Journal Entries

Day 6, July 15th: Pocket Meadow to Vermilion Valley Resort. 3.6 miles. (Note: these entries are from my trip last summer. I am writing them after-the-fact)

Cowboy camping is great, although I have a fear of rolling off my groundsheet and getting my sleeping bag covered in dust or mud. My nose is cold from poking out of the cinched-up hood. We pack up and eat our random things for breakfast, then leave. We're both in a good mood. It's still smoky, and the flowers are incredible, but we can't stop to appreciate them. Will we catch the ferry? The trail switchbacks down through nodding Black-Eyed Susans and hanging orange Tiger Lilies, hot pink newberryiae Penstemon, and everything besides.

We're going to miss the ferry time if it's actually at 8, but we still keep going in case the info we have is wrong or if the ferry waits. If not, we can always have a meal at the lake and walk the flat 8 ish miles to VVR today. The trail splits off to VVR through a thick and meadowy forest. The path becomes narrow and dense grasses brush our legs, a few mosquitos find us and half-heartedly follow.

The trail disappears at the edge of the lake where a sign with the ferry times is posted on a tree. The time we had is wrong, it's actually 9:45, so we'll catch the ferry after all! The lakeshore is cut by small ridges of granite filled in between with water. We make our way across one of the ridges to the upside-down orange Home Depot bucket sitting on a metal post that marks where the ferry will land. I set my pack down against a granite ledge and unfurl my accordion foam pad. I'm about to break open some snacks for an early lunch when the ferry boat comes up, early, and scrapes onto the shore the next granite ridge over. I shove my things back in and we scramble over the rocks. We get in with a PCTer couple. It's a big boat, and we lay our packs and trekking poles down the middle length-wise with plenty of leg room to spare. We pull out into the middle of the lake and idle, waiting for more hikers to appear. The engine is too loud for conversation and the air is tainted with exhaust. After half an hour we start heading down the lake towards VVR.

The wind roars by and forces me to squint and keep my head down. Apparently there's AT&T service in the middle of the lake, but we have Verizon. The boat pulls up to a high dirt bank, engine puttering, and we slide up onto it with a crunch. Paddle boats and canoes and random junk lines the bank. We step out and skirt around a stack of old windows. The man gives us a tour, pointing out the bathrooms and laundry, explaining the honor-pay system. My mom gives me a mischievious sideways look as we walk past the tent cabins, and I shake my head at her, grinning. We set up our tents in the camping grove, leaving our packs inside, and go to the store to set up our tab and get our free drink. There are more PCTers here than I've seen in a while, as we've been hitting the tail end of the herd. There are so many people around and things to do! We watch as a helicopter dips down to the lake with a gigantic bucket, fills it with water, and then flies to the fire that's by the side of the lake. Because of the fire, they won't be serving lunch, and we sit around talking to people for 6 hours, waiting for dinner.

I check out the hiker boxes, which are mostly mystery-powder ziplocs. There are some peanut packets left over from the person ahead of us who only packed chocolate bars and peanuts, and I pocket one, and also a bag of chips. In the store, a bear skin hangs on the wall. I can see the gray dash where the bullet went into its head. There's a refrigerated wall of drinks, and boxes of pawed-over and dirty drink packets. They have a packet of TJ's brand chia seeds, and other completely random things that look like they've all been pulled from the hiker box or abandoned hiker resupplies.

We talk to two guys who are about to head off on a big cross-country mountaineering trip. They go by their backpacking forum internet-handles, Alpine Mike and Ultra-Photonic, and we talk about photography, ultralight gear, Norman Clyde, and philosophy, all of which Alpine Mike is passionate about. My mom puts us in the laundry queue. Finally the dinner bell rings and we get inside. The rice that comes with the salmon we ordered tastes rancid, but the chili cheese fries were really good. I go to the bathroom after and on the way back start to help out with making lunch bags for the firefighters. My mom finds me and starts helping, too. We started with 60-80 bags until news came in that more fire fighters were coming, and we upped it to 120. We pull all of the remaining snacks from the store to fill them and joke about the spelling of Bologna when we realize several of us are labeling the sandwiches "baloney." It's dark and ash from the fire is fluttering down like snow in the light of the porch when the work finally slows down. I sit by the fire pit for a while and listen to people talking. Photonic is telling a crazy but true story about a hiking trip with his dad, who brought a homeless person along.

