John Muir Trail 2012 Day 3 7-16-12
We got a earlier start today, waking up at 7:30 to temps in the high 30's. The bugs had been almost nonexistent up to this point, and this morning was no exception. I had smashed my little toe on my right foot a couple of nights ago in a wood splitting accident, and I was happy to see it was healing nicely. It was a bloody mess when it happened and I had worried that it would derail my hike, but it felt ok in the boots. We had not used the tent up to this point, preferring to sleep out under the stars as is our custom.
We started our hike around 10am on the Young Lakes trail. The first section of trail is a bit boring, climbing steadily through heavy forest. We kept an eye out for wildlife and spotted a couple of deer.
After a couple of miles we reached a high meadow overlooking the Tioga high peaks with a nice stream to refill our bottles. I love this spot, I had stopped here for an extended rest years ago when I was last on this trail. I took advantage of the soft grass and took in some rays.
The trail climbs higher with ever expanding views, absolutely amazing. The wildflowers really started exploding above 9,000 feet and we stopped regularly to soak in our surroundings.
After cresting a high saddle, we finished the last 2 miles through lush forest. We arrived at Lower Young Lake and took in our beautiful surroundings. I absolutely love this lake. Ragged Peak stands guard at the outlet and the east shore is bordered by a sheer wall of granite.
We arrived in the spectacular setting of Upper Young Lake and started searching for a campsite. This area is very primitive and has very few signs of human activity. It was also extremely windy.. We found a spot with some protection from the gusting wind and set up our camp. The lake was a bit of a walk and challenging to get water from due to a steep shoreline. We braved the frigid water and washed up.
The remote feel of this high alpine lake is amazing. It is near tree line and sports an abundance of granite. It is also very exposed, therefore it's weather is more extreme then it's lower counterparts.
As we made dinner, the temperature started to drop rapidly. At 10,000 feet, this was our highest camp of the trip by far. We enjoyed our dinner while catching the last of the suns warming rays.
The sunset looked promising, so we layered up and made some hot drinks to wait out the show.
Although the sunset did not deliver as promised, it was certainly not disappointing. We soaked in the views until it got too cold, then retired to our sleeping bags to get warm and listen to a book on tape. The couple of times I woke up throughout the night, I was treated to an amazing show of stars. The wind dropped as soon as the sun set and we had a wonderful, and calm, night.
The total for our hike was:
11.5 miles
11.5 miles