Day 85 (13 July) - Mile 917.25 - 931.70

Campsite at Mile 917.25 to Campsite on a Stream

I awoke at 5:59 AM and one minute later heard Brad's alarm go off. I quickly packed my stuff and jumped out of the tent since nature was calling and I had to filter water before hiking today and we have to cover about 15 miles today.

As I was filtering water I looked down the trail and Tim was hiking up it. What?!?  Last night he saw that we had stopped only 2.30 miles from Agnew Meadow Trailhead where he can drive to, so he woke at the crack of dawn, drove to the trailhead, and hiked the 2.30 miles uphill and arrived at our campsite before 7:00 AM...how incredibly cool. Plus he brought us some hard-boiled eggs, cherries, and yogurt for breakfast. It was all quite a surprise.

After the surprise and eating the breakfast treats we were ready to hike at 7:45 AM.

Ready to go.

Tim decided to hike with us a bit further up trail. When he hiked in 3.5 miles he turned back. A 7 mile hike is quite a healthy distance. We said goodbye till we see him tomorrow in Tuolumne Meadows where he is going to resupply us.

Tim hiked with us a few miles today.

After he left we hiked on for a few more miles and then took a short break. We then hiked a bit more and had a great view of 1,000 Island Lake.

Beautiful 1,000 Island Lake.

When we got down there we of course had to take a little break at the lake.

Self-portrait "Break on 1,000 Island Lake"

When we got back onto the trail we noticed that the PCT and the JMT had joined back up together. There goes the nice grade of the PCT.

Fancy trail sign.

Immediately we began to climb towards Island Pass and got another amazing view of 1,000 Island Lake: 

Wow.

Island Pass is a whole 400 foot climb in 1.70 miles. This was by far the easiest pass we have climbed and crossed, but we still took a "pass celebration" picture:

Island Pass celebration, 10,227 feet

About 1 mile down from the pass w stopped for lunch.  We sure are taking a lot of breaks today!  Usually we take 1.5 - 2 hours for lunch, but there were crazy flies everywhere. So we cut the lunch break short.

At this point we had about 4 miles to the top of Donahue Pass that for some reason we didn't think it was going to be too bad of a climb up to it. I guess we were feeling good...probably because if all the breaks today...and the scenery was taking our minds off the 4 miles of climbing we have in front of us. 

Unnamed alpine lake.

Share Bear enjoying the trail.

As usual, the marmot were out and as cute as ever:

Cute marmot.

Then the climb started getting serious. Steep steps made of rock, climbing up granite, just a hard, steep trail. To make it even worse, the mosquitos we awful. When you stopped for a break they would attack. I learned to take a quick break if there was a breeze that would blow the bugs away.

We had no idea, as usual, where this trail was taking us, but it is somewhere up there:

Donahue Pass is somewhere.

Brad and Share Bear climbing.

Brad and Share Bear close to the top.

We finally made it to the top at 5:45 PM. Not only was it the top of Donahue Pass, we were now entering Yosemite National Park...so cool!

Sign announcing our entrance into Yosemite National Park.

Top of Donahue Pass

Celebratory pose on top of Donahue Pass, 11,073 feet.

As usual, we made it to the top of a pass late in the day. Now we have to hike over 2 more miles to get to out planned campsite for the night. Under normal conditions this would take 1 hour, but we know better than that. Going down passes is usually as hard as going up. Donahue Pass seemed to follow that pattern exactly. 

Brad figuring out the way down Donahue Pass.

Because we were rushing to get down, I didn't take many pictures, but I did snap this one showing the amazing beauty as we descended down the pass:

Incredible.

We were less than 1 mile from our planned stop for the night and we had to ford a stream. We were so not into this, especially since it was getting late and the mosquitos were still crazy. But ford we must, so I removed my shoes (Share Bear and Brad put in their water shoes) and forded across. We then quickly, before the mosquitos are us alive, dried our feet and replaced our hiking shoes.

We hiked on and Brad found a nice campsite a bit short from where we were planning, so we called it a night and stopped there. This was about 7:30 PM.

I quickly pitched my tent with crazy mosquitos everywhere and cooked my dinner with my mosquito net on. There was no way I could eat, so I took my pot of salmon couscous into my tent and ate in peace.

Tomorrow we hike into Tuolumne Meadows in Yosemite National Park were Tim is going to meet us to resupply our food. We want to be there for lunch, but have almost 12 miles, so I better get to bed so I can get a good night sleep before rushing to Tim.

My home for the night.