5 Days in the Winds Pt. 2

We last saw our heroes sucking wind at the top of Lester Pass

So great, we finally made it to the top of Lester Pass.  But per yesterday’s “cliffhanger,” our troubles were far from over.  There was a sizable patch of thick snow remaining on the other side of the pass right across the trail.  And there wasn’t an easy way around it through the rocks.  And we didn’t have ice axes because snow wasn’t supposed to be an issue in early September.  What to do?

I had trekking poles, so I decided that I would carefully kick steps into the snow on top of the trail.  The slope was considerable, and there was a collection of boulders at the bottom waiting to mangle me if I slipped, so I proceeded VERY carefully and slowly, with Mule following at a safe distance.  The patch of snow was 50-100 yards wide, and it took the better part of an hour to cross it.  I had diamond-crushing sphincter tone the entire time, and by the time we were finally back on terra firma we had to wait a few minutes to recover from the adrenaline crash.  While it WAS risky, PCT thru-hikers probably do worse dozens of times in the Sierras.

We felt better after about 10 minutes and started hoofin’ it, and as we lost elevation our stamina improved noticeably.  About 2 1/2 miles later we passed the first of the two trail junctions leading to the Cook Lakes, and then at about 6.5 miles into the day we forded a wide but shallow creek (I think it was Falls Creek).

Not long after that we took a break, taking advantage of bright sunshine and a light breeze to dry out our tent and quilts.

It was late afternoon, and although we felt better than we had the past 2 days, we were far from 100% of our usual lean mean hiking machine selves, so we went just a little further and made camp on a bench far above a lake that might have been Lake Sequa, although to this day I’m not sure exactly where we were.

We found the only halfway rock-free site in the area and did a very half-assed job of pitching our tent in the wind.  However, we did have some tasty beef tagine for dinner.  We got to sleep early because we knew we had a rough day ahead of us in the morning.  Day 3:  approx. 7.1 miles.

Mule and I were on the trail early the next morning.  We had to go 9 miles to August Lake, where we were meeting a horse packer who we had hired to bring us our resupply.  I think it cost us maybe $135.  Whatever it was, I highly recommend this.  We would’ve never made it over Lester Pass carrying an additional 4 days of food.  Anyway, we had to be at the rendezvous point by 4:00, and the way we had hiked the last 2 days we certainly weren’t guaranteed to make it on time.

Roughly 4 miles into the morning we passed the side trail to Timico Lake, where we had originally planned to be the previous night.

The trail was relatively level most of the morning, but it remained at or slightly above 10,000 ft., and we still weren’t well acclimatized, so our progress was a bit sluggish.  But we needed to plow on, so plow on we did.

Early in the afternoon we began our ascent of Hat Pass which tops out at 10,850 ft.  It wasn’t quite as brutal as Lester Pass, but we still struggled.  The descent was actually worse.

The trail was steep and rocky, and it was hard to imagine that pack animals were able to negotiate the treacherous path.  But since we were now within a mile of our goal, we found a second wind and once we got to the bottom we picked up our pace.

We made it to August Lake at 3:50, just in the nick of time.

August Lake was really pretty, and at 9,880 ft. was at the lowest elevation we’d been at for a while.  We were both toast at this point and took off our packs and basically collapsed in the grass on our backs.  Believe it or not, the horse packer showed up at exactly 4:00 with our resupply box, which meant that we had to pop back to our feet and not act like we’d had our butts kicked in front of this cowboy.

Our resupply box looked bigger than I remembered.  We opened it up and dumped all the goodies on the ground and returned the empty box to be packed out.  We both quickly came to the conclusion that we’d packed too much, so we did some culling.  Thankfully, our resupply guy was happy to let us return some of the undesired items to the box to be packed out.

There were 4 cans of beer in our resupply.  Now, 4 cans of beer equals 3 lbs. of pack weight.  Neither of us were feeling like having a beer at that particular moment, nor were we excited at the prospect of adding 1.5 lbs. each to our pack weight.  A solution soon presented itself.

Two older guys came trotting up the trail from a series of lakes below us.  They were carrying fly rods and looked like decent guys, so I held up a can of beer in each hand and greeted them and asked if they’d like some trail magic.  Their eyes lit up, and they graciously accepted my offer.  Even better, one of them stated that in return, they were going to catch us some dinner.  O rly?  This perked me up a bit.  And then the other guy handed me an ultralight spinning rod and told me to try my hand with it as well.  And wouldn’t you know, I caught a 14 inch cutthroat within 2 minutes.  The guys came by a little while later to add 3 more trout to our haul, and all of a sudden Mule and I had 4 fish to cook for dinner.  Things were looking up.  Mule is an expert fishmonger, and he had those 4 trout cleaned and gutted in no time at all.

I just happened to have a small bottle of ghee and a small bottle of white wine as well as some garlic, so I did a pretty solid job of frying up our dinner.

There’s not much that could’ve made this feast better, but the llapingachos were on point, as was the microbrew.

