Ain't no Mountain high enough..

Miles: 10.2
Start time: 7:32am
End time: 8:05pm
High / Avg / Low temp: 70.4F / 61.8F / 49.2F
Relative Humidity Avg: 44.9%
Injuries: none to report

Eeks.. it was a crazy camp site last night, loaded with mozzies, and they were back with a vengeance at sun up, lil winged leeches.  We packed up our tent in record time to avoid being drained of blood and basically ran up a half mile climb to try to escape them..which was mostly futile.. I think we avoided the interest of new skeeters when we fled, but the swarm that knew about us just followed us, we had to squish them all before we had any semblance of peace. This flight to freedom also included toting our gallon dirty water container in our hands which we'd stop and filter..if and when.. We escaped.. At the half mile mark we made our last stand and got our chores done...

It was a day of amazing views, after our first climb we ended up in alpine meadows, surrounded by mountains, and they were beautiful, and scary..one of then we had to climb to escape the meadow and we weren't sure which it was exactly, we just knew it'd be Forrester pass and the highest point on the trail. It was also five miles from the meadow so we had time to enjoy the view. There are a lot of lakes up in the Sierra, and it's been wonderful not having to worry about where to find water or having to carry 2 gallons at a time, unlike the dust bowl of the desert.

We saw a bunch of marmots today, they are adorable and they don't seem to have much fear of people, hopefully because the people who venture into the woods aren't jerks to animals.

So while we were approaching Forrester, which we identified in the distance with its distinctive show chute, the weather turned.  We had seen some dark clouds moving in, but on the far ridge line, until they weren't.  They brought rain, small hail, and a not insignificant amount of lightning.  The latter was the part of concern, here we were, walking past trees into barren rocky outcrops ascending to the tippy top of a mountain pass and a lightning storm was rolling in.  Thankfully we were not far from the last section of trees so we scampered off trail and took shelter, eventually putting up our tent for a while to get out of the elements.  We took refuge for about three hours, totally knocking us off schedule but safety first... Right? That delay committed us to a later night than planned and reduced our overall distance we'd hoped, no matter..

We saw marmots playing in the rain, and a bluebird flying back n forth to her hole in a tree feeding babies worms and such

After the elements abated, we moved on towards the last three miles to Forrester pass, into the land of no trees, rocks, and alpine lakes and streams.  It was beautiful. But also scary, the idea of the wind bringing back lightning clouds played on our minds a little, and this time there was no shelter to be had.  As we approached the pass we saw an a large cloud looking thing over the mountains that got pummeled by lightning, but it wasn't a rain cloud, but a smoke plume. This is how natural forest fires start ladies and gentlemen.

Thankfully the mountains we were climbing were all rock with nothing to burn, so we are safe from flames.

We ascended Forrester pass, highest elevation on trail, 13,200ft.. And it was brutal, at that elevation we had considerably less oxygen than sea level..onwards and upwards

The view from the top was magnificent, but we were also losing daylight fast as the sun had sunk behind other mountains.  
It was such a relief to make it to the top, and there wasn't any snow or ice on our path to make it dangerous. We did loiter a minute and recover from the climb, took a few photos, peered over the other edge too see where we were about to descend to. And descend we did. But not before touching snow for the first time.

We made it about a mile down the other side before calling it a night, by a sweet alpine lake.  We skipped dinner tonight, neither of us has the energy to cook and eat in the cold with mozzies buzzing around our heads. The temp is dipping fast so I'll call it a night.. Ta ta