Island Pass to Rosalie Lake
Just like the John Muir Trail has seemingly endless ups and downs, so, it seemed, did my health. When Omar walked over to make sure I was awake, I didn’t even want to move. As a nice way to put it, I felt horrid. We had a short day today since there was no way we would make it all the way to Red’s Meadow. So I mumbled with all the strength I had ‘I’m sorry, I need to sleep more’. He must have heard how bad I felt because he actually said okay and went back to his tent. Now I was grateful for the rainfly so it would stay a little darker in the tent, allowing me to sleep in! Thank goodness for small miracles!
But, it wasn’t meant to be. I was awake, which meant I was coughing up a storm. I finally calmed down enough to fall back asleep, but woke back up less than 20 minutes later with a terrible feeling in the pit of my stomach. Yup, time to get up. Now. No time to change, I scurried out of the tent in my base layer (aka a less embarrassing name than long johns) ran behind some rocks and emptied the contents of my stomach. Blech. Throwing up is never enjoyable, and a pretty view just doesn’t make up for it. Well at least after that I was able to sleep for another hour or so. It was drizzling a bit, so when I heard the rain take a break and peeked out and saw a sliver of blue sky, I figured it was as good a time as any to get up. So we got up and broke down camp. With the overcast sky, Omar made a comment that he hadn’t been able to fully charge his GPS or phone, and hoped the sun would come out soon. I numbly nodded my head and just focused on packing up. After the events of the morning, I was feeling pretty weak and 100% sick and just wanted to be able to move one foot in front of the other. How annoying that I could go from feeling great about a day, to dreading the next. Stupid cold.
We started down the pass, and soon Thousand Island Lake came into view. Another amazing view of Banner Peak and the Ritter Range. A lake with (not actually 1000, but a lot) of small islands. The overcast sky made for some great shots, but I’m not going to lie – I was a little disappointed there weren’t crystal clear skies and no wind so I could see the reflections in the water. There also would be no ‘alpine glow’ today, a phenomenon where the mountains can turn a variety of colors early or late in the day – whites, oranges, yellows, reds…a reason John Muir called the Sierra Nevadas the ‘Range of Light’. Oh well, just gives me a reason for wanting to come back someday and spend more time exploring the area!
At the end of Thousand Island Lake, we ran into a couple, one of whom (a former ballerina), was nursing an injury. We’d actually seen them a bit earlier but saw them again when we, along with a few others, stopped for water at the foot of a log bridge over the outlet of the lake. They were spending the summer exploring the Sierras. Not the JMT specifically, but wherever they felt like going. Another gentleman (who’s name we would later discover is Garret) was also there. We all started talking and the ballerina’s injury came up. A high school coach, Garret asked her to walk, and said that taping her knee/IT band might help her keep going. Thankfully, Omar had KT Tape! Garret had the knowledge, Omar had the tape, but Garret wasn’t sure it would stick without alcohol prep pads to help it adhere. Enter Ally’s first aid kit! So between a group of strangers, we got her all taped up, and hopefully ready to keep going. That’s what I’m talking about with this camaraderie thing. Willing to take the time to help your fellow hiker any way you can, and every little bit adds up. Both of them were very thankful, and we jumped between each other on the trail for a good chunk of the day, until they decided to go to a different lake, slightly off the JMT. From time to time afterwards, Omar and I would wonder what happened to them, if she was able to move on from the injury or where they finished up. Guess we’ll never know!
During our lunch break, I noticed that Omar was particularly quiet and a little brooding. If you knew him, you would know that’s completely not his personality in any way. He had mentioned a little while earlier that he felt like today was already a failure. We started late and planned on a short day, and were still behind in our mileage. So, me being overly paranoid and deep in my own thoughts, assumed that his anger was directed at me. I was sick, slow and had messed up our first day, which we still hadn’t recovered from. I remember specifically Omar saying ’20 days is unacceptable. We planned on 19, we should be finishing in 19.’ I felt awful. Here I was, ruining his experience because I was underprepared, and, even if I had been prepared, I never had a shot in hell at keeping up with what would be his ‘normal’ pace. He had mused aloud how long it would take him to finish solo. Our guess, about 12 days. He could easily do 20 mile days and be fine. Yes, I was the wrench in the machine. I sucked. Wonderful.
