Red’s Meadow Resort

Mileage: Zero

Today was a great day and it was nice to have a day off the trail. We knew that the trail would become progressively more difficult one we got past Muir Trail Ranch and that this would be our last zero until the end. So we made the most of it and caught the shuttle bus down from Red’s to Mammoth Lakes to do a bit of exploring.

Red’s Meadow

The shuttle down to Mammoth was pretty uneventful and it felt a bit strange to be on a bus rather than walking. The weather was definitely a little cooler than it had been the last few days and it felt like rain was on the way.

Mammoth was a great little town which is a ski resort but still set up to be a good spot in the summer. The Red’s shuttle dropped us off right outside the town’s namesake. From there we took a little shuttle bus around Mammoth.

The shuttle bus was great and took us all over Mammoth. At first, it took around what was the residential area which had some pretty nice homes. After wondering if we were going to get stuck in the middle of suburbia we were relieved when the shuttle bus headed towards a shopping area. There were a few outdoor shops here so we were able to jump off and head into an outdoor shop.

I’d been having a few problems with my sleeping mat which was a Therm-a-rest Ridgerest, mainly on account of it being a bit uncomfortable so I swapped it out for a Prolite short. We had a good chat with the employee at the store and found out they had a 10% discount for thru-hikers – score! When he found out we were from Australia, we learnt he was a huge car fan and he showed us a picture of his car.

After that, it was time for serious business – food and catching a movie. We headed to a local shopping centre and found a pizza restaurant which had huge pizzas. It really hit the spot but we both found it pretty hard to move for half an hour or so after we’d finished!

The town had a small cinema so after lunch it was time to hit the movies. It was a pretty small place which only had two movies on so we had ‘Inside Out’ or ‘Jurassic World’ to choose from. After buying our tickets, we headed on into the cinema.

The movie started with a short film which appeared to be clearly directed at kids. No problems, we thought and sat there for 10 minutes and enjoyed it. It seemed a bit strange to us that we were the only men in the cinema and it was full of Mums with prams. Once the movie started, I turned around to Ben and said ‘Dude, we’re in the wrong cinema’. Turns out the sign which pointed to ‘Inside’ was actually letting us know that movie was ‘Inside Out’.  We quickly scarpered out and went next door to find that ‘Jurassic World’ had started 15 minutes ago. Oh well, it turned out to be a great movie in the end.

After Inside-Outgate, we did a bit more shopping and then headed back. It was early afternoon by this stage and we experienced our first Sierras thunderstorm. It absolutely poured down with rain and we had some large rumbles of thunder as well as the temperature dropping fairly dramatically. We got a bit wet but headed back to the shuttle bus up to Red’s.

We had dinner at Red’s which was super busy so were very grateful the harried looking waitress was able to squeeze us in at the end. After dinner, it was time to head back to the room and get a good night’s rest before hiking out.