Day 76

Campsite to Kennedy meadows north - 16 miles

Total - 1018.1 miles

What a crazy day. As always, mosquitos were horrible in the morning. I was kinda intimidated with today with the elevation gain which makes no sense because we’ve done way more than what we did today. I was just not in the mood. Marc and I left camp around 6 and cruised to the base of the climb happily. I was caffienated and ready to take on the day. The first initial 1/3 of the climb felt good, under the canopy of the trees, no mosquitos, and I felt like I had a good pace. After the water filtering sesh, it was a little brutal. The wind picked up as I can out of the trees and the trail was straight gravel causing my feet to slip with every step making it seem like I was using more energy than I should. Above tree line it was gorgeous. The trail turned to straight loose gravel with long switchbacks under the sun with the wind going to still keep you cool. People looked like tiny little dots above me as I started the true climb up the pass. It was slow moving but worth every step. There were still a couple snow fields on the first ascent but they were easy to navigate even when they were a little slushy. I finally got to the top and realized I had four bars of service and tried to call emily but the call still wouldn’t go through so I continued to trudge on. The next couple of miles were up and down but all just below the ridge. It reminded me of the goat rocks section of the pct that we did when I was younger as you could see the trail a mile ahead of you embedded into the rock. This was the end of the sierras and it truly felt like I was leaving it behind as the snowy mountains were distant and green fields lay in my future. I traveled along the ridge for awhile before catching up to Marc to eat a lil something something before continuing. We then descended in a basin before entering through a rocky cliff into another basin. The snow fields were a lil scary but nothing too bad as the slope wasn’t as steep as any of the other passes. The sun cups also just make you feel safe knowing that they were big enough to catch your feet and not slip down. The second to lay climb took me out but we still had three more miles to go before reaching Sonora pass road. Final little ascent was easy and we were able to talk to some day hikers to ask about the descent as all the FarOut comments had warned us it’s a scary descent but that was also 5 days ago. He said it was no biggie just watch your footing. We waited maybe 5 minutes for Caleb to catch up so we could go down together just to be safe. Initially, the FarOut comments told us to take the pct but the boot track down the dirt looked better so we slowly picked our way down. Probably not the best idea but it still felt like a safer option. Scattered snowfields slowed us down as well but it was the easier route in the end in my opinion. Dirt feels more stable than snow with no boot track. Eventually we made it down, tired and drained and ready for a burger. After trying right at the corner for a hitch we moved to the parking lot and 15 minutes later we got a hitch from a forest ranger. Didn’t know we had any more of those lol. He said he wasn’t supposed to do this but we looked so sick. So we were sick until he dropped us off and crazy enough we got better. Immediately got a double decker burger, while the guys got the triple pct burger. That was 1 pound of meat that they consumed. Truly impressive. Then we had to figure out how to get klara. She took an alternate route down the mountain as her hip and knee were hurting and according to the FarOut comments it was the better way down. So she was about 5 miles past where we entered the road and as a woman we don’t like to hitch alone so we planned on grabbing a hitch to go grab her. I was joking that we should get the big group of guys to go grab her starting out with the line “hey boys want to pick up a single sexy lady” but I didn’t have the guts to do it. Instead Caleb spotted two guys putting away their fishing gear in the car so we approached them. Immediately they were so friendly and after clarifying what we needed they agreed to grab her with me in the car as well. Garmin in hand, we headed out. We were talking and laughing it up before the car in front of us stopped and put on its flashing lights causing us to slow down. We weren’t sure what was happening but Logan one of the guys kinda hopped out and saw that a car had run off the road and flipped into the river paralleling the windy road. The crash happened maybe a couple minutes before we got there and they were trying to get people out. Immediately the guys hopped into action pulling over and getting down into the water. No service but luckily I had my garmin so I pushed the sos button to try to emergency vehicles here. Two kids got out of the car with severe bloody heads and up onto the road into a passer by car to wait until medics got there. The mom was bigger and they got her out of the car but couldn’t get her up the 10-15 feet back on the road so Logan sat there holding her leg up half with the water as we waited. People were stopping trying to help in anyway they could from slowing traffic down to checking on the kids. The driver, an 18 year old guy, was uninjured and going back and forth from sister to brother to mom. He kept making so many jokes which is a great way to cope but jarring at the same time. I kept checking in on him asking him to sit down as Adrenaline can mask head trauma but after sitting down for awhile he seemed fine. The sister was in bad shape, very bloody, she was repeating herself, getting sleepy, and was feeling sick to her stomach. The other brother, her twin, was a fire cracker. He had a puncture wound to his back, and also head trauma but seemed to be fine mentally. He kept telling us the only thing that hurt was his back so I was like that’s great! Do a lil jig, and he ended up fucking breakdancing. I was like NOOOO NO NO NO, let’s not do that, I said a jig not get on the ground and bust a move GODDAMIT. I mostly kept him entertained with Joshua the other guy who went to pick up klara wirh us. The kid also was very forthcoming with information like they have had cps involved before, they were living out of hotels bc of a shitty landlord who wouldn’t fix the pipes so they are in a legal battle with him. Winning apparently so that’s great. The older brother said the crash was caused because of break failure. During all this, I was in contact with garmin who were giving me updates about medics coming and helicopters. Eventually after it seemed like forever, people started to show up: firefighters, medics, highway patrol. All at once and started to check out everyone. The younger brother was talking up the firefighters and just yapping his little heart out. Might I say, love a man in uniform, so I was also happy as a clam. The boss firefighter pulled up in a suit bc he was at a promotion meeting before getting the call, put his gear on over the suit and got to work. Apparently he did slip on the wet rock and fell on the mom down in the river. I didn’t fully see how they got the mom up but they had to levy something with the fire truck and drag her up with the help of some man force. There were so many people around. They then informed the older brother that everyone was basically going to a different hospital which is incredibly stressful as he has no way to get to them. The two guys that I was driving with were also phenomenal during this entire thing. Logan has been with the mom the entire time holding her leg up while she chirped him if he even coughed and he got her entire life story. Joshua was so sweet with the kids and running around helping with everything. Poor klara was sitting on a rock picking her leg hairs out as I kept her updated the best I could but it was a 20 minute plan turned into a 4 hour diversion. I felt so bad but it was recommended I stay so I could update garmin when things were finished. Caleb’s parents were coming to pick him up and told them about the crash but I sent Marc a horrible text saying car flipped, ppl injured, will be late to pick up klara. The first part sounds like I was in the car wreck but they figured since I said we would be late to pick up klara I was just helping. Also garmin sent messages to my parents which I didn’t think of so I got texts from both of them asking if I was okay, so I had to quickly explain the situation. Eventually, everyone got sent away and we got in the car to go pick up klara. We finally got her, got stuck in a little bit of traffic on the way back due to the tow truck dragging the car out of the water. We did pick up some other hikers on the way back which was fun. We offered to pay the guys for their time and they refused but klara still slipped them a $20 for all their efforts. Really great guys. Met Marc at the entrance to the restaurant and immediately got dinner after a long and exciting day. I got the chicken which was so incredibly dry. Chewed that bitch for like 3 minutes each bite. I got desert with it though which was pumpkin crumble so I was happy…kinda. Then I got some shit sleep as the generator was going all night and it was so hot. Then it was cold this morning. Wild and rough day but just happy to help out in anyway that we could!