Mountaineering on Pinchot Pass & Mather Pass – PCT 2017: A Hiking Story [21]
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Part 20 ‘Glen Pass & the End of the Family‘
Day 65 (01/06) – Pinchot Pass
In the morning at camp, I explained to the guys what happened with Rex and Corky. I was just happy to at least be with familiar faces given my mood.
We set off with another 3am start, crossing the rickety suspension bridge, and passing mile 800. Grim was leading and after about half a mile, Pirate realised Grim was leading us down the wrong trail and we had to turn back. Eventually, about 2 miles later, I realised I lost one of my gloves, and slackpacked (hiking with no bag) back to retrace my steps. Sadly, I returned to my bag empty-handed, assuming it must have fallen out at one of the river crossings. Looks like a sock glove might be on the cards!
The day was mostly climbing – 3000 feet total in elevation, mostly gradual, before reaching Pinchot Pass. This was a high, but non-technical pass. I caught back up to the others, and ended up breaking away from the rest with Pirate and Thirsty. Pirate took an alternate route up Pinchot, whilst Thirsty and I headed up the normal side.
We briefly celebrated on top of Pinchot Pass before a combination of glissading, walking, and post-holing down the other side – the first downhill of the day! I made it first to Lake Majorie, set up my tent on an exposed rock nearby, and waited on the others to arrive. We chilled there in our tents wearing only our underwear as it was quite hot! The tents served as the only shade in the exposed land around us at that time of the day. I had seen Pirate ahead earlier, but he had snow shoes and caught make faster miles, and I couldn’t keep up. Would we catch up with him tomorrow? Who knows!
Eventually, Akhuna, Rubberball, Grim and Bobby Hill caught up and joined us in the ‘prime real estate’ rock out of the snow. We cooked our dinners had some laughs and went to sleep, ready to tackle Mather Pass tomorrow.
Distance hiked: 9 miles
Total PCT hiked: 809 miles
Day 66 (02/06) – Mather Pass
My alarm probably woke up everyone, but that was a good thing! We all did our packing and set off with some easy hiking to start the day. However, later at mile 811, we hit a large stream with no snow bridges to cross. The only feasible part to get across without getting our legs wet (remember, it was -5 deg C at the time!) was two snow ledges jutting out at a horrible distance. Grim went first… ok, followed by Thirsty who slipped and broke off a large chunk. It was now harder for the rest of us. Bobby Hill threw his bag over (almost slipping) and then jumped. I advised against this strategy as the weight often pulls you with it. Rubberball attempted the same strategy, but he fell in, dragging Akhuna with him who was trying to assist. I jumped last and made a good purchase with my ice axe and was fine.
We then gradually ascended uphill for most of the early hours of the morning. Akhuna was struggling from the cold and was zoning out at times – similar to the time on Kearsarge Pass. He often needed to stop, but we encouraged him to put on whatever dry clothes and keep walking to warm up. Was it fatigue, anxiety, or something else? He never told us, being the strong confident character he was.
Eventually, at around 9am we made it to Mather Pass, one of the harder passes in the Sierra. At first glance, it didn’t look too bad. I was at the front and chose to take an alternate route that allowed me to gain most of the elevation by bouldering up the steep rocks. I didn’t expect everyone to follow, but they did.
The bouldering part was fairly easy, but I did misjudge the distance of the lateral sidle to get to Mather Pass – it was further than I thought. Once the elevation was gained, I then had to cut across the ridge all the way to the pass – jumping over some rocks in the process. I’ll admit, it was a harder route than anticipated due to the post-holing steps and degree of risk, but I was actually enjoying it. Thirsty caught up to me using my steps, and I let him take over to give me a break. Toward the end, I gave Thirsty a break and took the lead again. Soon after, we reached Mather Pass – it was a great achievement! I called the route ‘the badass mountaineering route’ as it was a little more hardcore than just taking steps up the snow (which we saw people had done previously). To be fair, we never saw the steps initially, and probably would have taken them under different circumstances – but our way was super cool!
At the top, we celebrated (I had my little whiskey bottle from my care package still) and waited for the others to catch up. Eventually, the others caught up. I remember hearing some of the comments about the challenging route – I had to laugh!
