5:20 am Lodgepole campground : site 189
June 29
I tossed and turned in between times of imitating a rock. I finally had to put my tights and jacket on around 2am because I couldn’t avoid the potty any longer. It was warm yesterday but got cold quick (just as we suspected).
Jarron and I are taking the car back to town today while the girls go to the park post office to send postcards home. We all scored a permit to start today so we are a day early. Denise will be waiting on us at the end with a campsite at the Whitney portal. (She doesn’t know about the baby yet).
I missed this place so much. It was honestly a place I didn’t know if I would ever see again so I am extremely thankful for this trip.
Yesterday we hauled ass to the park to score permits and do some site seeing. First we climbed Moro Rock, which was pretty amazing then we met a fiasco at the log tunnel. People were lined up waiting to take their pics. We left after our turn and went straight to the General Sherman Tree. We all walked down and had our pictures taken by strangers then returned the favor. We decided to walk the path of giant trees around the area while A mother bear and cubs were the main attraction for idiots who wanted to get too close. We were looking at a stump they had on display because it was about three of jarron’s wingspans when a guy looked at us and said “Hey I have a weird question. Do you work at Cafe Alley?”. Lmao we all looked like cartoon characters with our mouths wide open. I said “WHO ARE YOU?!” Lol! He said he worked at the refinery and they lived in Lone Grove! As they walked away we heard him tell his wife “I told you that was her!”. Small freaking world.
We hiked out of there but not before Jarron made a buddy. A father and son named Steve and Tyler (I see what he did there) who were doing an out-n-back to twin lakes. They were super nice and congratulated us.
*skip ahead to
7:08 pm Big Arroyo Cabin camp
July 1
I haven’t been keeping up with my notes very well because I have been going nonstop. I’ll update you. Jarron and I returned the car to Visalia BUT it wasn’t that easy… I was carsick the whole way down just trying to survive. The road in and out of sequoia is by far the worst park road I’ve been on. By worst I mean like curvy. It was nothing but switchbacks for cars. We got a later start than we wanted and had to rush down the mountain and into town. We still had to go by the post office and return the rental car full of gas. Long story short, we ran to the transit station and arrived just before the shuttle…it was a 3 hour ride back up to the park… then get off at the museum and take a different bus to our campsite. We made it back around 1pm and had lunch with the girls. Then we all packed up and headed back to the freaking bus station to go to the museum then ANOTHER bus to the trailhead. We started too late. It was around 3 or so. We were hoping for 10 miles but got about 6. We stayed at an awesome campsite that wasn’t really a campsite but we could tell other people had camped there and we needed to stop. Most of us stayed up to watch the stars come out.
The next day (yesterday) we started around 8:30am continuing the rolling hill hike we started. We had a mid morning break/snack around 9 mile creek (I believe) and it was a super cool spot. After break Jarron and I started before everyone and got to another good place to stop and wait. I was also looking across the river at the switchbacks with dread. We stayed in the shade awhile until everyone joined us then started the climb… Ali caught up with us after awhile and we both ran out of water but I could hear it so we kept moving. We finally made it down to a wooden bridge over a river that was probably 200 ft below us… there was no way we could get to it so we just sat down in the shade to wait on Gina and a map. Jarron went ahead and came back about 15 mins later to tell us he found water and a spot to rest so we packed back up and hiked up about 3 switchbacks to a junction. After our lunch, we didn’t stop going up until we reached Hamilton Lakes. It was a very tough day and Veronica made a smart decision to go back the way we came the next day due to feet problems.