Naturally, once we had finished dinner our moods swung 180 degrees.  We finally got around to pitching our tent and filtering some water.  Not long after that a ranger and 2 summer intern trail runners came by and nicely let us know that our tent was too close to the water.  However, they could tell that we were pretty whupped from our day on the trail, so the ranger added that if we didn’t move our tent back 50 feet he’d never know 🙂  One of the 2 interns was from my oldest son’s university in Indiana (small world) and actually knew who he was.

After they left, we…..didn’t move our tent.  And really, it was pretty close to 200 ft. from the lakeshore already.

We fell asleep happy.  But at 3AM Mule woke me up excitedly because he had heard a strange noise that freaked him out.  I listened, and a minute later I heard an elk bugling.  What a great way to end a day.  Day 4:  8.9 miles.

The morning of Day 5 presented us with a decision to make.  My itinerary had been made based upon us being able to increase our mileage, which meant that if we stuck to our plans we would need to hike 44 miles in the next 4 days mileage that would include Washakie Pass at over 11,600 ft.  Considering that our longest day to this point had been merely 9 miles, and factoring in that we still weren’t totally acclimatized to altitude, we grudgingly admitted to ourselves that we probably needed to come up with a Plan B.

We reviewed our map for bailout points, and found that we were 12 miles from Boulder Lake, which had a lodge.  Since we were going to need a shuttle to Big Sandy trailhead to pick up my car, we thought this was a good option as it increased our chances of bumming a ride.

So we took off for maybe a quarter mile down the Fremont Trail, hung a right at a connector above North Fork Lake, and then returned to the Highline Trail for just over a mile before hanging a left onto the Ethel Lake Trail.

We steadily lost elevation as we hiked down a valley dotted with lakes.  Along the way, we saw our first bear sign.

On the Ethel Lake Trail we were passed by another horse packer carrying a load to set up a camp for some folks who were going to hike in separately and fish for a week.  Pretty sweet deal to have a camp already waiting for you.

We passed a lot of lakes, and we kept our eyes pealed to hopefully see a moose.  No luck.  The lakes were pretty though, and as we got lower some of them had a plenty of vegetation that looked an awful lot like moose food to me.

Even though we were going downhill, the trail was often rocky and it was beating us up.  By the time we approached the trailhead, I was DONE.  Like, I had zero ATP left in my body.  There were a lot of confusing trail intersections near the trailhead, and like a true friend Mule told me to wait while he hiked ahead and figured out which way we had to go.  It took him a while, but he succeeded, and guided me to our goal.

We had arrived at dinner time.  We went up onto the porch and were greeted by one of the servers.  We explained our predicament to her and she said that while nobody was free to drive us to Big Sandy at that moment, there would likely be someone available after dinner.  And oh by the way, we were welcome to have some of that dinner if we had money.  I peeked through the window and saw white tablecloths and a very well-dressed older couple dining.  It didn’t look like the kind of place that needed smelly hiker trash, and I gently mentioned this to the server.  Her reply was that they had tables on the porch too and that we were welcome to dine there.  She didn’t need to twist our arms any further.

It turned out that for a mere $29 we received a gourmet 5 course meal that included some of the best mussels I’ve ever had for an appetizer, a really good salad, and filet freakin’ mignon!  They also had amazing huckleberry ice tea, which I drank at least a gallon of.

Mule said he’d never seen me so happy.  Meanwhile, I checked in with Kate at GOTCO and she said she’d have a driver return my car from Big Sandy to their lot in Pinedale tomorrow, so Mule and I only needed a ride back to the hotel.  At around 9:00 one of the lodge hands shuttled us back to the Best Western, which fortunately had vacancies.  She gave us a very entertaining account of Pinedale’s cowboy bars on the drive into town.  We ended the day in comfy beds.  After showering of course.   Note: This is why I always carry cash and plastic on the trail.  You just never know.  Day 5:  12.1 miles.

We decided that since we had an extra day to kill that we would zero in town.  Pinedale is a really neat community of about 2,000 people that has a surprising amount of places to dine and shop.  There are several outfitters in town, and we visited one of them to buy our families some gifts.  After that, we finally found our moose.

Only in a place like Pinedale would the Chinese restaurant have a moose out front.  Not a Buddha.  A moose.  Very solid food by the way.  We bumbled around town for a while after lunch and found a really neat market called Obo’s.

Pretty pricey, but given the location not unreasonably so.  Lots of fresh fruit and vegetables as well as great meats, some seafood and an amazing deli.  This would be my go-to if I lived there.

We had an early dinner at Los Cabos, which was also an above-average quality restaurant, and then returned to Wind River Brewing Co. for a nightcap.  All in all a great zero day.

The next morning was Saturday, and we began the long drive back.  What took 28 hours on the way out took 33 going back, in part because we crashed at a rest stop halfway there.  My GPS also decided to avoid the simple interstate path thru St. Louis and instead took us through the neighborhoods Chevy Chase went through in that Vacation movie.

We hadn’t quite pulled off the 80 mile adventure I had planned for us, but we both agreed that it was still the trip of a lifetime, and we vowed to return with our wives one day.  I also determined that I was too much of an out-of-shape fatass to have attempted this hike, which led me to begin a daily walking regimen that helped me lose 30 lbs. by the following spring.