Day 18.  Can we walk any slower? July 8, 2016.

6am to 5pm. Lake Catherine to Blue Lake 6.1 miles.

I really don’t know how we can hike for 11 hours and only get 6.1 miles. But that’s what we did. Of course  there was some backtracking to get back on track….. we did this several times so I’m sure we actually hiked a bit more than 6.1. Roper describes much of today as “tricky.” And that it was. We crossed no passes today and had no snow but still didn’t get very far.

It was also spectacularly gorgeous and had lots of easy walking. Most of the time was spent reading and rereading the guidebook and looking at the map.  This section is known to be slow going and we accomplished exactly what we had planned. We also managed to avoid all the cliffs and class 3 sections. So it was a very successful day.

Wired looking over the edge to find the best route

Trees. An unusual sight on the high route.

Wired fording Twin Lake. This is near the outlet but the directions say to cross IN the lake where it is calm. The bottom was very slippery which made the crossing more difficult.

More granite to walk across.

Heading to Blue Lakes

Killer campsite.

When we got to Blue Lake it was only 4:30. The next pass isn’t far or hard (or so the guidebook says.) I had to lobby hard to call it a day. It’s absolutely gorgeous here and the chance of getting a campsite this spectacular on the other side are low. We are camped between the 2 Blue Lakes. We have a view of the Ritter Range, the Minarets, the Kaweah Peaks ridge 90 miles away, plus other mountains. And since we quit early we had time to enjoy it…. except that it is cold so we all headed to our tents early.  But I can see the lake and all the peaks from my tent.

View from my tent.