NOW back to July 1
THE CLIMB OUT OF HAMILTON LAKES IS BRUTAL. It is 5 miles uphill. Great views but my god I was dying. Everyone was. It took us about 5 hours and several false summits. We did get to see Precipice Lake and that was beautiful. We got to the top and I spotted a plaque nailed into a huge boulder. It said “Mount George Stewart named in honor of Col. George W. Stewart 1857-1931 the founder of Sequoia National Park”. We thought it was cool. We were all so excited to be going down that we just kind of floated until we had to run… Ali went ahead of us so she was waiting when we got down the first section. After that we had about 2 miles left to camp. And it was still downhill so we were making pretty good time… right before we got to a creek crossing I started to notice them. I’m swatting at my face and I can see them collecting on jarrons back. We rounded the corner where Ali was standing by the water and I said “DONT STOP!”. We basically ran across the creek (Gina ran right through it) and didn’t stop until we reached a junction. I threw my bag down and yanked out my tent in a panic. Ali and I climbed in with no poles or anything and just sat on the ground defeated lol we had to wait for Gina to make sure she knew which way we went. Jarron went ahead and found a camp near water. I jumped out of the tent when I heard him yelling and told Ali to wait for Gina. I slung my bag over one shoulder and jogged to where he was standing. We found a campsite and immediately started building a fire to try and ward off the army of mosquitos that followed us. I took the camp shower down to the river to fill it and have it ready for when they got here. The mosquitoes actually calmed down to a point where we could clean up. Everyone was washing hair and doing laundry when we started to hear someone yelling. Gina saw him first and he came over to our camp. He needed bug spray. The poor guy was covered in bites so I took my extra contact case and filled one side with anti itch cream. He lathered it on his neck and arms. It was a sad site. We sent him on with what we could spare and went back to finishing our chores and eventually eating dinner. I got mine down before the mosquito army returned. We are all back in our tents to escape the little bastards. On top of the blood suckers, Jarron and I are both so sunburned from the waist down. I have no idea why we didn’t use the sunscreen.
July 2
4:42am
We went to sleep before the sun was completely down last night. That on top of this kid in my body are reasons I’m always the first one up. I have to get food as soon as I open my eyes or I am nauseous and miserable. The sky is getting lighter and the stars are starting to disappear. I can hear someone snoring, pretty sure it’s Jarron. I’m waiting for my oatmeal to fluff up and dreading our walk today lol at least our bags are getting lighter! Normally I want sweet things to eat but now it almost makes me gag. I prefer SALT! I’ve already blown through my slim Jim’s and I have been day dreaming about bloody Mary’s and pickles.
I’m back in our tent in the fetal position waiting for the Dramamine I took to kick in. I forced myself to eat almost all my oatmeal. I REALLY wanted the ramen noodles instead. Yesterday, I had the one and only miso soup I brought for breakfast. That helped my stomach too.
July 3
2:30am
We left camp yesterday around 8:00am. We made it to the cabin where our bug bite friend was outside his tent and thanked us again. We started switchbacks going up after a short time of rolling hills. I was struggling. I have no energy. I have been thinking hard about going up Whitney and I think it would be best for me to skip it. Yesterday was 8 weeks and Im feeling it. We finally made it to the summit around 10:30am. We took a small break then started the downward process. We FINALLY had a decent little stretch of trail that was enjoyable. This section reminded me a lot of the John Muir. We caught back up with the girls around noon at the moraine lake junction. They were plopped down in the shade and responded to my “Lunch?” with “Lunch”. I had two packs of ramen noodles. I’m so ready for a fresh salad and I still want a pickle! After lunch we still had a long way to go. A miserable hike down to the Kern river. And once we got there, we still had 1.8 miles to go. Jarron and Ali are starting to realize how long “trail miles” actually feel. It seemed like it took us hours to finish. BUT we made it to Kern hot springs. We all threw camp together then headed down to soak. After a little hot/cold therapy we headed back to camp. We hiked 13.4 miles and you could see it on everyone’s faces. We were beat. We made a fire and had dinner while listening to Jarron ramble about whatever was on his mind. I had my dinner eaten first and took some of Jarron’s Scooby snacks for dessert. Gina informed us that tomorrow (today) we will have to do 9 miles to Wallace creek. 3 of those miles will be straight up… we all groaned but it is possibly our last “long day”. We watched the bats go to work on some bugs flying around the tops of the trees then stumbled to our tents after dinner. I fell asleep as soon as my head hit my pillow.
