Mile 810.0. - 827.0

Camping in the meadow was great until morning. We slept without our rain fly and ended up soaked because of heavy dew. On top of that, the temperture must have been around freezing because our bear canisters had ice on the lids. It was very unpleasant to get out of our aleeping bags and continue to break down camp but we did after some debating. To top that off, our first steps were to ford a river.  I decided that i could rock hop this river and not get wet. Wrong, my rear foot went right in the river and now I was really cold and wet. I had no choice but to start hiking as fast as i could just to warm up. Balance found a better location to ford and made it safely across.

Another day, another pass to climb here in the Sierras. Today's 4 mile climb up to 12,000' is called "Mather Pass". For the past few days we have been climbing a pass a day and dropping down to the valleys only to climb back up to the same elevation the next day. These are all beautiful passes but tiresome on the body. 

After reaching to summit of Mather Pass we descended around 9 miles along lakes, rivers and waterfalls. All with huge mountains lingering high above.

It is now starting to thin out. Today we only saw 2 other northbound thru-hikers. We are not sure why, or where everyone has gone but were not complaining. Today we got the feeling of being the only ones out in this huge wilderness. That's nice once in awhile. We were told that the group of hikers would spread out but we never thought this much.

We found a nice camping spot at the base of three different valleys. One in which we will take tomorrow to climb Muir  Pass.

Warmed up, Balance takes a break climbing up Mather Pass.

With each pass comes new challenges. Most passes still have some snow crossing to do. Some steeper than others. Some you posthole. Some you slip on ice. Some you can just walk across. 

Mather pass is on the far left of the photo. We can't tell where the pass is until we are starting to go up it. The trail is often hidden by rocks.

The top of Mather Pass, at just over 12,000 feet.

Descending these passes can be as hard and dangerous as ascending them. The tops of these passes have snow and ice and it takes time to carefully go down without getting injured. 

A yard sale. Everything out to dry. At lunch we found a nice open meadow coming down from Mather Pass and took everything out of our bags to dry from this morning. Most important were our sleeping bags which got real wet from the morning dew.

Beautiful vistas like this remind you why you are doing this.

Tomorrow's hike, somewhere down in the valley.