So lunch was quiet and then he revealed why he was really upset. The sun. Or lack thereof. With no sun, he couldn’t charge his solar panel, and therefore his GPS/lifeline. His mom purchased the GPS/communicator when he informed her (as I had also bluntly told my parents), to not expect any communication during our trip. We’d be lucky if the few passes that sometimes have spotty signal had enough that we could send a text or email. The only sure places we could get a message through were our resupplies at Red’s Meadow and Muir Trail Ranch. Well that wasn’t acceptable for her! So he ended up getting the InReach Explorer. If he couldn’t check in each day or communicate, he felt like he’d failed his promise to his mom to keep in contact. Ah-ha! So it wasn’t (entirely) my fault he was so mad. That made me feel marginally better. But I know the pace was still bothering him. He grew up in a military household, which he can probably credit for his inspiring self-discipline. But it also means that he puts a high value on timetables, and keeping on track with plans. I do too, but I was ready to be flexible on our finishing dates, he wasn’t. According to his views (and I alluded to this on my Day 1 entry), he doesn’t sign up for a race just to finish it. He signs up to win. Anything less is unacceptable. Not finishing in our planned number of days was tantamount to a failure. When you have an extraction date or place (hello military/video game upbringing!), if you miss your timing, you’re SOL. I stayed quiet at this. He had a point, and I understood his view point, but we had different views on this topic. Normally, I look forward to a healthy debate. But since I was still feeling like it was my fault he wasn’t enjoying the day, I felt like if I argued, I might start crying because I felt bad. And I thought that would just make things worse. But in my head, I had a brilliant counter argument.
On day 3, during our heart to heart, I asked if he thought I could finish. He said when friends had asked him the same question, all he could say was what he had observed of my previous patterns. I have a goal. I try to accomplish it and fail in some capacity the first time. Then, I go back and accomplish it. The reason I hired him as a trainer was to successfully climb Half Dome. That took three times. I did my first Tough Mudder with him and refused to ‘walk the plank’. My excuse was that I am not a swimmer. I can….not drown..for a little while. I don’t know that I would call it swimming. During that Mudder we had our first (and if I think back…I think only) fight. He hoped that the JMT wouldn’t be the same thing, but only time would tell. So, back to my rebuttal. Given my propensity for attempting something and failing the first time. His definition of failure was not completing in the original time. For me, crossing the finish line period would be breaking my cycle of first-attempt failures. If it took 19 days, 20 days, 21 days. As long as I finished what I set out to accomplish, it would be a win in my book. I’m not a runner, never have been, never will be. Not only with my asthma, but I’ve just always hated it. You’ll only ever see me running from a bear, and even then I’d probably be more likely to play dead instead of choosing to run. But my friend Amy got me to sign up for a half marathon with her. It was brutal. Like, the moment I crossed the finish line, when she was trying to congratulate me, all I could wheeze out was ‘never again Marsh….NEVER AGAIN.’ But I crossed that finish line. I never set out to win it. In fact I’m pretty sure I was within the last 3-5 people to finish the whole thing. But if Omar had signed up for it, I’m sure he would have wanted to take home a medal. Clearly this was going to be our biggest difference in how we approached things. I can credit some of it on our different upbringings, mine wasn’t nearly as strict as his. It is probably also due to us being in different places physically. He’s been a physically active adrenaline junky for years. I was just getting to the point where I was comfortable realizing I was becoming a regularly active person that could actually partake in different activities if I wanted to. So our definitions of success are bound to be different. But this was all part of our learning process.
But I didn’t muster up the courage to say any of this, so we just kept on in semi-uncomfortable silence. I think he could tell I was assuming blame for his mood, so he did say at one point that he wanted me to know he was never upset with me. He knew I was doing my best, and he was just frustrated with ‘unknowns’ that we could never prepare for. Bad weather. Me getting sick. Stuff like that. So it made me feel a bit better but today was clearly shaping up to be my worst day so far, mentally at least.
