Mile 1057 to 1082 Showers Lake.

Our cowboy camp turned out to be a windy affair. The gusts just kept coming and neither Bedazzled nor I were able to sleep much. We did, however, get a fantastic view of the night sky and Milky Way. After one brief spell of sleep, I awoke to a brilliant orange moon just rising over the mountains. It lit up the clouds in a strange light. I woke Bedazzled so she wouldn’t miss it. Shortly after, I gathered my things and headed into the stand of trees where I had pitched my tent as a hedge against the wind. I was soon fast asleep. Bedazzled heard a large animal moving around our cowboy campsite shortly after we moved back to our tents. At first she thought it was me going back looking for something, but then she heard me turn over in my tent. I wonder what it was?

When my alarm went off at 5:00, I awoke bleary-eyed and sat up. The horizon was awash with color and I quickly grab my camera and made my way out of the trees. I yelled at Bedazzled and she soon followed. After a few minutes, I went back to pack up, but Bedazzled came to get me when the sun rose over the mountains.

In my haste, I ran without looking where I was putting my feet and I managed to put a foot under a hidden rock and trip. I wasn’t hurt, but I tore my good shoe straight across the toe box. Not a good way to start the morning  when you plan to walk 25 miles.

Bedazzled and I set off and walked through the golden sunrise glow. This is our favorite time of day and the reason we both wake up at 5:00. Vipr and Fun Dip  put priority on their beauty sleep and decided to sleep in until 6:00 today.

The views were magnificent as Bedazzled and I descended past the Raymond Lake junction with the PCT. The trail was generally clear of snow, but we did come to a snow slope early on in the morning. It bulged out from the mountain side and had footprints that were all but melted out. We don’t have our crampons anymore so we, like the other hikers before us, decided to down climb a 10 foot section of the dry rocky slope and traverse below the snow. As I was down climbing, suddenly a football size chunk of rock around my hold broke away. For a second, I was in limbo not knowing if I would tumble backwards or fall forwards into the rock. Luckily, my left foot slipped and it shifted my balance towards the wall and I fell towards it. Unfortunately, the chunk of rock struck my right knee on the bone and broke skin and a small line of blood started to trickle down my leg. The blood soon stopped, but my knee swelled around the wound and was tender all day. I gingerly climbed below the snow and back up where I slowly walked across the last bit of icy snow in order to get back to the trail.

The land around soon changed to mosquito infested forest and Bedazzled and I hurried along trying to escape from the little bloodsuckers. After about three hours of walking, we entered a beautiful area of volcanic mountains, forested valleys, and alpine lakes. As we dropped lower in elevation, the wildflowers became abundant and the smells of mint, sage, and other herbs filled the air. It was a beautiful section of trail and we stopped often to smell the flowers.

We broke for lunch around noon and Vipr and Fun Dip arrived just as we were getting ready to leave. We had only 10 miles left to complete our 25 for the day and set off under the hot sun. Before we knew it, we were at the Carson Pass Visitor Center. The Center is super hiker friendly and they even had bananas, oranges, and other snacks for thru-hikers. Being a Saturday, the PCT was also crawling with day hikers. We left the center and walked the final 5 miles through meadows to Showers Lake.

We only have 8 miles to South Lake Tahoe tomorrow morning. We should make it there for breakfast if we survive all the mosquitoes at the lake.