I finally head to my tent and snuggle in my sleeping bag, everything smelling like smoke.

Day 5- More Smoke

Day 5- Smoke North of Silver Pass

Day 5- Smoke over Silver Pass

Day 5, July 14th: Duck Lake Trail Junction to Pocket Meadow. 13 miles. (Note: these entries are from my trip last summer. I am writing them after-the-fact)

We pack up quickly in the morning to avoid possible mosquitos. The sun is still below the mountains when we start moving, everything bright with reflected light regardless of the sun. Granite grit crunches under our feet. We've decided that Tanka and Bebak are probably behind us, and maybe slept in at Red's. There's a short rise and we pass by sole sister and friends, just starting to poke around camp and cook breakfast. We pass by Purple Lake around 2 miles in. Its shores are crowded with pine trees and camp sites. When we get to Lake Virginia, many hikers are eating breakfast and repacking hastily-gathered belongings after being driven out by mosquitos at Purple Lake. Glad we didn't camp there. Virginia Lake is edged by a sweeping carpet of green, and we hop over its shallow outlet past hikers enjoying the lake.

We keep meeting PCTers complaining about the mosquitos near Tully Hole, which we drop down into right after Lake Virginia. I preemptively sit down by the trail to dig for my mosquito gear, which I keep near the top cradling the top of my bear canister. I pull my black windpants over my bulky Lone Peaks and scrunch my mosquito net over my visor. Ready. It's a lazy few miles, and I leap-frog a silent guy with a green shirt and a green buff over his half of his face. I dub him "The Green Ninja"in my head. Since it's difficult to keep track of all of the people I meet, and I forget everyone's names almost immediately (is this genetic), I give people unofficial trail "names" in my head. They're not exactly always names: Sole sister, short-red-haired-girl-who-walks-in-front, man-with-broken-poles, blue, bear-bell, and flower. There aren't really many trail names given or used among JMTers, at least among the people I've hiked with. Most of us seem to agree that you'd need to do a longer thru-hike to get a proper one.

I'm getting hot going down sets of exposed switchbacks, and when I get down I look for a rock to sit on to take my windpants off. Suddenly, mosquitos start seeping out of the pores of the forest. I wait a few seconds for my mom to catch up, jumping up and down to stop them from getting too comfortable. I suck on the end of my platypus hose and it rattles as I drain the last of my water. Dangit. My mom comes up and says she's out too.

Fish Creek lies by the side of the trail and we rush to filter a liter of water each. I try to eat, alternatingly either succeeding or attempting to shove lifesaver gummies through my headnet. My mom's Sawyer Mini filter is slower than my Squeeze and I jam out as she's still packing back up to avoid to bugs. We meet up again at footbridge crossing over the creek as it rushes down a gorge, silver-steel water leaping down and pounding rock, flecking the air with spray. Then the mosquitos are bad again, my mom tells me not to wait for her, and I put my head down and hike, my windpants sticking to my legs with sweat in the heat. My headnet traps my breath and I'm breathing stale, hot air that smells like the lifesaver gummies. I go slow and stop often to breathe, but anything is better than having my skin bare to these mosquitos. They try to get in under my headnet and buzz around my ears. My skin is crawling.

The trail starts rising up out of the infernal Tully Hole, and when I look around the trail has transitioned from shade and grass and dry pine duff to granite and manzanita. A breeze tugs weakly at my damp face. I've been walking without stopping for a long time to keep my sanity from being stolen from me, and I wait for my mom for several minutes. Finally I leave her a note saying "See U on top of Silver Pass in 2 miles" written on paper torn from my map, and head up the side of a steep granite wall, where I'd watched other hikers disappear over the top as I'd waited.

I crest over the wall, and see a lake banked with soft green mosses. There's an abandoned Garcia bear can sitting in the middle of the trail by the lake outlet, lined with bush willow. I cross the outlet and a couple, who I think we met at Red's, invite me to sit by the shore with them and soak my feet. The tell me this is Squaw Lake, since I haven't had the chance to look at my maps for a while. Another duo joins us. Again, names. Agh. Green Ninja silently claims a spot a hundred feet away.

