John Muir Trail Journal: Part 4
Days 20-25: Woods Creek to Whitney Portal
JMT DAY 20 - 8.28.20
Woods Creek to Middle Rae Lake (mi 174.8) // 6.3 miles +2,200 -100 ft
We had a short day today! Even though we didn’t have many miles to do, we still got hiking at 6:00 am because we wanted to beat the heat, and I knew the climb up to Rae Lakes was totally exposed. We also wanted plenty of time to relax at the lakes and get a good camp spot since it’s a Friday night and can be a busy place.
The hike up was that - just up. We leapfrogged with a couple we met on Pinchot Pass yesterday and learned they were going over Glen Pass today. We were happy that we weren’t. The ascent was long, and it was starting to smell pretty smoky. But it was mostly cool since the sun hadn’t risen over the mountains to the East yet. The best part of the hike today was watching two marmots hang out with each other, and at the same time, we saw from a great distance a fawn having the zoomies around it’s mamma in a patch of grass/ bushes. It was the cutest thing to watch!! It just kept frolicking and prancing around in circles. So much joy. I felt like we were guests in mother nature’s house.
After that encounter, the grade of the climb leveled out and we took a water filtering break at Dollar Lake. Then we kept climbing to Arrowhead, then Lower Rae, and finally Middle Rae Lake! We also encountered the ranger for Rae Lakes and he let us know that the smoke has been worse in the southern portion of the Sierra and there’s a new fire down south somewhere (not in the mountains) that is blowing smoke in. Such a bummer. We’ve now run into each ranger from the stations along the trail! McClure, LeConte, Bench, and Rae! And that’s not including the 2 USFS rangers either.
We got to the camping area around 11:30 in the morning! I found one of the spots I was envious of when I camped at Rae earlier in the summer, so we pitched our tent there and ate lunch. Since we had so much time (and sun) in the day, we decided to do a little laundry with some soap we got at MTR and the bear canister. We hauled water from the lake with the canister to our campsite and after multiple trips, washed our hiking tank tops, kula cloths, and socks. Washing the Kula Cloth was the best idea because it was starting to smell really bad. I did laundry much more frequently on the PCT than we have been on this trip!
After laundry, we put everything out to dry and then went for a swim ourselves. It wasn’t as hot out as I would have liked, and it was pretty breezy, so I didn’t go in all the way: I blew up my thermarest and used it as a floaty and just laid in the water, which was very nice. After swimming we just hung out and dried off, then got ready for bed and ate dinner and crawled back into our tent. I also re-did my braids since they were falling apart! It is very smoky outside and the sunset wasn’t great for photographing, sadly. It is still a beautiful place though!
Hopefully after our relaxing day, we’ll both feel more energized for tomorrow. We are doing Glen Pass first thing, and then hoping to get as far up Forester Pass as we possibly can.
JMT DAY 21 - 8.29.20
Middle Rae Lake to near Forester Pass (mi 186.3) // 11.5 miles +3,300 -2,600 ft
We woke up early again today - 5 am to get the pass done early. I was kind of awake earlier - I definitely woke up at 3 am, but just laid down with my eyes closed, possibly getting some sleep between 3-5 am. I’m going to experiment with not taking a Benadryl tonight because I think it might be causing me to wake up earlier. When I left the tent to poop, the stars were incredible, and all the smoke cleared out of the basin overnight. It was so beautiful! But cold! So I finished my business and we got ready to hike.
We were on the trail at 6 am, and made our way towards Glen Pass, walking between upper and middle Rae Lakes. I again passed the sign for 60 lakes basin: next time I actually will go there for sure! We made pretty good time going up the pass. We were moving faster than I was when I did it in July! And only one person passed us on the way up. A small victory. I am really starting to like Glen Pass. It’s really not too bad going up, especially from Rae Lakes, and the views are just outstanding the whole way. I chatted with the hiker that passed us at the top - he is also doing the JMT and not going out to resupply at Kearsarge. He’s a lot faster than us though so not sure we’ll see him again!
