It was really cold this morning and the idea of putting wet socks and shoes on made it hard to get up. Nonetheless, we were on the trail by 5:30. We had a pass to conquer. Muir Pass isn’t very steep, but we had lots of climbing and the trail was covered. Our approach had us doing some pretty intense scrambling to avoid avalanche debris.
Once we got to the pass, we climbed past frozen lakes and snowfields. Eventually we got to the top and had a snack in the Muir Hut. It was built by the Sierra Club in the 30s for hikers that get caught in a storm. It would have been a cool place to camp for a night.
So we kept going down through the snow, resting in one of the few places that had decent access to water. It was weird that we were literally walking on water, but it was hard to find any we could actually use. Most of the running water that high was 10 feet below a snow bridge.
On the way down the pass, we ran into the first John Muir Trail hikers. They gave us some good news about Evolution Creek, the major ford of the day. A ranger told us it was chin deep, but the JMT hikers told us it was only waist deep. That means that our day would be easier and it probably meant that the creeks are getting lower.
I’m mad I didn’t take any pictures of the ford, because it was pretty incredible. During times of high water, people cross Evolution Creek in a large meadow where the flown is slow. The meadow was completely flooded. I was the first to go in the creek and I picked the wrong spot. It was just a little too deep and my floating backpack lifted me off the bottom of the creek. It was extremely slow moving and I was able to swim/jump my way across to the other side.
The farther we went on the trail, the more Evolution Creek raged. We hiked down into a canyon at about 8000 feet, the lowest we’ve been in awhile. We made a campfire and cooked dinner. We’re only one pass and one major creek crossing away from a hot meal. It’s been a good couple of days.