Back to 20 Mile Days - Mile 968.5 - 7/15

So at Glen Auldin last night Spins and I were talking about pulling a string of 20 mile days to get to our next resupply at Bridgeport in roughly 70 miles. Waking up, Typo and the Michigan Wolverine were like have fun with that but then later joined the bandwagon and also set out to push some 20 mile days.

The beginning of the day seemed fairly smooth except we didn't have a water source for 8 whole miles past camp! This was the longest stretch without water for quite some time and it was a laughable thought because after hiking 20 mile waterless sections, I felt like I got this well under control. The first half of the day was not was I cared about it went by fairly easy (especially because this area is so beautiful), the second half on the other hand included a significant climb up a ridge and the end of the day would be hiking up over Benson Pass.

The first climb went rather well. Yosemite's trail definitely has large sections of just massive rock walking due to it's exposed geology so climbing up large rock sections, in my opinion, is more fun. It's also more strenuous but hard hiking makes the scenery even more rewarding. Going up Benson Pass at the end of a 20 mile day was slightly straining because I had been hiking strong uphill the whole day which left me pretty spent for the pass. When I made it up the view from where I had hiked was well worth it. After making it up, I hung around for the other so we could start heading down to look for ample camping around Smedberg Lake . The perfect spot made itself present and we all set up camp and got a fire going to end the day. All four of us made it through the first 20 mile day any of us had done in a short while. We'll see how sore in the morning everyone is for twenty day number two!