Day 9 - Click on Map
Day 9 (August 3) was re-supply day at Muir Trail Ranch! That meant new food, a taste of some of the goodies in the bucket, but most of all, e-mails from and to the wife! It would be the first time we would be able to contact them since we left them at the Whitney Portal Trailhead. Nine days on the trail without contact was along time! We woke up with a renewed vigor and our spirits seemed to be climbing. We had made it past the half way mark the day before as far as time was concerned and today we would hit the half way mark as far as miles. We were on the home stretch.

We left camp early and decided to not blister up in the morning as we were to make the crossing over Evolution Creek in a mile or two. We donned our shoes, sans moleskin and duct tape, and made out way to the creek. This would be our first true crossing and reports were to make our way across in the meadow and not at the trail crossing. A sign from George Durkee led the way (thanks George!) to the meadow, where we traded hiking shoes for creek shoes. We made an easy ford across the creek and hiked down to the trail junction before we started our morning ritual of blister treatment. Mike's feet were starting to really flare up and I now had small blisters on both feet and a toenail that wanted to keep cutting into my toe on every down hill stretch. We managed fine along the trail with our tape and moleskin and began the descent into the San Joaquin river basin. It was a little hard on the feet down the canyon, but we made it to the first bridge crossing just fine and made it into the lower forest growth below. It was quite a change from the flora and fauna we had been experiencing the week before. Along the way, we ran into search and rescue teams, that unfortunately had been downgraded to a search effort along the river. It was a sobering experience and made us wonder if the news had hit our wives and what level of information was given. "Lost hikers" was not what we wanted to have reported, but figured the e-mail drop later in the day would help. The river was flowing rather strong and a slip or fall would prove to be fatal.

We stopped for snacks and a rest at the bridge across Piute Creek and the border of Kings Canyon National Park. We had been in Sequoia for just a day or so, but in Kings Canyon for quite some time. It seemed strange to leave and cross into Sierra National Forest and the John Muir Wilderness. However, the trails in these areas were exceptionally well maintained! I tip my trail hat to these crews! As we snacked along the trail, John stopped by and we chatted for quite a while. He was heading onto VVR for his resupply and we were making the bypass to Muir Trail Ranch. Our original plan was to spend the night and relax near the ranch but with the river so high and our desire to make some time, we decided to hit the trail that afternoon and head up to Sallie Keyes Lake. John was heading straight up to the lakes and we told him we would likely run into him again up there.

We made our way into Muir Trail Ranch around noon and got our bucket and started to sort through the food, both what we had left and what we had in the bucket. We also snacked on the fruit cups and applesauce in the bucket! What a treat. If only we had room for those beers! We found that we had much food left over and way too much in the bucket. Into the hiker's bucket much of our leftovers went. A couple at the table beside us was doing the same thing and it was like the trading table. “You guys want.., how about...”. It was an interesting time. Well we had way too many M&M’s, mangos, and miso soup. Those went into the hiker’s bucket. The couple next to us got some Emergen-C and mangos, but had enough miso soup in Japan a few weeks ago and did not want to see any for a while! We ate our lunch and packed our remaining food. We also made it over to the store and took advantage of the e-mail. Muir Trail Ranch has an Apple laptop with satellite internet and rents it out for $10 for 15 minutes. That seems like a lot of time, but we used it up quick reading and sending e-mails to the wives. It was quite a boost to get the e-mail from Sue and send her an update on the trip. Did I mention that 16 days on the trail is a long time to be away from the wife!

We headed out of Muir Trail Ranch about 1:30 that afternoon and worked our way up the use trail to get back on the John Muir Trail. Now the trail out of the ranch is quite a trail! As Mike said, it looks like someone took a beach ball and rolled it down the hill and called that the trail! Switchbacks don’t seem to be in the trail plan for this section. We were quite pleased to get onto the JMT where the switchbacks were graded. I never thought I would be glad to get back to regular switchbacks! We made our way up the hill (about 2,200 feet) and made it to Sallie Keyes Lake around 5:00 or so. We found a great site on the south side of the first lake and pitched the tent and did some fishing. By now the feet were killing us, and we had to make some decisions on the remaining part of our trip. Did we have enough gas left in our tanks and feet to do some 20 plus miles in a row? We would do some fishing in the lake to ponder these thoughts.

Mike has a unique ability to put together his rod and catch the first fish in a matter of minutes. He had landed quite a large golden (by our standards so far) out of the lake. The fish were about 9 to 10 inches out of the lake (at least the ones he was catching). We both had some success in the lakes, but did much better in the outlet, where they cooperated with my flies much better. We got some real nice looking goldens out of the outlet and then made our way back to camp. Walked back to camp would be a liberal term, as we felt that the two of us were more hobbling than walking! I think that made the decision for us that neither of the two of us had the gas left to put together three 20 plus mile days in a row to make into the Valley by Thursday. At that point we decided to pull up short and make it into Tuolumne Meadows on Thursday instead of the Valley, cutting about 30 miles from the trip. The modified itinerary seemed doable if the feet held up. It also seemed feasible if another problem that was just surfacing quit. It seemed the climb up and out of Muir Trail Ranch had a bigger impact on me that I had thought. I noticed some red in my urine that night but it went away quickly so it was more of a “what the heck” than a concern at this time (the days ahead would tell more!)

To view photos of our trip please refer to the Photo Albums section of this site!