I've been registered for awhile, looking at posts and what not and thought perhaps I should introduce myself formally, and what better way to do that then to share my recent thru-hike of the John Muir Trail.
My friend and I went southbound for the 220 mile trip, and completed it in 17 days. I had planned for a leisurely 3 weeks or 21 days to allow for any zero days we wanted to take, and still not have to try to make it up with extremely long hikes. Instead, we pretty much just kept to our roughly 12-13 mile per day pace and could have been out in 16 days but got caught in a pretty nasty storm. I don't know if it has been posted here but I'm sure you're aware of the hiker whose body was recovered below Old Army Pass, Tom Heng, who I think was hiking in that same storm. I feel for his family.
We got up early on the first day and climbed up to take a picture of the sign. I actually grabbed a permit for a Glacier Point starting point, since all the traditional Happy Isle permits were spoken for. We still wanted the sign, and both of us have frequented the Mist Trail as well as the JMT intro trail so we didn't feel too bad skipping it.
I should note, I'm the guy in the coolie hat and that thing was the best hiking hat I've ever used! You'll also see my belly shrink, I lost 15 pounds total on the trip.
Tuolumne was our second night, and getting beers that early in the trip was nice. I accidentally glossed over a rule on the permit requiring you to either camp 4 miles away from T Meadows or to stay in the backpackers camp, so we ended up having a pretty monster second day of mileage, from cloud's rest jct to the TM backpacker's camp. I think it was something like 18 miles.
We got chased off Thousand Island Lake by a storm and had to book it much farther to get a clear night.
Made it to Red's Meadow in 4 days, and decided to stay in a motel in Mammoth. Once I got into town, my phone blew up with messages from my girlfriend and my older fly fishing friend Jon. Apparently jon was in mammoth at his condo for awhile with his family and invited us to stay the night with him. Jon is the former head chef at the Ahwahnee (probably several decades ago) and treated us to chicken parm and lots of good beer. Hooray for free room and board!!
On our 6th or 7th night? Duck Creek. A rare sighting of a herd of Sierra Llamas. There was a couple using them as pack animals. Definitely one of the oddest things I have seen or slept next to.
Hit our 100 mile mark, just between Marie Lakes and Selden(?) Pass. Things were progressing smoothly!
Have to show a picture of Muir Hut. It may look like some kind of racist pose, but the wind was gusting really hard and I had to grab my hat else I lose it right before my friend snapped the photo. Muir Pass is such an alien looking place.
Had to lay low for pretty much a full day. Got stuck on our way up towards Rae Lakes. It was good that we decided to make quick camp, as not 5 minutes after we set up in this gully, we got a huge dump of hail on us. Storm was off and on for about 5-6 hours, broke around dinner, then continued through the night. We climbed Glenn the next day and had some adverse weather but nothing like the spectacle of hail and lightning the day before.
My friend caught me in the act, I had several bars on top of Forester (13,200ft) Pass and I figured why not? No call went through through unfortunately. I was definitely missing everyone at home at this point.
We met a bunch of other great thru-hikers along the way, this is a few that made it up and over Whitney last wednesday with us. We all got together for pizza and beer at Pizza Factory afterwards. That combo never has tasted so good.
I am certain there are quite a few guys on this forum who have done the JMT, I'd love to swap stories! If anyone is doing it or thinking of doing it, please don't hesitate to ask me any questions you have about it, I'd love to share any information I can offer up!