It was windy at the top, so mom and I got going down pretty quickly. We crossed paths with many weekenders and day hikers walking up Glen Pass as we were going down. The miles to the Kearsarge junction seemed to drag on and on. The trail kept doing little up bumps which slows us down a little. The view over Charlotte Lake to the west though was crazy: we could see the line of smoke in the air way out there.
We were wanting water though. There wasn’t any water until we started the switchbacks down to Vidette Meadow, so we got a move-on, and at the first stream, we took a longer break to filter water and eat a snack and cold soak lunch. I had eaten my 2 bars for the day on the way up Glen Pass, and was getting pretty hungry. My hiker hunger has definitely kicked in.
After our break, we descended all the way to the bottom and walked a bit longer along the meadow & Bubbs Creek before sitting down to eat lunch. Mom is still having a hard time eating. Good thing we’re almost finished so she can eat some real food soon.
After lunch we started our dreaded afternoon climb to get as far up Forester Pass as possible. There were many campsites along the way, so we basically re-evaluated how we felt and our progress every mile or so. I was worried all of the hikers who passed us would be aiming for the last campsite on Guthooks before the pass, but we decided to push for that spot and I was shocked when we arrived and no one was there!
It’s a beautiful spot and I actually ate lunch here on the PCT after doing Forester. We were pretty exhausted, but still arrived by 5 pm. We got water, set up camp, ate dinner, etc. and were laying down by 6:30 pm. It was a long day and the sun went behind the huge mountains around us very quickly. Being at 11,200 ft, it gets cold once the sun disappears! Sadly, a lot of smoke moved in this afternoon, but hopefully it will clear up overnight like last night! I want to enjoy the views from Forester because they are truly spectacular.
JMT DAY 22 - 8.30.20
Below Forester to Wallace Creek (mi 198.7) // 12.5 miles +2,500 -3,300 ft
I woke up before the alarm again. It was another cold night and while I wasn’t particularly cold in my quilt, I could feel that it was cold. Like if it was five degrees colder I might have been cold, you know? Maybe because my pad has a low R value I feel a little colder? I immediately left the tent to do my business and admired the beautiful stars.
We started hiking at 6:00 am, and we were 3.1 miles from the top of Forester Pass. The first mile seemed pretty gradual and was really beautiful. The alpine meadow and streams running through the rocks with the huge mountains as a backdrop was amazing. Also, the sun was rising and we had the best alpenglow of the trip on those mountains! Sadly, smoke was starting to settle in and distant mountains became engulfed quickly. The second mile was more challenging. The group that we thought was in front of us passed us here. Turns out they camped at the sites behind us AND are going to summit Whitney tomorrow and need to hike 18 miles today to put them in a position to do so. Godspeed. They were so fast and sped ahead of us.
I spent time admiring my surroundings during all of the rest breaks. It looks so different from when I was on the PCT. Literally like night and day. For one, I didn’t hike any dry trail coming down Forester until we were almost at the place we camped last night! Crazy. And then add the smoke vs. the bluebird day I had in 2018 and there was just so much difference! The final mile was a hard push. It was so steep and the switchbacks just kept going. But finally, 3 hours later, we got to the top of the pass! It was super windy, and a northbounder arrived at the same time as us, so we took some pictures and went down. It was pretty cold and windy the whole time and I left my rain jacket on for most of the ascent and descent of Forester, only taking it off once we reached a stream for a break and the sun finally felt hot.
After a nice water break and talking to a nice group of NOBOs, we took off again. I turned around to grab another glance of Forester and to tell Mom something, and then saw a pretty amazing sight out of the corner of my eye: a very large buck laying in the grass with 3 other adult females around him and 3 fawns! It was super cool, and a little intimidating because he NEVER stopped staring at us. He was protecting his harem! I snapped a few pictures and we kept hiking along. Definitely one of the coolest wildlife sightings on the trail, even if they were *just* deer.
