- Date: 2023-06-30
- Pct day: 56
- Start: Mile 778
- End: Mile 788
- Distance: 10 miles
- Ascent: 1443 feet
- Descent: 3835 feet
- Start name: camp near Forester Pass Approach
- End name: Videttes meadow
- Wake up: 03:00
- Start hiking: 04:00
- At camp: 15:30
- In bed: 20:30
- Where I slept: tent
- Shower: no
- Best thing: Getting to a beautiful camp, seeing some “normal” parts of the Sierra pct trail and seeing what it would look like on a normal year, Forester pass being totally fine and straightforward.
- Worst thing: Feeling physically wrecked, stressing out about exposed sections of walking, sloshing around and falling over on sloppy snow
Key moments
- Early start to knock out forester pass
- I was a bit stressed out about us finding the right boot pack to make the ascent easier - as we were basically making our own new path. I thought there would be boot pack somewhere.
- It was exciting but nervewracking on the approach. It was just quite steep. Glad to have an ice axe, a slide from here would be probably fine but not fun. Also it’d be a time.
- But I’d be stressed and then I would look out and we could see the first rays of the sunrise shooting out over the Sierras. That was something. Reminded me of the times where you’re a bit wigged out on a rock climb and then you take a moment to appreciate where you are, and what the view is. It’s calming, and centering.
- I asked Granite Man if he could be my Hype Man. I wasn’t feeling so crash hot, and he was a very encouraging dude.
- So sporadically he’d call out: “Friend, you are so awesome man. You’re crushing it. You’re looking solid”. And that felt nice. He’s a good dude.
- Forester pass was actually quite straightforward - like you need to take it seriously but I wasn’t worried I was doing anything particularly sketchy.
- We each crossed it one by one. It was basically a snow covered steep crossing that had a really well worn wide enough section of boot pack. Like at its narrowest a little wider than a foot.
- Plus there were really well formed ice axe holes in the snow that had frozen up. You could slide your ice axe in there and it wasn’t coming out. That felt good and secure.
- It was a bit nerve wracking. Looking down it would be Not A Great Time And Probably A Bad Time if you slide down. But there were heaps of sections of Mt Whitney that were more sketch and had higher consequence.
- Franck crossed ahead of me, I think.
- I had a bit of a cry when I got over the ice chute, it was so good to be done with this part of the hike that has had us all stressed out for days.
- Franck and I had a hug and a bit of a cry. Far out.
- It felt like such an achievement. We felt like a team. For all the stress and bickering of the past week or so. I think in a normal hiking situation we’d all get along. It just turns out that facing really high consequence decisions day after day with people you’ve just met is, well, a bit stressful.
- We all took some time at the top to take photos and enjoy the moment.
- In a normal year there’s be heaps of hikers up here but it was just 8 of us
- Had quite a steep descent down after that on snow that got kinda slushy after 7am
- Pulse had to self arrest - she was fine but it was a bit exciting.
- Spent a long time tromping around in sloshy snow to try and find the track
- The path is just super slow going at the moment, there’s navigation and so much snow - like you’ll walk up to a section of the trail and then there’s like 1-3 metres of snow blocking the path
- We had a proper river crossing of Bubbs creek - I decided to wade the creek instead of take a log crossing as I felt the log crossing had very high consequences if you fell off.
- Wading the stream was fine but Granite Man did it first to show how low it was, only came up to the calves, even though it looks really intense. He did it in crocs.
- It was intense. By the end of a short 3-4m crossing I absolutely could not feel my toes at all.
- We all had a nice nap at the stream and I cooked my first hot lunch on trail. It was kind of amazing.
- Getting up reminded me how sore all of my body and my toes were.
- We had to cross through a lot of avalanche debris from wet slides. This was intense. Big trees snapped in half like match sticks. The debris fields were metres tall, and full of hunks of tree and wet hard snow. You had to be careful because there were a bunch of potential holes near the trees, and it wouldn’t be a great time falling in those.
- We hit the first sections of continuous path for more than 5 metres. We could see the trail winding through the forest. We could SEE THE TRAIL. It was amazing.
- We all were so stoked by such a minor thing. We started singing. It was surreal.
- We made pretty good time through the forest and snow and avalanche damaged forest, getting to a nice campsite with shade, I rolled out my ground sheet and piled some clothes into a pillow (instead of inflating my pillow I slept on it deflated - look, I was tired), and promptly passed out for I don’t know how long.
- I could see how magical the sierras would be - seeing deer roam around the forest and these huge streams, it’s really something. It’s just really really hard going at the moment.
- The stream next to us was very swollen but if you followed it up a little bit there was a swollen tributary that formed a beautiful plunge pool. I skinny dipped in there and washed off the sweat and grime, quickly. It was very cold.
- We were all in a pretty great mood at camp and I just continued to eat all the leftover snacks and other food I had. I just basically couldn’t stop myself. I think I’m also back on team stove again, cold soaking just isn’t as good. Hot cous cous with refried beans and olive oil - so much better than the cold soak.
- Cukes called this process of working out that you can eat an extra day of food a “Gala Dinner”. It was joyous to know that I had an extra day and a half of food that I could just pick through all the good snacks I wanted.
- Granite Man appeared and gave us all bars of chocolate. There was a bear canister - like a big metal locker that they provide at official camp sites that is bear…resistant. And it had heaps of snacks. What angels left this here?
- My friend Allison that I know from the R programming world lives just outside Bishop, I’d messaged her about staying for a couple of days. She replied saying absolutely, what are my dietaries? I started to cry reading that message. Such a thoughtful person. I knew that I would have a friend who I knew, who really knew me, who would meet me and pick me up and take me to her home and feed me. I am so lucky.
Plan from here
- Hike out of Kearsage pass via bullfrog lake to Onion Valley Trailhead
Animals sighted
- Deer
Gear thoughts
Physical condition
- feet hurt everywhere and my legs are totally juiced
Thoughts and Observations
- All your gear gets soaked in the snow.
- Starting early sucks, but a saving grace of this is that you get plenty of time to dry out all your gear in the sun. Having a dry tent and dry hiking clothes feels so much better. I’d still end up sleeping with my hiking socks and other bits of clothes on my body as I slept to help dry them out overnight. It’s a bit gross, but it’s a somewhat normal thing to do in the mountains.
- We had brief sections of stony trail at the back of Forester Pass. Man. The Sierras really would be just so much more straightforward in a non insane snow year. Far out.
- Franck made a good point that we shouldn’t guess the path of the person who is leading the trail. I was probably being a bit of a pain when Tomas The Austrian was leading as I felt we were taking a long route over very bad snow. I guess I was just so tired and exhausted, I was getting antsy. Franck was right, though.
Some of the bad things
- buying gear like crampons and realising they probably weren’t the fight ones to get and feeling annoyed you spent so much on them
Quotes of the day
- make a decision based on what you can see
#pct #pct2023 #pctclassof2023
