(Mike)
(Note: the following was written o/a 1 August, as we--in true outdoorsmanlike fashion--sat in a bar in Lone Pine waiting out a storm which we could clearly see raging up in the vicinity of Mt. Whitney):
We are seeing a side of California that I'd never anticipated: awful summer weather! We arrived here yesterday (after having jumped ahead on the PCT in order to temporarily bypass the High Sierras area which had earlier been inundated with deep snow, and then spending a couple of weeks relaxing back home in Washington) just in time to watch this major thunderstorm pass through the mountains surrounding Lone Pine: black, billowy clouds, severe rain, hail and lightening (bad stuff!). As we approached Lone Pine on a bus we could see dark clouds forming in the vicinity through which we had planned to hike the following day (a later check with the local weather service convinced us to remain in town for a couple more days). We are feeling darned lucky when we consider that, a week ago, our itinerary would have placed us right in the eye of this sudden storm. As luck would have it, we had earlier been forced to alter our agenda in order to accommodate certain train and bus schedules. Here in Lone Pine the sky darkened, there was a rash of lightening flashes with tremendous thunder, and it rained a great deal for about an hour, but in talking later with some who had been up at higher elevations, there had been total Hell to pay there. The road toward the trail to Mt. Whitney (our intended access to the PCT) was closed due to flooding and washouts, it hailed seriously for a couple of hours and rained hard for 3 or 4 hours, the wind blew and the temperature dropped significantly. Two climbers were seriously burned by lightening strikes, and many were forced to stay overnight out in the storm because of the water that accumulated on the trails and the roads. About 20 hikers were evacuated by helicopter, and Search And Rescue personnel were kept busy throughout the night evacuating those they could get to. Later that evening things settled down, the temperature went back to around 85•, and the sky cleared up. However, the following AM, the access road to the high country remained closed and there were thus a lot of extra tourists here in town (including Jan and me) who were very happy to be here and not "up there". This weather disturbance had occurred pretty much as predicted by the weather service and there was a forecast (20% chance) of a repeat performance for this afternoon (we were not surprised then when, as predicted, right around 5PM a similar weather pattern re-occurred). Yesterday our plan had been to begin hiking this morning, but we heeded the weather report and extended our stay in town. As I write, it has now been raining hard for three hours, and we are, once again, happy to be in our hotel lobby. Now, all this bad stuff happened totally as predicted (they called it "a 20%-30% chance of thunder showers"). We have arranged for a ride up to the trailhead leading to the PCT on Monday AM. But wait!: now the NOAA website says there's a 20% chance of a thundershower on Monday as well. This is frustrating, but we do not want to be caught up there in a storm like the ones we've seen these past couple of days! We'll check with NOAA again tomorrow and then decide accordingly.
Note: several days later, on the PCT, we encountered a group of 7 ladies who appeared to be in their 50s who were hiking back to Lone Pine and who told us of their having been caught in that storm at a location near the summit of Mt. Whitney. They described a 2-hour long hail storm with an accumulation of hail on the ground of 2", several
hour-long rainstorms, and hours of repeated lightening bolts usually followed (within less than a second) by loud and long peals of thunder (indicating that they had been right in the heart of the tempest). A couple of them expressed that they had feared imminent death by either electrocution or hypothermia. All the while, Jan and I (remembering having weathered the storm in a hotel back in town) were thinking "...there, but for the grace of...".
Sometimes we get lucky!
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(Okay, it is now 13 August, and we are in Bishop, Ca., where we arrived yesterday in search of food). Here's what has happened:
I suppose it seems as though we are always lounging about in town. Not exactly. We did finally leave Lone Pine on 2 August, when we began our High Sierra odyssey--incredible! We have, for two weeks now, been walking through (and living in) countryside that is so beautiful to me that, had I seen it 50 years ago, it likely would have changed my life!
Continuous mountains, the likes of which I might have believed existed only in Tibet or in Peru, our trail being always heading up onto or down from very high passes. To us "flatlanders" in Wash. State, a high mountain pass might be something like Snoqualmie Pass, for example (which tops out at around 3,100')--well, for nearly two weeks (until we left the trail a couple days ago) our feet
haven't stood on ground lower than 8,900'--in fact, the town of Bishop, itself being located in a "valley", is at around 4,500'.
