Well, okay. This post is not actually about icy hot. That was just a gimmick to get Erik interested in the post. Well, and it does have something to do with the post. I lied. So sue me. We left Zion the same day we charged the Narrows. Once out of the park, we stopped in a "big city" called St. George, UT to grab something to eat that was not a) Snickers, b) Top Ramen, c) Tortillas, or d) Easy Mac. I think I got my logic right ~( a or ( b or ( c or d) ) ). Amy, check me on that one. So anyways, we stopped at Don Jose's Mexican Food. I got the carne asada tacos and Richard got some Enchiladas. Let me tell you, after you have been eating crap for a week-and-a-half it is amazing how good even a simple taco can taste. After we gorged ourselves, we continued on straight through the desert down into Sin City. Yup, Las Vegas itself, heralded by many a billboard advertising "adult stores," strip clubs, and casinos. All of which did their jobs, might I add, as Richard and I took a couple days to explore the objects of the advertising. Just kidding, mom, I wouldn't do that.... Stupid bouncers.... Then back off through the rest of the desert, sticking to "scenic routes" and byways. Soon we went through Death Valley around 9:00 PM and found out why they call it Death Valley. Even at night you could die from heat stroke. At 9 PM it was still well over 100 degrees. Plus they have these freaky drunken bats that fly right across the road directly in front of the car, narrowly being missed most of the time. We may have killed one or two of them. Sssshhhh. Don't tell anyone. We finally ended up in Lone Pine, CA, the proclaimed gateway to Mount Whitney. There we slept. The next day we zipped on up through the hometowns of Ana and Matthew to arrive at Tuolomne Meadows in Yosemite at about noon. After grabbing backcountry permits and bear canisters, we set out on the John Muir trail to begin our 40 mile trek.
The first 6 or 7 miles proved to be fairly easy. The land was flat and went right alongside an alpine river the majority of the time. The only hardships were some scattered mosquitoes and heavy packs laden with all sorts of goodies like top ramen and trail mix. Oh, and at this point in our journey I had not eaten a real vegetable in about a week. Eh, well, I'm over it. As with most of the other places we visited, my scattered words here will not be able to truly and adequately describe the beauty of Yosemite. I will let pictures talk for me. Although even they cannot catch its majesty.
After wandering through the cool valley by the river, deftly hopping over snow-fed streams and cricks, we started the long and arduous journey up a mountain. The going was easy at first except for breathing which does not come naturally at 9000 feet, but soon became much more difficult as we started to come upon snow and ice. At some points we had to cross snow fields with water running underneath the snow and ice. By this point in the day, the snow and ice had become quite soft as the day was quite warm. Thus when hoofing it we would sometimes sink in all the way to our hips. Suffice to say, several times I was vividly reminded of the fact that I am a man. 'Nuff said about that.
We camped at about 10750 feet on a little patch of more-or-less dry ground overlooking a frozen alpine lake (into which I threw Richard). Dinner was a glorious feast of top ramen and snickers. So good after 9 miles of hiking and trudging through snow fields. But we slept well and woke up the next morning to head down to Merced lake almost 3500 feet below where we camped. Snow in the morning is much more crunchy than it is at later hours of the day. Thank the Lord.
Over the rivers and through the fields and forests we pranced, past more frosted lakes and monstrous granite slabs with rivers surging down their faces. The Yosemite wilderness proved to be rugged enough to be challenging even for Richard's and my ample amount of wilderness survival skill. But after many hours we finally arrived at Merced Lake where we read our adventure books by a roaring fire and swatted many a mosquito.
Day three had us hiking back up most of the elevation that we had lost the day before. Thankfully there was relatively no snow on our route this day. Just more of the same beautiful wilderness. This day was exciting for me because it was the day I was finally able to *ahem* lighten my own personal load if you know what I mean. It had been four days since my last lightening, coming within one day of my all-time record five days on a backpacking trip with my dad 5 years ago. Good times. Our last night in Yosemite brought us to Sunrise High Sierra Camp, a decently developed backpackers camp at 9500 feet, just low enough for us to have a flickering fire to read by. Okay, so it was more than just a flickering fire. It ended up being so hot that we had to constantly rotate to not burn ourselves. If a bear had been around it probably would have thanked us for baking ourselves rotisserie style.
Our hike out the next day proved to be our last in the wilderness for our trip. We were both getting to be quite tired and both wanted some time at home before beginning our lives in the "real world." So we headed up to Sacramento where we stayed with Greg Allen for four days, enjoying the comforts of home and real food. His family was very hospitable to us even though we smelled bad that first day. But that is beside the point. We are both back at home now and are about to go up to Santa Barbara to move into our new apartment with Colin Andrew Eli Daxon, aka Dax the Ax. Or maybe Daxon the Saxon. Thank you for all your prayers throughout our trip. I still have some letters I want to send out, so if you were expecting one and didn't get it, worry not. The best is yet to come.Love, Grace, and Peace,
-Josh and Richard
PS - I shaved my beard. Check out the pics:
http://picasaweb.google.com/jtholm2003/BeardTrimming?authkey=PIsjsEs1Rtk jkl
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