There are no bugs, and everything is green and soft. I think this is my favorite lake. My mom comes up and we sit at the lake shore with our feet stuck into the water, the others complaining about sore feet and blisters. (This is a PSA: don't wear boots while backpacking. You don't need them, they just cause problems. Your feet and ankles have been evolving for thousands of years to support you and whatever loads you decide to carry, they aren't inherently weak or flawed).

We wonder what the bear can back at the lake outlet is doing there, and if maybe it has food in it. I volunteer to go and fetch it. It feels like there's something in there at least, so I weave between stepping stones as I cross the outlet again, and it feels like something is moving in there. My imagination kicks in. What if somebody trapped a rattlesnake inside and it's dying. What's even more creepy than a rattlesnake is a half-dead rattlesnake, because it's both dead and alive, and I run full-tilt and screeching under my breath back to everyone else with the writhing can at arm length. "It's alive!" I blurt out, and then drop it. The lid pops off and a trail register almost falls into the lake. Other than that, there isn't anything in there of course.

Well then. Thanks, imagination. Everyone laughs and starts passing the register around to sign. I cook some pho for lunch because I have nothing better to do, and then join everyone else as they head off, one-by-one. My mom stays at the lake for a while longer. I hike barefoot for a while, which phases the PCTers passing by, until my mom catches up. I put my sandals on. We skirt a slippery patch of snow and then we're on top of Silver Pass. A haze that we had noticed coming up to the pass becomes a veil of smoke smudging the view of the entire valley ahead of us. No one heading north seems to have much information about the smoke other than it's near Vermillion Valley Resort (VVR) and it's controlled, so it's probably not an issue. We get info from a PCTer about ferry times so we can get across Lake Thomas Edison to VVR, since we're more than a day ahead and need to kill time.

It's a quick drop down from Silver Pass, and we pass lakes in the haze as the sun is sinking. We want to get to the ferry in time so we don't have to walk, which means we need to be within 2-3 miles of it. We hit Pocket Meadow and there are a lot of people camped here, so I give my mom the only tent site and set up my sleeping bag to try cowboy camping. I really want to try it. My nose starts bleeding randomly as I'm getting ready to sleep and won't stop, which happens frequently up here because of the altitude and since it's so dry. It's best not to blow your nose, or even look at it the wrong way.

The mosquitos come. I get into my sleeping bag with the hood cinched tight and my headnet on. My nose begins bleeding again in earnest and my wad of TP is getting soaked with blood and the mosquitos are barraging my headnet and buzzing, buzzing, buzzing in my ear. I jump out and start pacing around barefoot. Between my wool sleeping clothes and mosquito bites and the actual mosquitos, I itch everywhere. My mom clears space in her tent and I dive in, 20 mosquitos with me. We sit and talk until it's dark enough for the mosquitos to have gone.

I clamber out and into my beautiful cozy soft silken sleeping bag, a couple of the more persistent mosquitos still bumping into my headnet. Pines skew haphazardly across my field of vision. I wake up in the middle of the night and see the stars.

Day 4, July 13th: Red's Meadow Resort to Duck Pass Trail Junction. 10.8 miles. (Note: these entries are from my trip last summer. I am writing them after-the-fact)

We sleep in, and as usual I wake up to my mom getting ready for the day. It's a huge cabin, with a full kitchen and 5 or so beds, half of them in an upstairs room. It feels weird to have it to ourselves. Our packs sit by the couch, still mostly packed from yesterday. Gritty trail dust forms a film over the floor near our trail shoes, gaiters lying limply beside them. We decide not to bother with the washing machines down near the store and rinse some of our clothes in the sink, leaving them to dry on our trekking poles stretched across two chairs. They're not really that dirty yet, especially since there is so much water along this trail and we swam at Thousand Island Lake the other day. I follow my mom down for breakfast at the café in my rain and sleeping clothes. Eggs, sausage, and bacon. This hike has been luxurious so far.

The café is full and the open area between all of the buildings is scattered with hikers fiddling with their packs, few of them showing motivation to leave. We talk with a few, a PCTer named Mover who hikes every year and knows Billy Goat, and a JMTer named Kapiko from Hawaii. They offer my mom encouragement and advice to HYOH after the hard moments in the heat yesterday.

