Aug 16: Grouse Meadow -- Palisade Creek -- Golden Staircase -- Meteor Shower

At about 5AM the people in the next camp got up and broke camp. Or so it seemed. Switching meal plans, now my breakfast was muesli and milk, a definite improvement.

I got delayed leaving the camp area and then saw a nice view open up a little south of camp, so I shot my first pan of the day.

Not much further another great view of the Citadel was found, resulting in this scene. The guy with a Hobbit hat came up at this point, and we talked for awhile. He had taken some of our extra food, which we were hoping he’d find.

A mile or two downstream and suddenly Grouse Meadow appears -- great spot, with some horses grazing in the pasture. I shoot two panos and some single shots. There was a lot of smoke in this valley from the south, evidently from a large wildfire.

I continue onwards and soon come to a fork, to the right is to continue downstream on the Kings River, and to the left is our route on the JMT. I go a few hundred feet on the JMT and come to an old bridge abutment, which happens to be a wonderful lunch spot on the stream where there’s some pools of water. The bridge was washed out decades ago and marks the start of a trail south to Simpson Meadow.

I lazily wash my face and eat. Perhaps I spent too much time in the hot sun, because once I put my pack on, I feel quite lethargic. Another hundred feet and I see another nice elevated platform for a pano which captures two canyons at once:

Finally I head up the trail, and the first thing that I run into is a relatively recent bear poop right on the trail. Lots of berries in that bear’s diet. The trail is not level at all but quite steep in places, and at first there were a number of lush ferns and vegetation, but that didn’t last long. Perhaps half a mile along I am in an uphill stretch amidst clumps of alders and bushes when I hear a crashing sound like a very heavy person moving through underbrush to my right. I look over and see a dark shape like a bear. I grasped my two hiking sticks and resolutely kept going up the trail, as the bear appeared to be moving down the canyon from whence I came.

For awhile I had the energy of the possessed. I trucked along the trail, until after a mile or two I felt safer and shot this grassy glade along Palisade Creek:

A mile or so later I reached this overlook and shot it, perhaps mostly because I could rest for awhile:

Continuing onwards was a struggle. I kept going through what seemed like a very hot summer day at a lower elevation, not 8800 feet. I saw no sign of Deer Meadow unless it was a few square yards of grass. The trees started fading away and rock piles narrowed the canyon until I reached the base of the climb up to Palisades Lakes, which looked steep as anything we’d seen. The trail zigzagged up nearly vertical cliffs, also known as the Gloden Staircase. I made up my mind to catch up to the others. I made it up the top of the incline in about an hour, although not without my heart racing and lungs rasping from the cold. No sign of my friends at the top of the grade. The view both forwards and backwards was a spectacle of towering and carved rock.

I couldn’t believe there was more uphill. I got the mile or so to the first Palisade Lake and was totally bushed and ready to camp where there was an alpine glade.

But my friends were now visible as tiny ants about a mile farther along. I shot the lower lake and headed on up. I was in total disbelief as the trail now climbed up a rocky bluff instead of following the lake shore. Why this punishment? I took a rest at the top of the bluff and headed down. Well I got 1000 feet and realized I was missing a hiking stick. Since I rely on the sticks for my tent poles, I had to head back. For 30 minutes or so I had the foulest mood of the whole 9 days. There was my stick at the top of the bluff, rather than back at the lower lake where I thought it was.

So another delay, and I found myself extra tired as I descended to my friends’ location. They had set up camp on a sloped rock bench, which I couldn’t imagine getting any sleep on, so I told them about the bear, and moved farther along the lakeshore to find a flat spot.

I was so tired that dinner seemed like salvation. Soup, pasta, tea. I set up my sleeping bag in a hollow near the lake. I surrounded my bag with things I might need, and weights to hold down my tent footprint, but didn’t put up the tent. I looked for meteorites but drifted off to sleep feeling very alone on my corner of the lake.
About 1AM I woke up and instantly felt a sinking feeling -- my sleeping bag was covered with dew. As were all the accessories I had put besides my bed. I put on all the layers I had and tried to sleep again. Not much later, perhaps 2AM, I woke up and the dew was freezing, with all the tiny crystals of water looking like diamonds in the moonlight. I could feel very cold drafts inside the bag, as the down was clumping up. I felt defeated--20 miles from any road, at almost 11,000 feet, cold, and with cold, and a wet, useless sleeping bag.

I grabbed my bag and after negotiating a wide stream in the dark, stumbled over to my friends camp. I’m sure they were not thrilled to hear me approach and advise them of the situation. I went back to my campsite and made myself some hot tea and thought about my options. Not many. But if I was going to get hypothermia, it’d be better to have my friends nearby to help, so I dragged a few things back to their site and attempted to stabilize my feelings of gloom. Never had I looked forward to the sun rising as I did that night.
I watched the meteor shower for at least 45 minutes and saw a number of glorious shooting stars. At some point I got sleepy and rested my head against a rock outcrop and wedged my feet against a boulder to keep from sliding down the rock hillside. At the higher altitude, away from the lake effect weather, my sleeping bag seemed to dry a little. Strangely enough, I actually fell asleep in this position and awoke sporadically.

Finally, at about 5:30 I could sleep no longer as the sky was starting to lighten.

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