6:19am
I’ve been awake since about 5:30. I started the fire back up and tried to get my oatmeal down (failed). Everything makes me gag in the mornings so I’m going to ask Gina if she has anymore trisquits for me. She is moving around but Ali and Jarron are still dead. Speaking of dead, my calves are DONE. They are so sore from the downhill we did yesterday and I can’t really rub them bc they are also sunburnt.
July 4
4:22am Junction Meadow Camp
We left camp at 9am yesterday (way too late) and it was HOT. At first it wasn’t. I was actually shivering as I hiked but the best thing to do is to keep moving. We walked through an entire burnt forest. It felt like we hiked through soot and ash all day. We had lunch around mile 5 and gave up around mile 7. The heat is not my friend. It’s not anyones really. So we decided to camp at the junction and give ourselves a rest. We have had hard days since we started this trail. I told Gina “I don’t think I’d do this again” lol it’s almost all uphill. We got to camp around 2pm and started doing laundry. I rushed Jarron around because I know how long it takes to dry clothes out here. Once we were all clean and had clothes hanging, we sat around the fire (mostly smoke to ward off mosquitos) and made our dinners. It was about 4:30pm when a ranger walked up on us. His name was Rob and he was the Tyndell creek ranger. Gina told him about her bear sighting and he asked us to keep the fire down. He also told us that the burnt forest we walked through was caused by lightning 2 years ago. He loved his job. He said something about this being paradise. And in a lot of ways, it is.
July 5
5:11am
I’ve taken on the responsibility of making fires in the mornings if it’s really cold. Mostly because I’m the first one up and I have to eat. I’ve been munching on Gina and Ali’s leftover trisquits to sooth my stomach. Our bug bite friend showed up around 5 yesterday. I was starting to worry about him when he didn’t show up but he said he camped at the kern junction instead of going another 1.8 miles to the hot springs like we did. We are trying to leave camp by 7 this morning. We are starting the day going uphill but I’m pretty sure it’s all uphill from here anyway. We are trying to make it to Crabtree meadow tonight for camp. That is where we meet up with the John Muir Trail. Surely there will be more hiker traffic as well. We have only seen a handful of people out here. We can’t decide if it is because we are stupid for going during the heat or because this trail is extremely hard. Last night, I asked Gina if she would text Denise to see if she would bring us a jar of pickles. Lol that’s all I’m looking forward to. And maybe a fresh salad. And maybe tea. I just waved one of my tortillas over the fire to warm it up and maybe it tasted like pine but at least it was something different.
5pm
Crabtree Meadow camp
Another very exhausting day. We climbed all day. Again.
Jarron and I arrived at camp around 2:30pm and the girls shortly after. We all met PCT hikers on our way here. One guy was from Japan. I asked another guy “are you on the PCT?”. He responded with “Hell yea”. We’re only 3 miles from guitar lake so we are going to sleep in and leave camp around 2 tomorrow afternoon. We are at a camp full of PCT and JMT hikers calling each other by their trail names. I’m jealous. And speaking of trail names… Ali is now Snooze and Jarron is Pete…
11:06pm
I just got back into the tent. I finally gave up and went to my bear can for a tortilla. They are one of the only things that sooth my stomach. I swear it’s like as soon as I open my eyes it’s warfare. I also had to put on another pair of socks bc it is freezing up here. Earlier, We heard some guys by the bear box talking about hiking up Whitney to watch the fireworks… I’ve never liked the 4th of July enough to freeze to death on a mountain but to each their own. We watched them hike off in shorts.
Gina got in contact with Denise and Meridyth. They said they will have enough food to feed an army at the campsite when we finish. She said s’mores for dessert, French toast, pickles, cocktails, who knows what else. I am so ready to see their faces. I am also so ready for dinner and breakfast at the Whitney cafe. All I can think about is coffee and waffles.
