PCT 43 – Muir Pass

Daily miles : 20
Total miles : 854

The uphill climb that we had started last night continued for several miles up to Muir Pass.   Most of the climb was not on any visible trail since there was so much snow up in the canyons preceding get the pass.   We were able to start hiking by 6am and made it to the pass around 10am, with about 3 hours of snow walking.

The Muir pass is neat in that it has a stone Hut on the top in honor of John Muir, the famed naturalist who hiked through much of the high Sierra. The Hut was built in the 1930s and is still in great condition.  We did a fun picture to commemorate our wedding anniversary,  which is today (17 years).

From the pass,  we had a long hike down through Evolution Valley.   A couple hours of this was in snow,  basically until we got to the lunch spot where our friends were hanging out.    Polaris had lunch with us and told us about his 3 years of traveling that he has saved up for (hiking the PCT being given the first of his travels).   We had met Polaris back on day 3on Mt Laguna and had lunch with him there.

The feared/famed evolution creek crossing was about 4 miles from where we ended our day.   We crossed the creek at the high water alternate since there is still so much snow.   The crossing was quite easy with the water being about 3 feet max depth and the flow of the river being fairly light.

Tonight we are camped at a nice and large campsite that is along the San Joaquín River.   The sound of the river is loud from where we are.   Proton,  Mountain Man ,  Dream Catcher and Braveheart are all camped here with us. We don’t typically/always camp at established sites,  but this one was located just right.