Going down the pass was easier than anticipated, and could be done by simply glissading down the slopes. It took about 15 minutes to get down, yet some 1-2 hours to get up! Thirsty and I were a little ahead again, and we ended up doing three slides before trudging through the soft snow for the final 3 miles or so.
I eventually got ahead, leaving a trail for the others to follow by two lakes known as the Palisade Lakes. I was actually on the second lake accidentally before checking my map. It wasn’t as frozen as the first, and I quickly got off the ice. At a weak spot on the edge, my foot ended up going through the ice into the water, but it was wet anyway.
It wasn’t too late, but I found a snow-free campsite above the huge river fed by the lakes, and set up a cowboy camp in a flat area. Unfortunately, some snow melt was flowing under me that I didn’t notice before due to evaporation, but the flat area was good. The others all arrived eventually, and agreed to camp nearby too, some on different rocks. The other reason I wanted to camp is that the next descent was quite steep, and I fancied the firmer morning snow for it, which the others agreed to. We all wanted to push on, as it was only 2pm, but we decided that it was beneficial to camp now, so that tomorrow we’d be able to hike closer to Muir Pass – allowing us to could go over it early the next day.
Distance hiked: 13 miles
Total PCT hiked: 821 miles
Day 67 (03/06) – Actual Trail!
Dzzt… dzzt… dzzt
Off went my alarm… As I turn it off, I realised that it was only around 10 minutes after I had set it – I must have been tired! This made me sleep in, as I never set a new alarm. After waking, I rushed a quick coffee and oats and joined the others, who were all in a similar vote about getting up late.
The ice was still relatively soft… and we were already partially post-holing – dammit! It mustn’t have gotten cold enough. We needed to descend a crazy steep snow section immediately – 1200 feet in 2 miles, and it was hard going. I was leading the group at one point and made an alternate route to get down to the river where it flattened out much sooner. The first warm glow of morning light showed, and it was a spectacular sight behind the mountain.
During the day, we had a break, and discussion our plans. Grim was meeting his girlfriend at a set date in Mammoth and had to pull out early at the Bishop Pass trail to get back to civilization. The others realised their food situation was dire in teaching Mammoth in time due to it being so hard to make miles in these conditions. I was already going to Vermilion Valley Resort (VVR) for a resupply I had made using Sonora Pass Resupply – an online trail food vendor. The others agreed to join me, and Grim was going to return there and resupply the others too for the final 4 or 5 days to Mammoth.
We were pleasantly surprised to see the snow… almost disappear after several miles. The valley was suddenly a green lush forest full of life – Grim’s description was my favourite, “I can almost picture wild moose and deer running through the grass”. It was a morale booster and everyone was in high spirits at this point. The feeling of being able to walk on an actual trail again and see the terrain under us was euphoric! We were suddenly hiking, and not mountaineering again (note: it’s not that the mountaineering side is bad, it’s an amazing challenge – but it’s hard work and miles are hard to come by).
The amount of water flowing down Kings River was the biggest I had ever seen in my life – even after being on the famous Futa River in Chile. The snow melt had created a monster flow! It was incredible – I probably don’t want to raft this river anytime soon.
Grim departed around midday at the Bishop Pass junction and Akhuna, Rubberball, Thirsty, Bobby Hill and myself pressed on. We were exhausted by this point, but we needed to push out a few more miles to get closer to Muir Pass. Since the valley, it was all uphill. We managed to hike around three more miles, getting us to mile 834. It was so hard because the top layer of the snow was full of uneven potholes (or sun cups) and stability was tricky.
Finding a dry campsite became harder and harder as the valley grew steeper and thinner. We almost camped on the snow, but I suggested we push on at least a little more. About a half mile later Thirsty found a great spot by the river that was relatively flat and dry – it was exciting, as camping on the snow was looking more likely towards the last few miles. Camping on the snow wouldn’t have been so bad, if we had proper winter-insulated sleeping mats, but we didn’t.
I terra-formed a tent space by moving rocks and using my ice axe to flatten the ground as best I could for a good sleep later. Then, I went for a quick wash in the river – ridiculously cold! We ate dinner around a fire and then rested for the famous Muir Pass tomorrow.
Distance hiked: 13 miles
Total PCT hiked: 833 miles
Next Post:
Part 22 ‘Muir Pass, Evolution Creek & Flooded Creek Crossings’
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