Finally, after dilly-dallying quite a bit more, we get moving at 10:20; late by hiker standards. The first mile after Red's the trees are once again snapped in half, or uprooted completely, and littered across what was once the forest floor. We wade through ferns that tower almost to our waists. We meet a hiker named Robert, who is carrying three bear cans and a month's worth of food, hiking from lake to lake and fishing. He explains that there was a huge, sudden windstorm that swept through the Sierra a few winters back and caused huge swathes of trees to snap off. It was a combination of incredible wind speeds and the fact that the wind came from the opposite direction than normal, where the trees didn't have root systems to support them. (I find evidence of this event as far south as Kearsarge Pass. Without Google to corroborate, this explanation was as good as any and as far as I've researched it seems true).

The rest of the day is a steady uphill along dry and sandy ridges. Good cell service continues well past Red Cone, a volcanic-looking red and conical mountain. PCTers pass us, including a group that have dirty dreadlocks down to their waists and are gray with a film of dirt and grime. I think they must be stoned, although I'm not even sure what that looks like, because they don't react or even blink to my hello as they stumble past me. They're the first I've met that smell bad (I disagree that thruhikers really "stink". They just smell human).

We pass a group of JMTers, including a girl who just got Altras at Mammoth Lakes (Red's) to replace a pair of problematic boots. She's excited that I have a pair, too, and calls me her sole sister.

I'm sorry if these entries are all just about the people I meet and interactions; the JMT truly is a social trail.

We find a campsite by a creek near the Duck Pass Trail junction and decide to stop here, instead of pushing up an elevation rise to Purple Lake. We eat Mac n Cheese, and I add a sweet and spicy tuna packet that I was gifted in Tuolumne. I wish I would have just eaten the tuna by itself as it loses its flavor in the watery noodles.

My "sole sister" and the rest of the big group she's with camp on a rise across from us. They've brought a red hammock and it hangs between two pine. I go down to the creek to filter water and sing Christmas songs to pass my least favorite chore. The sun is below the ridge and the light is turning grey. I sit in the meadow on a rock and try to write in my journal, but there are mosquitos and instead of writing I catch them to press between my journal pages like flowers.

I go to bed to end the buzzing and biting. I'm cozy and I turn my phone volume down as low as it will go, set it by my ear inside my sleeping bag, and listen to Lullabye by Billy Joel on repeat. My dad used to sing it to me and my brother when we were upset, and it's soothing. I love the symmetrical and geometric ridgeline of my tarp-tent, the way it sways gently when the wind runs over it. How the moon makes it bright inside and casts shadows. The rustle of the wind and my mom as she turns over in her air mattress. I tell my tent in my mind how much I love it, euphoric, thoughts running through my mind like a creek over stones. I need to go to bed though, my legs throb anc are tired.

I get up to pee, crouching barefoot behind a bush willow, hidden by the dark. I stand by the entrance to my tent, reluctant to get back in. A PCTer cowboy camps in the meadow below us, cooking in his sleeping bag by the light of his headlamp. The fading light of the sky, stars fading in, and his headlight beam moving back and forth are the only light. I stand barefoot in the dark, breathing silently. I love this place, I love being here, I don't want it to end. I let the mountain cold sink into my body, the cold, sharp, earthy smell of it clinging to my skin. I stay there for a while, watching the meadow and the stars.

Finally I give in and crawl into my tent. It's a long and gradual while before I fall asleep.

Moonshiner's Cave, AR

This is an abandoned moonshiner's "cabin" built into the side of the cliff. Directly to the right of this photo is a small, but flowing waterfall...making this location perfect to hideout and make shine! Very few people know the whereabouts of this special spot. :)

Kyle's Landing, Buffalo National River This was the sunset over the Buffalo River Valley, above the "camping area". The bluff was at least a couple hundred feet tall. Absolutely breathtaking!

Denali National Park, Alaska We traveled to Alaska for a family reunion type of vacation this last August, and on our way to Denali, we stayed in these small one room cabins right outside the park. Naturally, I wanted to go explore. I came across this little pond and had to snap a photo. It was easily one of the most serene, and peaceful places I've been. The soft, tundra laden ground felt amazing to walk across, and it just felt "right" to cast my line in to see what I could catch... The mega mosquitoes didn't waste their time in finding me, and biting through my clothes, so I didn't stick around too long.

Clingman's Dome, Tennessee

My wife and I took a road trip to Mammoth Cave in Kentucky and then headed south to Gatlinburg, Tennessee. Obviously, we had to go hike part of the Appalachian Trail. It was absolutely beautiful, and one of our first "big" trips as a married couple.