The downhill was pretty nice and gradual, but also barren and hot. I kept turning around to steal glances of the mountains behind us. Soon enough, we reached the bottom again at Tyndall Creek, and I reminisced about Hot Mess losing his phone at this water crossing in 2018. We ate our cold soaked lunch and had some chips and filtered some more water. David & Steve - the Big SEKI Loop duo that we met at Lake Marjorie soon appeared behind us! They had gone into Independence to resupply, so we caught up to them while they were off trail. It was nice seeing them again.
After lunch, we had a small uphill to Bighorn Plateau, which is such an interesting place. It looked so out of place in the Sierra, but last time I was here, it looked more “normal”. Maybe because there was more snow and the lighting was different. But this just doesn’t look like the Sierra at all! Maybe Wyoming? The views of the mountains all around were stunning, and we had a full view of Mt. Whitney in the distance - the end is literally in sight!
After the climb, we had 2.5 more miles of downhill to Wallace Creek, our campsite for the night. We got to camp pretty early - 4:30 - but I knew the campsites up ahead weren’t that great and neither of us wanted to do another 600 feet of climbing when we had a nice camp area with a beautiful creek nearby. We soaked our feet in the stream until they were numb, then changed into our sleep clothes, laid down in the tent for a while, and then made dinner & laid down some more. We deserve rest after today!
JMT DAY 23 - 8.31.20
Wallace Creek to above Guitar Lake (mi 206.6) // 7.9 miles +2,200 -700 ft
Today we slept in a little bit since we didn’t have as far to go, setting the alarm for 5:30. We both just laid there, not wanting to get up, especially since it was cold outside. Eventually we did, as the bathroom urges were urgent enough. We were pretty slow getting everything together though, not getting on the trail until 6:45. We immediately started switchbacking up a hill, but I was happy to do so, as my fingers were completely numb. After just 15 minutes of hiking, I regained feeling and warmth in them. The morning was quite uneventful as the terrain is not very exciting in this stretch to Crabtree Meadows. We went downhill a bit, saw some meadow views, climbed up again, then down to Crabtree.
There were no wag bags at the junction, which there usually are on this side, as you are required to pack out your waste in the Whitney Zone. Good thing we packed wag bags in our MTR resupply. We found Steve & David again and they planned to camp at the same place as us tonight. We told them to save us a spot as the passed. The trail climbs in about 3 sections for our last part of the day. First to Timberline Lake, where we took an extended lunch break, enjoying the views. Then, we climb to Guitar Lake, where we camped last year on the HST.
We took some time to soak our feet in the creek as it was still early afternoon and we knew there was no shelter or shade at our campsite. A couple groups trickled in and set up at Guitar, and we saw some people coming down from the summit. Two guys had a message from David & Steve letting us know that there was plenty of water near camp. Cool, no need to carry too much up the last super steep climb. Our third chunk of climb was up to the campsite. We did this part in the morning last year and it kind of sucks to do then since it’s usually wet from streams and has big steps. It was better in the afternoon when you can see everything. After stopping for many pictures of Guitar Lake, we finally made it to the campsite 0.8 miles later, with plenty of day left. We found a sandy campsite to set our tent up, and then went down to the tarn to soak our legs and feet again. They deserve to be pampered as much as possible before tomorrow!
We strategized for tomorrow and planned what time to wake up and leave. We both want to finish at the portal tomorrow, but we know how rough the descent is too. Last year, I could barely make it to Trail Camp in one piece, I was so fatigued and lightheaded: probably low-grade altitude sickness from not eating and drinking enough. Tomorrow I plan to have way more snacks within reach and more water too, with electrolytes. After planning, we went back to the hot tent and did our baby wipe shower, and I slathered my crispy skin with lotion and let it sit for a bit. Soon enough, it was dinner time, so we brought our food up to David & Steve’s awesome site and had dinner together: possibly the last on the trail! Once the sun started glowing orange on the horizon through the smoke, we knew it was time for bed. We both had early 3:30 am wake-up calls.
