Eyes glaring in the night

May 31st, 2015

I sluggishly continued down the trail and came around a corner and I saw two eyes looking at me. I the first though that came to my mind was that I was looking at a mountain lion…

I woke up and realized that I had a long day ahead of me to get to the South Lake trail head by tomorrow. I had to go up and down two passes that were over 11000+ feet high. This also meant that there was going to be more snow. With this looming in my head I started going up the trail. Eventually I made it to the first pass which was pretty bad. I was able to get up and over it and wasn’t making great time. I hiked throughout the day and by the time I made it to the second pass I was looking at the setting sun. At the top I saw a lot of snow on the other side.

The good thing was there was a full moon which made it ideal for night hiking.  As I started to descend the mountain I started walking very carefully on the snow that seemed to collapse every five steps.  After about 15 minutes of crossing the steep snow field my leg went deep down into the snow and my foot was stuck. I did my best to get my foot out and lost a shoe again. Here I was in the snow at 10 o’clock with one shoe on the side of a huge mountain in the Sierras. I guess I should have gotten used to these things by now. I got out my headlight and lied down on my stomach and started digging down into the snow to retrieve my lost shoe. It took what seemed like forever and finally got back my snow filled shoe.

After I got to some solid ground I retied my shoes to the point where the circulation was being cut off to prevent this from happening again. By the time I got over the pass and was off the snow in was 1030pm and still had about 10 miles before I got to Bishop pass trail (the place where I was set on camping).  I kept on hiking going down the mountain and heard coyotes on the other side of a lake at 11000 feet. I thought this was a bit strange but were a lot of marmots in this area.

By about midnight I was getting very tired and I was 5 miles away from the trail/camp. I sluggishly continued down the trail and came around a corner and I saw two eyes looking at me. I the first though that came to my mind was that I was looking at a mountain lion. I took my trekking poles and hit them together real hard to see if I could scare it away.  It ran a couple of feet and then stopped and looked at me again. Then I got closer and got a better look at it and I saw a deer.  I was a little bit has relieved but when I started to walk something seemed funny. Then I noticed that one of my trekking poles was broken. I guess when I hit them together one snapped and flew off into the distance where I couldn't even find it. By around 1:30 am I was getting close. I hiked a little bit more and put down my sleeping bag off the trail and fell asleep instantly.