I awoke to the smell of smoke. The distant smoke from the previous night that had given me such a stunning sunset had blown into Humprey’s Basin overnight. I had no idea where the smoke was coming from, so I was glad that today I would be getting off the trail. This day’s plan was to hike out to the North Lake trailhead over Piute Pass and catch a ride into Bishop, where I had reservations at the Ramada. Dave would be driving out from the Bay Area that evening and would meet me there.
The smell of smoke was a bit overwhelming – I’m sure the air was just terrific for me to be breathing in while hiking. Some of the peaks that had been so beautiful the night before were now completely obscured by the smoke. But, as I climbed the short 2 miles and 400 or so feet up to Piute Pass, I quickly got out of the smoke. It had settled in the Basin, so at the Pass I was just above it. I ran into a couple at the Pass who told me that they had heard the smoke wasn’t a fire in the Sierra at all – it was actually smoke blowing in from the Zaca fire in Santa Barbara.
With the knowledge that I didn’t have a forest fire nipping at my heels, I took the short walk over to Muriel Lake to find a geocache and have a long lunch. Muriel Lake is about level with Piute Pass and the trail over to it is incredibly flat, by Sierra standards. I scrambled along the shore of the lake until I got to the cache location. After finding the cache I lingered for about an hour, enjoying the views and my peanut butter tortillas.
Once back at the Pass, I started thinking about a shower, cold soda, and Cheese Nips (those random trail cravings…), so I kind of rushed through the last couple miles of the day. The trail down from Piute Pass is beautiful, so I did stop a few times to take in the views and enjoy myself. I also noticed the clouds building, so I wanted to get off the trail before it started raining.
At the trailhead I caught a ride down into Bishop, and by 6 pm I was checked into my hotel room and freshly showered. Dave would be arriving around 8 pm so I waited on him before dinner, and took the time to walk down to Wilson’s to pick up more tape for my mummy hands, as well as a new pair of socks.
This day’s stats:
- Mileage: 9.57 mi
- Ascending: 738 ft
- Descending: 2277 ft
- Cumulative Mileage: 112.44 mi
- Cumulative Ascending: 19,691 ft
- Cumulative Descending: 18,931 ft