We got ready for bed, wearing almost all of our clothes, and took our first wag bag poops of the trip. Always a joy. We’re camped at nearly 12,000 feet tonight, so it will probably be a cold one. We are excited and a little anxious, but mostly excited and in disbelief that we will finish the JMT tomorrow!
JMT DAY 24 - 9.1.20
Above Guitar Lake to Outpost Camp // 10.4 miles +2,750 -4,400
Whitney Day! Finishing Day! First of September! Surprisingly, it was not as cold as we were expecting it to be last night, and it was actually pretty pleasant out for 3:30 am when we woke up. Since we slept in our hiking clothes, we didn’t have much to do in terms of waking up & packing up, so we just did our bathroom duties, got the bear canisters, and pulled basically all of the food out into more accessible areas. I was going to need to keep fueling myself today to avoid bonking later like last year. We heard the groups of people who camped at Guitar Lake passing our site, hoping to get to the top by sunrise.
At 4:30, we were all packed up and ready to leave. Our friends had already left. They didn’t have to pack up at all since they would be returning to camp on this side after the summit. I was super happy we camped where we did. It was much more satisfying to start at this location in the dark than at Guitar Lake. The trail is a little better graded and you’re only on sand & rocks, not climbing up through grassy, wet, rocks where its harder to see the trail. We took our time, slow and steady up the switchbacks. Since the weather was so pleasant, we both had to shed layers within the first 30 minutes of hiking. And of course, for some reason, my bowels just get unhappy on Whitney. I had to go to the bathroom - again! Luckily, I found a nice spot behind a rock pile on a switchback to open my WAG bag in relative privacy. Not that there was anyone around. It was actually oddly lonely on Whitney. I’m used to many more people, but this year, it seemed like everyone around us was going for a sunrise summit.
After the potty break, we continued on. I loved hiking during this pre-blue hour with just my headlamp guiding me. Probably because I knew what the scenery was like around me, and it made me feel less bad about our progress if it was dark and I could only see 20 feet in front of me. Once we were nearly to the trail junction, the sun started to rise and the mountains just started glowing. I had to stop to take pictures every 10 steps because the lighting was changing so quickly! It was so beautiful. Whitney may be crowded and an “easy” mountain, but it really is beautiful. Don’t let the crowds and permit process stop you from coming here. I hiked it three years in a row, and it was magical each time. It really doesn’t get old.
We reached the trail junction at 7:00 am, which was much faster than last year! We took a 20 minute break to take some heavy items out of our packs and only hike up with our most important things, and to take a snack and water filtering break. Now we were off for the last 2 miles of the JMT! These last two miles always take so much longer than I think they should. The trail is certainly only slightly uphill/ flat in certain parts, but has some curveballs thrown in there as well. And there’s always a little more traffic on this part since the day hikers/ eastern side backpackers are in the picture now. So there’s more yielding too.
After about a half mile of hiking from the junction, we started running into the sunrise summit crew. They all had a lovely morning. I was hoping I could convince mom to do a sunrise summit this year, since I still haven’t done one, but I guess I will have to save that experience for another trip! We also ran into our friends Steve & Dave and we all wished each other luck in the rest of our trips. Its always fun making trail friends. I thought of other people we met along the way and how their summits went. Eventually, the sun rose more and was overhead instead of being blocked by the mountain, so we shed some of our layers in preparation for the final summit push. We reached the location where the “permanent” snow field usually is, but there was nothing but rocks. Unstable rocks, too. It’s actually nicer when there is snow on the route. After that part, we just had one more steep push to the top. I was super happy when I saw the shelter at the top. We made it! 211 miles from Yosemite Valley, and now we are here! I went over to the trail register and signed while mom caught up just a minute later. I always love reading the summit registers. We reached the top at 9:45.
