pct blog. : Day 82: Noble lake - Mokulemne Wilderness (mi 1046-1062)

End of the vacation, for everybody! Group shot leaving camp at Noble Lake.

Back to the new reality. Salamander whipped up an excellent breakfast of pancakes, which was accompanied by freshly burr-ground Peet's coffee from the Bialetti pot that Watermelon hiked in. Starbucks Via micro-ground coffee was doing it for us up until that point, but man what a great cup of coffee! We were just a camp break and cleanup away from the end of our long weekend with amigos. We posed for a group pic before starting the descent to Ebbets Pass then headed out. Beautiful sharp and steep volcanic cliffs rimmed the canyon along the way out. Multiple folks mentioned that they were flying on the way out, mostly because they were down to base weight without any food and maybe with a liter or so of water.

Janmming northward towards home, for most, and towards Canada, for Smiles and I.

Severe features dominated the landscape below Noble Lake.

Everybody made it to the trailhead with the kind of elation that comes when you KNOW a town stop is due - hot food, cold drinks, soft beds, good water pressure, fluffy towels, and no more walking. As everybody piled into the cars for their lives back in the Bay Area, Smiles and I felt really, really alone for the first time in a long time. We loved having our friends out with us, but the reality of what we were attempting set in again and hit much harder than it ever had. Canada was still a long, long ways away. Back when we started, we were taking it day to day and really didn't have much idea of what we were in for. Having hiked just over 1,000 miles at this point, our chances of success were higher and we knew what we were doing.

Victory for America this past weekend! At the trailhead, almost everybody intact.

Somehow Under Construction's pack made it.

...it was a close call, though.

We saw a sign for trail magic near the trailhead, and after bidding them a fond farewell and safe journey back to the Bay Area, we went to visit with hikers and trail angels. We walked quietly and numbly the quarter mile up to the trail angels, who had laid out quite a spread - fresh fruit, hot dogs, hamburgers, beans, potato salad, cold soda & beer - incredible. Lizard, a section hiker set to finish the PCT with the Washington segment later this summer, & his wife put on quite a production. After stuffing ourselves and resting a touch, Smiles, Belgian Red, Kenobi and I set out again. We didn't make it a quarter of a mile before we encountered more trail magic. Brian the trail angel met a PCT hiker last summer training for Whitney and eventually got "sucked into the vortex," as he put it. He fed us more, then we had about an easy of an afternoon walk as one could hope for following a 2-hour face stuffing at the pass.

Belgian Red, Smiles and Kenobi at the second trail magic.

Thankfully for us, the two trail angel encounters had come right after finishing up with our friends, which helped distract us for the rest of the day. We rolled along the eastern faces of Reynolds and Raymond Peaks, with fantastic lava formations jutting out of weathered talus landscapes. Off to the northeast, an enormous plume of smoke from a forest fire billowed into the stratosphere. We finished our day just northwest of Raymond Peak, and got to see a sooty grouse hen up close, too. The mosquitoes were back, and we filled up on ramen to refuel before bed and our last full day before South Lake Tahoe.

Smiles hikes around Reynolds Peak of the southeastern Mokulemne Wilderness. Huge plumes of forest fire smoke were visible to the east of Markleeville.