Today it is a short 11 mile hike down to Toulome’s general store. Plan is to get a burger then hitch somehow to Mammoth for a zero.
The walk down Lyell canyon is an easy one. Almost flat, slightly downhill. I got ahead of Soho early on and poured on the speed. Kept running into JMT’ers, mostly southbound and full of questions I didn’t feel like answering.
Passed 3 groups of northbounders who were finishing up. Kind of hard getting around them, their packs are so big (heh). Struck up a couple of nice conversations while walking, but these folks didn’t seem as motivated as me to get that burger.
About 2 miles from Toulome, ran into yet another ranger who wanted to see my permit. Yosemite is a police state.
Rolled into Toulome Meadows a little before 12. The exact route that took 3.5 days last time with Stephanie and her friends took only 27 hours at the PCT hiker pace which was about 15 hours of hiking. It is an interesting contrast. Totally different style of hiking. At least 14.5 of those hours was spent looking at the ground instead of the scenery.
Soho showed up a bit later and we had burgers and beer. Spent another hour chatting with other JMT’ers who were picking up resupply boxes, lunching before going back on trail, etc. Not sure why you need to resupply after only 20 miles of walking from the Yosemite start.
This is the labor day weekend and there is a ton of automobile traffic on the 120. We figured a hitch would be simple. Turns out it was impossible to get anyone to stop. We stood out there with our thumbs out for over an hour. Hundreds of cars passed us and not a single one stopped. Stupid Los Angeles city people. The looks of fear they gave us would have been funny if I wasn’t getting so hot standing there.
Soho and I got so discouraged that we walked back to the store so we could thumb it in relays while the other drank beer. We decided anyone in a nice car was a bad bet. We needed a beat-up ride driven by some local. Sure enough we see 15 year old dented and calico colored Subaru signal us. It pulls into the parking lot and out pops Tito a tall white guy with foot-long dreadlocks.
Tito is a late 20’s rock climbing junkie who works a seasonal job with Yosemite. Super nice guy originally from Michigan or Wisconsin, can’t remember exactly. Turns out he is heading down the Lee Vining to pick up a package, then to Mammoth to do some grocery shopping for a birthday party he is throwing for a “friend-who-is-a-girl”. He seems to be very specific about the distinction.
He moves some of his rock climbing stuff around and we wedge our packs in the back. I make some foot space from the pile of cans and bottles on the floor of the passenger seat, then climb in. Soho takes the back seat. On the way down, Tito explains that he has ordered some new minimalist shoes and, because he finds Yosemite’s postal service to be unreliable, he is having it shipped to a coffee shop in Lee Vining. We arrive there and hop out since he is clearly going to be socializing for a while with all the employees.
Soho and I mill around then decide to enter and order some coffee. Who is behind the counter? Carrie. The same gal who is dating Trent, the guy riding his horse up the PCT and last seen at Burnie guest ranch, at least 400 PCT miles North of here. This is some freaky stuff. We chat with her while Tito learns that his shoes were returned by the local post master because, according to him, she is a hater. This sends him into a long tirade about having to contact the vendor via email, finding the tracking number, blah, blah. Poor Tito just doesn’t like the modern world.
Eventually we load up and head to Mammoth. When he is pulling up to my condo, we talk a bit about winter job last year. He was helping with snow removal for a “guy who manages houses for rich people”. Turns out that guy is Jeff…..the dude who cleans and checks out our condo. Sure is a small world here on the Eastern side of the Sierras.