July 6
7:07am Crabtree meadow
I almost puked in the tent so now I am wrapped up in my sleeping bag outside in my chair. This is the coldest it’s been. And I can only imagine tomorrow will be colder. Jarron and I can either hike 3 miles to guitar lake today with Gina and Ali or take a zero here and hike all 12 miles out tomorrow. Im not really sure what I want to do. Im sure guitar is super cool but it’s at even higher elevation. But 12 miles is also a no so I am at a crossroads. 6 miles up and 6 miles down. I was reading the notes on our map app and it said there were 97 (no joke) switchbacks coming down at the end of the trail. Idk, we’ll probably just go camp at guitar and make the next day easier on ourselves.
8:32pm
Guitar Lake
We hung out until about 2:15 today. We were aware there was little shade up here so that is why we left late. That and we only had to do 2.7 miles. We were all sitting outside our tents facing Crabtree meadow when a guy walked up and made friends with us right away. He put his bag down and stumbled over to our little gathering. This was around noon. While he was talking to us, another man walked up and said he was lost. Kinda but not really. He was headed to Whitney but just took a detour to the meadow ultimately having to backtrack. He stayed with us awhile too. We talked about Fred Becky and cycling. He was from Minnesota. Jarron got his number lol while ALL of us were sitting there, a young, native looking man walked up and asked if we had seen a pack train. One of the guys asked if he was a ranger and he responded with “nope, I’m just a man”. He also asked what we were doing with a hint of smartassness lol it was an overall weird encounter but jarron was fascinated by him. He did have a cool hat and a wicked cowboy aura. He left us and went to sit on the bear box. About 10 mins later we saw why… about 10 people with the exact same day packs on walked up. So they paid MONEY to have these ranchers pack their supplies in and out while they just carry water and snacks.
Shortly after, we all started packing up camp. Our new friend “Sherpa” took over our campsite when we left. We gained only 1000 ft in elevation up to Guitar lake but it sucked the entire life out of us. We will gain 2000 more in 3 miles tomorrow morning. We stopped to let a pack team go by us on the way up and found it’s receptors at the top. A group of older people (Gina and I like to call them the safari’s) had an entire kitchen set up complete with freaking catering chafers. They also had those old school metal/aluminum with like a plaid design lawn chairs all set out in a circle. We got a kick out of that.
July 7
Whitney Portal family camp
Gina and Ali left camp around 4am from guitar lake while Jarron and I waited around until about 6:30. I actually got up when the girls were packing up and could see headlamps bobbing in the dark already. After dawn, we left a freezing camp and shuffled up the first set of switchbacks. There was a stretch of flat-ish ground then we headed up again. We gained 2000 ft of elevation over 3 miles. Jarron was fighting altitude sickness and being pregnant mixed with altitude makes me slowwwww. It sucks all the energy I have out. We hit the mount whitney junction at about 13000 ft around 9:30am. We sat and had a snack before heading over to trail crest where we met some nice people then started the trek down. On our way people were asking how it was or if we made it to the top which I explained why we didn’t go. Jarron and I decided several days ago that it would probably be smartest to not go up due to the lack of oxygen. People were congratulating us on the baby. We got fist bumps from older men who were excited to know before we have announced it lol! We got down the horrendous switchbacks and stopped to get water at a lake where a JMT hiker was lounging on a rock. I apologized for disrupting him but he was super nice and talked to us for awhile. He was a lawyer from Chicago. We left the lake which was at Mount Whitney’s trail camp… that place was the trashiest we’ve seen so far. Emergency blankets just hanging on to rocks, food in the water, trash on the ground, toilet paper everywhere where just a few things I noticed before I had just put my head down and move on. It was my daily reminder of why I hate people sometimes. We hiked down another long stretch of switchbacks before we HAD to take a short break. My stomach was growling. I hustled Jarron from our pit stop and we continued down. We met some girls who asked us about water and I asked how far we had left… she said we were moving at a good speed so she’d give us 2 HOURS. Ugh. We thought we were only doing a 9 mile day. It was supposed to be 3 up to trail crest then 6 down when it was actually 3 up and 9 down… 11+ miles freaking total if you count the walk to the store for burgers and then down to family camp. We made it to a junction where a couple women were telling everyone how proud they were of them lol I couldn’t help but tell them I didn’t go up. They asked why and long story short, when Denise and I drove by their campsite that evening she ran out to the car to give me a pickle! They were very nice. After we talked to those ladies we kept descending until I heard “Sydney?!”