Bunny will swear I never say this, but, I was wrong. There was no deer waiting for us to eat. We were not attacked because of a messy camp. What did happen was this: one bar had a bite out of it. That bite was spit on the ground and covered in saliva. Every other bar was covered in bear scat. Either he’d (for the sake of not being overtly sexist, I am assuming only a male bear would be so crass as to poop prodigiously so close to stranger’s eyes) been saving up for a while, or the bar didn’t agree with his stomach. I know, the morning after I had two bars in one day, I raced to dig a large hole that I completely filled.
It was still pretty cold when we started hiking at 9. I opted to hike with my raincoat on to cut the wind down. We didn’t see anyone all morning while we were hiking up Mr Toad’s Wild Ride. This is a mountain bike trail that loops with the TRT on one side. As long as you’re going downhill, it looks kind of fun. I’d sure hate to cycle uphill with all the rocks.
Mr Toad starts his wild ride around 9000’. From here, it’s possible to catch a glimpse of the Southern portion of Lake Tahoe. One thing none of the videos prepared us for was the diverse hiking on the TRT. Everyone just shows their impressive views of Lake Tahoe, but few really bother showing any of the numerous alpine lakes or mountains that make up the Tahoe Basin. It is an incredible variety. Lest not forget, we are on the northern end of the High Sierra. Incredible views are a dime a dozen.
Age is rearing it’s ugly head. I did pretty much everything wrong today and paid the price. I didn’t pay attention to where we are going, or how high we were going. We hiked up to a bit over 9700’ above sea level. I could feel the difference in my breathing every time we approached the 9000’ mark. Bunny and I have been sporting low grade headaches the last couple of days. Instead of drinking more, we’ve been drinking less because of the cold. I even felt a bit dizzy around 9500’. I was not expecting any of these effects from altitude. After all, I’ve hiked to almost 18,000’ in Nepal and didn’t feel much worse then. Age is my answer (and lack of diamox, but I didn’t start taking that until 12,000’).
Bunny handled the whole day better than I did. I could never get warm. I hiked with my rain jacket, gloves, and my buff folded over my ears. Bunny was sporting shorts. She claims she’s tough. I think it’s women typically carry 9% more body fat. Other than her light headache, she wasn’t having any of the other problems I was.
We earned it today. I’m glad we hiked the extra 2 miles yesterday, because the 12 today took its toll. The winds never let up. A few times we were able to get in a little protection if we found a deep ravine to duck into. As we were approaching Freel Peak trail junction, we started running into a fair number of bikers climbing up and over the pass. The wind was so strong, it was blowing us over. I am impressed with the mountain bikers braving the wind and narrow, rocky trails.
We’re still not entirely certain what the current restrictions are. If the NFS is taking it day by day, they definitely wouldn’t have opened up the backcountry today with the winds being so strong (30 mph sustained with gusts to 50mph). Yet, when we arrived at Star Lake and decided on the least sucky spot, backpackers kept coming in long after we were in our tent trying to get warm. That makes me feel better that we are probably legal.
When I say we were in our tent trying to get warm, I should point out that we got in our tent about 3:30. We tried to find a spot out of the wind, but couldn’t find any. We didn’t want to hike to a lower elevation because this is our last source of water for all day tomorrow. Whenever possible, we prefer not to carry extra water. Today was supposed to be the coldest day we will have. If it broke 60 deg F today, I’d be surprised. After today, it should be all smooth sailing.
EFG