling and flashing his strobe light like he was at a gay German disco. We setup our tents and I passed out solid.

Thus ended day three, so far every day had been more beautiful than the last.

Breaching the Kgap, Day 2

Day two began like most do, with a nice little sunrise, though the woods around us were so deep we didn’t get much of a show. We had the first of our many days of oatmeal and raisins for breakfast. After breakfast we packed up and still not all our food fit into our mandatory bear canisters, hopefully we’d run into no bears, and no rangers.

The hike started off downhill to Lone Pine Creek, unfortunately that meant all the more uphill later in the day. It was quite spectacular though, we were still in the lush low elevations with green and granite. On the way down we saw a Mountain King Snake, which was a neat first for me. The other two I was hiking with seem to be low level herpestologists (intentional misspelling) and knew quite a bit about snakes, which I gladly made fun of.

When we finally hit the bottom, we saw our first bridge enabled creek crossing, as well as one of the previous attempts at bridging the creek. LP creek itself was a powerhouse; loud, fast, strong and impressive to watch from 30 or 40 feet above it as it raced below the bridge. At this point, everything in front of us was uphill, very uphill. We were at about 7,500 feet and the goal for the day, Kgap is at about 10,700. So we had our work cut out for us.

So we began the uphill. Along the way passing massive monoliths and un-named waterfalls like you pass parked cars on a city block. Eventually, even the mighty Gant was tired and needed a break. We found ourselves a nice pool to stop at, bandaged our feet, rinsed off in some of the most refreshing water you can imagine and just had fun (picture is confusing, I think Gant has a gun, Jared has a guitar and I have an attitude).

After that, we hiked on. Passing the inspiring and intimidating Angel Wings. Someday, I’ll be back to tackle that one, I can’t ignore that kind of challenge, but I just don’t have the skills or experience for it yet. Anyway back on track, fast forward an hour or so and we find ourselves at another one of the highlights of the trip, the incomparable Hamilton Lake. We all Gant, Jared, Josh (side note, faster shutter speed for action shots, can you tell I’m not a sportsphoto guy?) jumped into this glacial beauty, after which Jared needed more bandages for his feet and Gant needed a nap (side note2, I love having the camera, it allows me to dictate the story, how it happened and who did what, no matter what was really going on).

The only unpleasant aspect to this lake was Jared threatening to get into the lake in the buck, which was doubly funny when some random old guy showed up and jumped into the lake in his tighty blue underwear, complete with holes. To top it off, after that display he got naked to dry off, not ten feet away from us while we were relaxing on a rock eating some lunch.

After this beautiful little spot comes one of the biggest and steepest uphills of the entire trip. At the top is the Kgap and hopefully a nice campsite. So we crossed the outlet of Hamilton lake and began the ascent. It was quite a nice uphill, most of the way we got to look down on Hamilton lake, (we swam right near the big rock slabs on the right side) and one of the waterfalls that feed it. It’s a bit difficult to describe just how imposing this granite scenery and the view overall is up there. This small section of the map is called Valhalla and it truly is inspiring, this was another one of my favorite little sections of the trip, which is why our break here was so long I think. This little area is apparently also problematic for the trail as well. Way back in the 30’s they built a bridge across it, but two years later nature said no and took it down, here’s all that remains of that old bridge. Now there’s a cave to walk through.

Another mile and another thousand feet of gain later we are still hiking. It’s getting to be later in the afternoon, but we are determined to hit the Kgap, despite our numerous lengthy breaks. If you see Jared in the bottom right of this picture, you can follow the trail back about two miles, Hamilton lake is at the bottom of the picture, out of view.

Now that we were really getting up there in elevation, we started to run into snow and that wily Mr Gant can’t not throw snowballs when he sees snow. The other nice thing about getting up there in elevation is that the rarified air lends an air of austerity to the scenery. Precipice lake was mostly frozen over, and the meadows were now nothing but short grasses, but the views were still stunning.

So, when we got to the Kaweah Gap itself, we setup camp and enjoyed a chilly sunset on The Black Kaweah’s western ridge.

Thus ended day two. 9 more miles down, one of the two hardest days on the whole trip done and another beautiful sunset.

Up to the Kaweah Gap, Day 1.

So, Wednesday morning we woke up in the campground and packed our gear up one last time. Double and triple checking everything that we needed to have and then double checking each other after that. Then unpacking some things that we had doubled up on and cutting a few more ounces here and there and then doublechecking one more time. After all that nonsense, we got our permit from one of the more unsociable deskrangers I’ve ran across and we headed to the trailhead to start our excursion. Of course with any big endeavour before pictures are a necessity, hence the following: Gant, Jared, Josh

The trail starts off very gently, in addition to being very heavily used, unlike what we’d find later in the trip. You find yourself hiking through the Giant Forest, where you can’t spit without hitting a gargantuan Sequoia tree. In the low growth of the trees it feels and looks like a rain forest. The greenery, the large leafed ferns everywhere are a stark contrast to the monopoly that granite has on the High Sierra. Off to the South you have a view of the Cathedral rocks, to the East you see the Great Western Divide, which is where the Kaweah Gap is located, our goal for day two.