. It was Denise and Meredith! I ran. I was so happy to see them I almost knocked a girl off trail with a passing “I’m so sorry” but kept running. We told them about the baby and now they are planning a trip to Oklahoma for the shower. We hiked down the rest of the way with them. They wanted to get ice cream from then store while Jarron and I shared the best burger I’ve ever had. (Not really but today it was) We hiked down to camp and immediately got in the river to try to wash up. Meredith, Denise, and Jarron had drinks shortly after so when It was time to go pick up the girls at the trailhead, Denise just handed me keys and said we’re going lol Jarron stayed with Meredith to set up the whole table spread of food they brought. Gina and Ali didn’t make it down until about 6:45pm. Jarron and I were hurting for them on the way down. They did close to 15 miles…We grabbed the burgers they ordered and headed back down to camp. When we got there, Meredith had an entire charcuterie board laid out. I ate all night. We also had s’mores for dessert! They are making us French toast and bacon for breakfast. They are absolute angels. We are all headed to lone pine today after we have to check out of camp. Denise said we are in search of Mexican food lol. Her and Meredith are staying the night in lone pine with us as well. It’s going to be so fun.
July 8
We got up and had a delicious camp breakfast but had to be out of our campsite by 11am. After we packed up, we headed up to the Portal store to meet Lone Pine Chuck who was giving us a ride into town. We got down to Lone Pine fairly quick but couldn’t check in to the hotel until 2 so we walked down to the grocery store for shower supplies. After that we hung out at Jake’s Saloon where I had one of the best Virgin bloody Marys EVER lol. Everyone had a couple drinks then we went to the Mount Whitney Cafe for lunch around 1. After that it was time to check in and I wasn’t feeling well so while I showered and laid down, Jarron did all our laundry. (Best baby daddy ever) Around 6 we all headed down the street to Merry Go Round, an Asian restaurant that was phenomenal. Jarron made friends with the owner because he was wearing an apron with trains on it. After dinner we all hung out around a picnic table outside the hotel. I was the first to call it a night.
July 9
We walked back across the street to the Mount Whitney Cafe for breakfast. I had been looking forward to that since we started. After breakfast we all walked down to the post office and after a scary few minutes, the man working found our box with the travel bags inside. We said our goodbyes to Denise and Meridyth then headed to the bus stop. We took a 2 hour shuttle to Lancaster where we boarded a busy train. We made it to LA Union Station around 4:30pm. We got an Uber to our Airbnb and when we pulled up, the neighbors were blaring Ice Cube- It Was A Good day. And it was. The Airbnb had LOADED orange, lemon and lime trees in the cutest back yard. We door dashed dinner then everyone crashed.
July 9
We left the Airbnb around 9:30am and took an Uber to Ocean View Cafe in Manhattan Beach. We had a great breakfast then walked straight down to the beach to relax until our 4:30pm flight. Jarron and I sat with our stuff while the girls roamed the area in search of souvenirs. And if you’re looking for something like that, Manhattan beach is not the place. It is mostly a residential area with little to no shops. We left the beach around 2:15pm and headed to the airport. Jarron’s flight wasn’t until 11pm so he got well acquainted with his terminal. I scored a window seat but didn’t sleep at all. We made it to DFW around 10pm to a hostile group of people waiting for the Parking Spot shuttle lol everyone was just ready to go home. We made it back to Ardmore around 1am and basically dropped our things and headed to bed. From now on, if I am visiting the Sierra, I will pay the money to fly into Fresno. The trip to and from LA isn’t worth it. This will probably be my last trip here for awhile due to the baby anyway and that thought hit me hard on trail. But I cannot wait to show my child what all the world has to offer. I just hope they like to be outside lol
Happy Trails - Great White