By the way, for the past approx. 100 miles, we have been hiking on the John Muir Trail (AKA "JMT"). The JMT is about 220 miles in length, and has been partially (for a distance of about 150 miles) incorporated into the PCT. The JMT is one of the most recognised and beautifully scenic trails in the USA (if not the world).
We are in Bishop because we are old and slow and we found that we hadn't been progressing at our usual "breakneck" speed of 18 miles per day, but more like 11, and that at that rate we were destined to run out of food a day before we could expect to arrive at Muir Trail Ranch (our next resupply station). Luckily, we were then in the vicinity of the Bishop Pass trailhead and we decided to hike on over to Bishop (that, however, meant we'd have to hike 13 miles each way, including up and over 12,000' high Bishop Pass--twice--and then also hitchhike about 10 miles from the exit trailhead out to Hwy. 395 and then another 15 miles into Bishop, and then back again. That was our only option but, our having earlier given up on the idea of planning to complete the PCT this season, and the fact that we correctly expected this side trail to be as enjoyable as the others had all been, we didn't mind going to town.
Actually, a week ago, we did a similar resupply diversion, hiking 17 miles (round trip) including over (and then back over again) 11,500''-high Kearsarge Pass in order to pick up a resupply box that we had paid someone $50 to deliver to another trailhead for us. That time, we arrived back at our camp on the PCT by the light of our head lamps at around 10PM, physically exhausted. After completing that side trip in one day, we were both very tired for the following two days. Grocery acquisition around here is a challenge, but we're adapting.
Weather: here in Bishop, around 100 (F). Up on the trail, around 85-90.
Mosquitos: just awful! Really. really bad! I frequently do a lot of hiking in the N. Cascades and I seldom apply insect repellent, having owned the same small bottle of Deet for maybe around 10 years. Here, I apply it 2 or 3 times each day! Jan suffers mightily from those nasty little bastards: some of her "bites" swell up to resemble boils. We each have head nets, and Jan has ordered a complete (head-to-foot) net suit--expect to see her modeling it on our next blog issue.
Lakes: we have walked past at least 50 of the prettiest alpine lakes I've ever seen (and I've seen trout--mostly Golden Trout--feeding in nearly every one of them, even up as high as around 11,000'). I have photographed at least 1/2 of these scenic lakes, as each one is unique.
Speaking of lakes: at one particularly scenic place, the pair of quite large lakes collectively known as Rae Lakes are separated by an isthmus which is about 1/4 mile long and about 30' wide. There is, about 1/2 way along this isthmus, a gap of about 40' with a huge (car sized) rock at about midpoint in the gap, leaving two roughly 20' spaces through which flows a lot of fast-moving and very cold water which is approx. 4'-deep. These two gaps would not be easy to wade across, and someone has placed some small, slippery logs across each one. I went across first, deftly demonstrating my highly developed sense of balance, foot placement, and confidence. I then offered to return and carry Jan's pack across for her, an offer which was graciously, predictably (and thankfully) declined--Jan usually eschews such offers of help (she always carries her own weight, in every sense of that term(!)--and then some). Jan fairly easily arrived at midpoint, where the huge rock sits, that first gap being spanned by two side-by-side logs, however the second gap is spanned by only a single log. As she began across, I sensed an imminent "Kodak Moment", and I unbuckled my pack and got ready: she was predestined to fall in--she knew it, and I knew it. Just as she toppled into this 4'-deep, rushing water (which had only a day or so before been a part of either a snow bank or a glacier), I think I may have considered reaching for the camera, but I reconsidered and bravely leaped to her rescue. Jan was pretty much wet all over , and I was soaked only to around my knees. There appeared to be a lot of damage to Jan's sense of pride, but (worst of all!) her partial roll of toilet paper was drenched! Really bad, that. She emerged very tight-jawed, wouldn't even smile when I later made a well-intentioned (albeit inappropriate and insensitive) comment about her "bath". At camp, she decorated a pine tree with wet socks, bra, panties, shirt, etc., to dry them, and then for a couple of days thereafter she would carefully unroll 5' or 6' lengths of T.P. and place them on boulders in the sun to dry them.
