June 4:Last Day in the "Desert"

So we're only sort of in the desert right now, but the way the trail is divided up we are technically still in the desert until Kennedy Meadows, and for us, that would be tomorrow morning.

We woke up damp with a low layer of clouds settling in over the mountains. I could see the trail go up and into the clouds and knew it would be a chilly morning. Luckily we would be climbing and, therefore, we'd heat up a lot quicker.

We walked for most of the morning in a swirling, foggy cloud; every so often the clouds would part and we would get spectacular views of the surrounding mountains. By noon the clouds had cleared and it was beautiful, clear skies all around.

We had one big climb left before Kennedy Meadows (KM), where we climbed up to what the data book called the "trail summit" @ 8020 ft, before descending into KM. We thought it would be a hot afternoon, but about halfway to the top we walked into an area that had burned awhile back and we got blasted by intense, make-it-hard-to-walk winds. There were constant strong winds, with gusts that tossed us around like rag dolls. We even had one gust that stopped us both in our tracks (PK, think Ranier). We eventually took a break in the least windy place we could find (which isn't saying much), and we heard a crack, only to look up in time to see a tree a ways away fall over from the force of the wind. Later, several other hikers reported seeing trees fall as well (and one guy almost got hit by one- twice!). We were really careful after that to keep an eye on the trees as we walked by to make sure they weren't swaying a little to much!

We went to sleep about 6 miles short of KM, leaving ourselves an easy walk in the morning and a relaxing day to look forward to (and a shower and laundry! WooHoo!).

Total Miles: 697.1
Miles Today:25.9
Camp 38:Last Night in the Desert

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