It’s important to note that during this time, we still took time to appreciate where we were. We were following a lot of cascading rivers that, for some reason I’m still not sure of, reminded me of Montana. My dad is from Montana, and, even though I didn’t grow up doing a lot of hiking or camping (outside of Girl Scout Camp that is!), I attribute a lot of my love of the outdoors to him. Since my mom wouldn’t touch nature with a 10-foot pole (she loves looking at the photos and hearing stories, but I can tell she has that wary look like a bear, mosquito or some other undesirable, dirty aspect of nature might pop out and attack her just looking at the photo), it clearly didn’t come from her! I haven’t been to Montana since I was little, and I didn’t fully appreciate it’s beauty then. But I remember the raging rivers. And these just reminded me of that. It definitely makes me want to go back to Montana and do some exploring. Maybe not backpacking…since they have slightly angrier bears than we do in California, but I’ll work up to that! I also distinctly remember Omar being pretty impressed too. At the bottom of several of the cascades there were naturally occurring pools, or slow spots blocked off by large boulders. They looked like areas you could sit right on the edge of a waterfall and not be swept over. He kept saying ‘nature is a pretty amazing landscaper..it doesn’t look natural’ and I had to agree.
We were planning on going to Gladys Lake, but at one point, encountered a string of backpackers going the opposite direction. They stopped us, asked where we were going, and vehemently suggested against it. Not only was the place covered in a plague of mosquitoes, but there had been one (or more) bear(s) traipsing through the camps last night. This group hadn’t seen other campers, but had heard them throughout the night scaring off bears from their food. In fact, the last person, at 3:45am, could be heard standing outside his tent (not sure if the bear was in fact there or not), yelling ‘COME AT ME BEAR! JUST TRY AND TAKE MY FOOD!!!!’ It was hilarious to hear, but I had no desire to stay up all night waiting to defend my food. So we decided on Rosalie Lake, the lake right before Gladys. And, according to these folks, the larger and prettier lake anyways.
When we stopped to set up camp, Omar was still in a bit of a mood. He hates my tent. I would say hated, but I’m pretty sure that, even though we’re home and unpacked, settled back into ‘reality’, he still fosters a deep hatred for that tent. He might even get night terrors, I wouldn’t be surprised. I like my tent. It’s the REI Quarter Dome, 1-person tent. But, being a 1-person tent, it’s small, and definitely not symmetrical. You have to set it up in a certain order and way to make it taught and fully functioning. I made the silly mistake of saying ‘all you have to do is match up the colors…’ to which I was greeted with the snarly response ‘I’ve set up this tent for 5 days now. I UNDERSTAND how to set up your stupid tent.’
Okay, time to go get water and get dinner started.
As soon as I was done filtering water and settling in to cook dinner, it started raining. Of course. The perfect end to the perfect day! Omar found a dry spot to stand under a tree, but I’d already set up the stove, and wasn’t planning on moving it. So we ate in relative silence (although I have to say, Omar was always very thankful for dinner, always said it was delicious and was very polite about it. Even today when he was in a funk) and retired to our tents.
Hopefully tomorrow would be a sunnier day – it kinda stunk to have us both in a bad mood. But I kind of got a taste of what it was like to be on the receiving end. I don’t think I had been short or snippy with Omar the first 4 days, but it can’t have been fun for him to see me struggling or be less than enthused due to feeling like crap. So I made a mental note to try and keep a smile on even if I felt crummy. It wasn’t fair to him or myself.
Tomorrow we would have a choice to make. Hike the 10 miles to Red’s Meadow, pick up our resupply and keep going, trying to make up for lost time. Or, call it a short day, and take a semi-rest day at Red’s. I was leaning towards a rest day, but wanted to let Omar make the decision since timing was clearly weighing heavily on his mind. I was also hoping that since I’d had my worst feeling day with this cold, that it was finally reaching the point where it started getting better. A girl can hope! At least it was nice and warm in our tents with the rain outside. It was really quite calming. Although I would wake up several times during the night. My tent was under a tree that kept depositing small branches, or something heavy-ish onto my tent. And with the bear warnings fresh in my mind, I would wake up EVERY time thinking it was a bear. I remember having a really weird dream in a dream in a dream that night. I would ‘wake up’ and see the silhouette of a bear outside. I’d open my tent to grab my poles to scare it away and it would poke its nose inside. Then I would wake up. And there would be a bear after the food. Then I would wake up, turn on my headlamp, and look outside to nothing. This happened 3 or 4 times. Enough that after the 2nd time I slept with my headlamp on my head for quick easy access. It was a very bizarre night. I must have seen at least a dozen bears that night. Thankfully none of them were real!