Later, a contractor constructing a new ranger station near there told us of his amazement back on 13 June when he happened to look up and see 3 PCT hikers (presumably the first in the pack) casually walking right down the center of the then frozen lakes, on top of the sun cups in the snow (such is the determination of many of our fellow hikers).
On the day Jan took her surprise bath, we climbed over one of those 12,000' passes (I don't recall which, as they're all beginning to run together) and at the summit I was informed by a girl of about 22 years that her father appeared to be attempting to give her some kind of obtuse signal from a location about 3/4 mile back down the pass. She hiked part way back down and learned that her Dad's friend there had been experiencing severe chest pains (he had a titanium heart valve from an earlier episode). She asked me to alert the Park Ranger located at Rae Lakes, as we were headed in that direction. Two hours later, upon arriving at the ranger station, we learned that the party with the "victim" was by then making it's way back toward a different ranger station (where there is an emergency 'chopper pad) and that a med-evac 'chopper was standing by. In later talking with a ranger, we learned that, in that relatively short, yet physically demanding section of trail, the park flies "...several..." injured hikers out every day all summer long, that this is a free service which costs the park $10,000 per incident,
that they will fly a patient only to the edge of the park (presumably to a waiting ambulance)--and that this was that particular hiker's second such flight.
We've noticed several hikers wearing SPOT emergency honing locator devices. Of course, these are for use only in dire emergencies. Apparently, last week, 3 young ladies "...just got too tired to continue hiking...", and so they pushed their SPOT panic button, thus summoning an airlift--much to the disgust of the authorities (and, hopefully, lightening their Daddys' check books).
Sunburn: Very susceptible at such high altitudes. I guess it is due to the "thin air ".
One more ("housekeeping") fact: Jan and I have now completed about 1,010 miles of PCT hike--no great shakes compared to a lot of the other guys and ladies, but for a couple of old farts...well, we think it's not too bad. We still have hopes of walking at least up to the Columbia River crossing (at Cascade Locks, Ore.), but that's still another 1,000, or so, miles away.
'Gotta get outta here, and back onto the trail tomorrow AM!
OK. Here are a bunch of photos we've taken. We haven't yet seen them ourselves, so we're hoping they turn out well (and now and then I sort of regret my not having heeded cousin Robert's advice to spring for a better camera than our iPhone4, but I still sense that a better camera would have been too big and heavy and that I'm also lacking in the skills appropriate to using one anyway.
A photo allegedly being equivalent to 1,000 words and all, here are about 40,000, in no particular order (general scenery):
This is Bard. He lives near Carmel-By-The-Sea, is a finish carpenter and a professional musician, he was (is) hiking the JMT with his buddy, Mike. When we claimed to be the last, slowest hikers on the trail, he issued a challenge: pointing back in the direction from whence they had come, to a small copse of trees clearly no more than 1 1/4 miles back, he announced that they had come that far that day. As it was then somewhere around noon we deferred to a true Master of Trail Diliatorianism and proclaimed him "De Man". Bard was especially proud of his homemade ice axe/walking stick (fashioned from a customized Home Depot garden hoe), and his rather unique hiking attire. This guy had it all, and we knew we were in the presence of royalty (he was also a lot of fun to BS with).
This fella, initially appearing to be a bit of a crackpot, is quite intelligent, educated, and well read. Also fun to talk with. He's wearing his adjustable sun/rain hat which he fashioned from parts of a lawn chair. Hiking alone, I imagined his wife had refused to accompany him if he persisted in wearing such a weird hat.
These folks drove us to Horseshoe Meadows, our starting point from Lone Pine.
Mt. Whitney seen through a natural stone arch.
Fini.
(Jan)
Pix with M&M's being proudly displayed indicate the topping of a pass; also, pictures of the two of us together were taken at the top of a pass. Would you believe we are even getting tired of M&M's? So many passes ...
MikenJan
Location:Lone Pine