We didn’t get the earliest start that day, probably around 10:45 or so and we had at least 11 miles to cover with the most weight in our packs because of exorbitant lunches and other first day goodies. We made pretty good time, even though we had numerous creeks and streams to cross and land to survey. Jared had a slight wardrobe malfunction, which Gant was overly interested in for some reason as well, but despite this we still booked along quite well. The only wildlife to note on day one outside of the thirteen hundred deer was a lone rattlesnake, who didn’t even strike at anyone.

Around the halfway point of the day, we came across Mehrten creek, what a gorgeous spot. We unfortunately got there while another group was in the prime spot, so we got the leftovers, but still the leftovers were simply stunning. We dunked our heads, cooled our feet, took small naps and generally relaxed at one of the prettiest spots we’d find on the entire trip. I’ll be back here, without a doubt.

But the Kaweah gap wasn’t getting any closer. Not that we’d make it there on day one, but the more miles we could drop the closer it would be for day 2. So, we booted back up and got back to work. We had at least 5 more miles to cover to get to Lone pine creek, which was an informal goal for the night. But when we got to a place called Bearpaw meadow, we ran into a very helpful ranger. After an hour or so of talking to her and picking her brain about our intended route as well as some welcome Tang and a shared piece of pecan pie she talked us into changing our plans a bit for the next few days. The view from her backcountry cabin was spectacular at sunset, during the day too, but the alpenglow colors over the divide and Kgap in particular was stunning.

But, since we had taken so much time talking to the ranger and mooching food we had just about run out of daylight. So, we decided to setup camp at Bearpaw meadows, where there was conveniently an abundance of firewood for us to burn, which was perfect since Jared and I had brought some kielbasa type foods for dinner, while Gant pretended to enjoy his dehydrated meal.

Thus ended day one. 11.3 miles, a beautiful creek, an amazing sunset and the realization that no one had forgotten to pack anything, what a great start.

Backpacking the High Sierra Trail

How to tell this story?

I’ll try a technique that calls for me to begin, well at the beginning. We had a tremendous plan to hike across the Sierra crest, the singularly highest range of mountains in the continental United States. We were to go off trail and climb some high peaks, cross some rarely crossed passes and generally see some of the more remote and beautiful areas of the Sierra for 9-10 days. There were three of us; Daniel Gant, Jared Meichtry and Josh Grant and we’d been planning/preparing for this trip for about 6 months or so.

For those with just a basic understanding of California’s geography, here is an overview of where we were and what we did. The black line on the map is the general path we took while hiking, generally following the High Sierra Trail. The red line is the route we had to drive, about 8 hours of driving were required to setup the vehicles before the trip. Jared and I had to drive up to the Whitney portal on the Eastern side of the Sierra and leave my truck there, then take his truck all the way over to Lodgepole on the Western side of the Sierra.

Just getting that setup involved me getting two tickets and an accident. Here’s how it all began.

I left my house and traveled south to the freeway interchange that would get me to the portal to drop my truck off. No more than 2 miles from home, some clown pulls out of a blind dirt pullout without looking. I’m so shocked to see anyone pulling out of one of these unused pullouts I waste time thinking about it instead of reacting. I plow into my brake pedal, remembering that my ABS is out so the truck goes into a hard skid. Thankfully before my foot got to the brake my hands reacted by turning away from the offending car. So now I’m skidding straight toward a tree and I feel the car in question hit my right side, he still didn’t brake.

Here’s the after picture. That’s my truck, that’s the tree. No real damage, just some scratches to the paint, but the Big Red Truck has kept me safe again, though since the 4 wheel drive is also out, I had to get towed out of the deep sand I was in. That was my first accident ever, and I’m a bit shaken by it. Well, no problem, get all the badluck out of the way before the trip…

So, I made it to the freeway safely after that, though within a couple of miles of being on the freeway I’m pulled over. Bleh, band of brothers yadda yadda yadda and I get away with a fixit ticket. Still though, within an hour of leaving my house I had an accident and the first of two tickets. Not long after this, I did get the second ticket, yaddayaddayadda fixit ticket again. Well great, my first tickets in years and my first accident ever. What else could go wrong after this kind of auspicious start?

After all this crap, we made it up to the Whitney portal and left my truck on the side of the road. On the way out of there, Jared picked up a hitchiker who had just completed the same general route that we were about to attempt. He said that two of his hiking partners bailed on him on the second day and turned around to go home. The route had been harder than they thought it would be and they weren’t prepared for it. He stank worse than you can imagine, but he had some good information, so it was marginally worth it.

What a stupid prologue.