Last night, Soho and I were chatting about today’s goal. 20 miles and over 5k of climbing over two passes, it will be a workout. We camped close to a creek crossing that we would normally have to ford, but we found a good crossing spot over some granite falls slightly off trail. Soho packed and disappeared into the trees.

While I was packing, I figured that I’d get on trail then not look at my positioning app until completing the first climb. No need monitoring my agony.

This great idea turned out to be a 10 mile mistake.

Crossed the stream around 7, checked my position to insure I was on trail, then started walking. First through a nice valley, then a long climb up to 10k. Was tempted to check my progress, but resisted. I was making good progress.

The trail was well maintained and I ran into several bunches of hikers coming down. Normal stuff. At 10, I reached a big flat area at the top of the pass with a large lake. Very pretty. Was taking a couple pics when I noticed the pass was called “Summit Pass”. Hmm… I thought this was called Benson pass.

I sat down to check my mileage and plan the rest of the day on my phone. That was when I finally realized that I’d gone the wrong way. I had walked 5 miles on the wrong trail ALL MORNING. Not only that, but the two trails diverged by 90 degrees almost at the start so there was no bushwacking my way out of this one. I was so pissed off.

Instead of a hard 20 mile day, I had a nearly impossible 30 mile day with 8k of climbing.

I practically ran the 5 miles back to my starting point, cursing all the way. Reached it at noon and I was already feeling tired.

The rest of the day was filled with hiking and hiking with only 5 minute breaks every hour or two, Adding to that was a couple river fords which consume 20 minutes of time switching shoes and drying off. I spent the whole day angry with myself. Not the sort of zen-like experience I’m supposed to have. Crossed the 10k Benson pass at 5. Here are a couple of hasty pictures.

After that descent, it was the next climb to Rock Island pass. The trail had been degrading all day. All this Northern area of Yosemite gets hit by a lot of erosion and is not really popular hiking ground. Trail maintenance is definitely not a priority here. Most of this area has not been worked on for years. The shear walls of the terrain caused dusk to come early. I was on the headlamp by 7.

I hiked until 10:30, then gave up at mile 975. I was not going to reach Soho tonight. I was exhausted, the trail was a mess, and was going to get hurt if I continued. Did 26 miles (only 16 of the PCT miles) and 8k of elevation change today. I put up my tent and collapsed.