Stats

Start: Duck Creek – Mile 895.8
End: Mammoth – Mile 906.6
Elevation Max: 10,128
Elevation Min: 7,774
Elevation Change: 2,187 up & 3,145 down
Average Heart Rate: 122
Walking Time: 5 hrs 1 minutes
Date: 6/2/2022

The Walk

My sleeping pad definitely had a hole in it. I woke up 3 times last night to blow it up. It only takes 10 blows to get back, but it’s annoying! I’ve dealt with this for the past week. Hopefully I can soak it in the motel 6 bathtub and find the hole.

The morning was brisk. As I packed up a few hikers walked 20 feet by across the snow. We are close to the trail. Woo! I wasn’t sure last night because it was getting dark and we were sliding around on the snow.

Today was a pretty chill day. 11 miles to Reds Meadow then a 4 mile side trail to Mammoth. Reds Meadow is a resort right next to Devils Postpile. An unusual rock formation of columnar basalt and a national monument. Usually Red’s is a great spot for hikers to hang out and resupply. But it’s still closed! Maybe too much snow in the area?

We walked the 11 miles and enjoyed the forest. The second half of the walk was filled with pine trees. They didn’t look real. They looked like the plastic figure ones with perfect spacing and needles. Weird. Maybe these are the trees the toys were modeled after.

Most of the taller trees had burned or fallen down. So only the pine trees were left. We soon came to the horse ranch and wandered around for 10 minutes looking for the trail. We found an unmarked trail that looked about right. We had 1.5k feet to climb.

I was 60% sure the trail was correct and 90% sure we were headed the right way. So it was relieving when we got high enough to see a lake and sign for the John Muir Wilderness. We knew we were on the right path with those two landmarks.

On our climb Chef came around the corner! He was heading back to trail from mammoth 1.5 days ahead of us. What a fun surprise! I hadn’t seen him for 1.5 weeks. We caught up and planned to meet in Yosemite on the 7th. Hopefully we can climb half dome together.

A few miles later we crossed paths with Jack Rabbit and chatted for a bit. We might see him in Yosemite too. Quest and I took the sierras slower than the rest of the group. And I don’t regret it. Such an amazing experience so far!

We finished the hike and saw the trolley pull up to Lake Roosevelt in the distance. The trolley is free and comes every 30 minutes. I started sprinting down the path to catch the trolley before it left! The last quarter mile flew by and I was running past people.

We made it just in time and hopped the trolley into town! I was starving so went straight to the grocery store and got food for the day. Then it was off to the motel for a shower and relaxed evening.

VVR was fun, but we stayed up late and still camped out. Tonight will be nice to have a room and a bed. Tomorrow we might hike out or take a zero. Who knows.