After signing the register, we went to the true summit, took some pictures with the brand new sign, and tried to enjoy the smoky view. Lots was happening at the top! There was a Hula dancing group that day hiked the trail and they did a Hula performance at the top! And then there was a marriage proposal! It was definitely a Whitney summit day to remember. We hugged and had our tears too. I was so, so proud of Mom for being able to finish the trail. I knew she didn’t have a super easy hike dealing with her neuroma, lack of hunger but also starving, and homesickness. But she did it! We called Dad from the top and told him that we were pretty set on finishing at the portal today because we wanted real food, pronto! He didn’t know if he could make it there due to where he was going to stay the night. We just decided to watch the time, and if we could make it for dinner, we would, and figure out our camping later.
We left the summit at 10:30 and made it back to the junction at 12:00 pm where I ate a few more snacks, cold soaked some lunch, and filtered more water to get me down the 99 switchbacks. We re-packed our things and hoisted our heavier packs on once again. We were feeling pretty good about our stamina, but knew the switchbacks were soul crushing. We started down, and I went onto auto-pilot mode for the stretch. Yes, the switchbacks really do suck. The view doesn’t really change, and it is very, very hot. They are also a little vertigo-inducing. You can’t really space out on them because there are some steep drop offs and loose trail. Eventually, the tiny lake at trail camp seemed to get much closer, and we were almost there! I sat down on a rock and waited for mom to catch up. It was 2:15 pm and we only had 6 miles left to the portal. We knew we could make it down for dinner, and we got really excited. We put our game faces on and left trail camp at a quicker speed.
Suddenly though, I heard Mom gasp in pain behind me. Something had gone wrong. We still don’t really know what happened, but she probably severely pulled a calf muscle. We had already hiked far enough away from trail camp that we didn’t want to turn back. So we kept hiking until a creek, needing to get water since we were both nearly out. It was painfully slow going. I dug out my ibuprofen and made her take 800 mg and got to filtering water. I realized then that there was no way we could make it out tonight at the pace she was going and how much pain she was in. I’m not going to lie: I was pissed. I ate my lunch I prepared at Trail Crest, suddenly not able to stomach trail food since the promise of real food was within reach. We left the creek after resting there for 45 minutes, waiting to see if the ibuprofen would work. It didn’t. The next 2 miles from the creek to Outpost Camp took nearly 4 hours to do. It was very, very painful. Physically and emotionally for Mom, just emotionally and mentally for me. We were so close to just being done. Finally, we reached Outpost and I just picked the first site I saw and set up all of our stuff. We sent Dad an inReach message telling him we wouldn’t be finishing that day. I quickly made dinner, shoved it down my throat, and climbed in bed, in no mood to enjoy our last night outdoors. Mom was equally disappointed. I felt bad for being so upset, but at that point, I couldn’t really help it.
JMT Day 25 - 9.2.20
Outpost Camp to Whitney Portal // 4 miles -2,000 ft
After going to bed in a pretty bad mood, it was another day. We didn’t set an alarm, but we still woke up pretty early naturally. Mom’s leg felt a little better, and we packed up and got going. I didn’t have many snacks left, having eaten most of the rest of them the day before. We just trucked along, passing by views that we had seen last year. It felt a little anti-climactic going down the trail. I just wanted to be done! Also, we technically finished the JMT at the top of Whitney, so these just felt like forced miles, in a way. Once we passed Lone Pine Lake and had a view of the valley, I turned my phone signal on and texted Dad that we would be in the parking lot in an hour. And of course, all of the messages and notifications from 12 days of no service flooded my phone. I poked around a little - reading texts, clearing my email inbox - as we walked down the very nicely groomed trail.
Finally, we reached the parking lot. I made a beeline for the bathroom: I couldn’t bear to open my WAG bag any longer since it smelled soooo bad, so I was holding a bowel movement in and really needed to take care of it! Dad and Riley found us while we were dumping our trash and we all hugged, despite our smell. It was nice to be reunited. After cleaning up a little bit, we all loaded ourselves into the van and headed off on the best 395 food tour in the world! We were ready for some real food, finally!
