Tahoe Rim Trail – Day 9

Daily Miles: 13

Total Miles: 119

Frank was feeling a lot worse this morning.  He felt like he didn’t have much energy and felt kinda achy.  Luckily we had several miles of downhill at the beginning of the day and then we slowed our pace for the uphill.

We left  Desolation Wilderness within a half mile of walking this morning.  As we got to Richardson Lake we started to see more TRT hikers and also some PCT hikers.

One PCT hiker we met was going southbound and had started his hike at the Canadian border on July 8th.  Which means he had done about 1500 miles in 30 days.  We don’t know if he was trying to break a speed record or not, but he was certainly flying down the trail.

We also ran into a hiker named Shawn who we had met south of Spooner Summit on the other side of the lake.  This trail is fun in that we can see hikers on both sides of the loop.  It seemed like Shawn was having a great hike and we chatted with him for a bit.

Late in the morning we started a climb up to Barker Pass.  Frank was feeling so terrible, so he decided to take a nap at the trailhead.  He pulled out his sleeping pad and just layed down in the grass.  The rest of us had a lunch break and then went to different spots to relax and nap.  Beardoh hung up his hammock, Annika laid down on her sleeping pad, and SweetPea and Sonja laid down on the picnic table benches.  We all managed at least a little bit of sleeping.

We ended up having a three hour break, but it was worth it, because Frank was feeling better after his nap.

The heat had also lessened a bit and we had more shade as we headed out.  It is pretty hard to get ourselves going again after a long break, and the climbing as we ended the day felt extra challenging.

It did help that the trail at the end of the day was shaded and there were long sweeping switchbacks.  That definitely helped make the climb more tolerable.

Once we got up onto the ridge we were able to find a nice campsite.  We even have nice views from camp.  We set up camp near the edge of the ridge and we had a beautiful sunset to celebrate the last night on the trail for our friends.

As planned, they are getting picked up tomorrow in Tahoe City to spend a few days with family before heading to NC.  We will continue on the trail tomorrow after we resupply in town.