Muir Trail Ranch to Sapphire Lake

Mileage: 16.0 miles (25.7 km), total 130.2 miles (209.5 km)

Today was a big day as we had to get ourselves set up for Muir Pass the following morning. From here on in, the JMT enters real wilderness which is both remote and majestic. The scale of it really stands forefront in your mind as from here to Whitney is so grand and epic in its scale.

We started the day at Muir Trail Ranch and had breakfast as well as grabbing a packed lunch from the Ranch. We met some people over breakfast who were just starting a section hike up to Yosemite so I took plenty of time to talk about the section we had just walked through with them. Breakfast was fantastic with lots of eggs, pancakes, waffles, coffee etc, a thru-hikers dream.

After breakfast, it was time to pack up our resupply. Our packs felt very heavy with enough food to take us through to Whitney.  We did the obligatory pack weigh and were pleasantly surprised with mine coming in at 30 pounds/14 kg and Ben coming in at 35 pounds/16 kg.

We started off our hike from Muir Trail Ranch reluctantly and started off with a cracking pace. On the initial part of the trail, we bumped into Eric out with his family who had been out early for a quick hike. It was good to see their little family again and after a quick chat it was time to keep going.

From there, it was a long hike up a canyon alongside the San Joaquin river within a rocky gorge. There were lots of stands of Aspen trees alongside the river which trembled in the wind as we walked through. It really was a beautiful spot with the sound of the wind through the trees and the river rushing past nearby.

After this section, the trail began a brutal climb up towards Evolution Valley. This was tough going at times with lot of switchbacks as we edged our way up the climb towards the top. On this part of the trail, we had to ford Evolution Creek which is known to be a tough ford in a normal snow year but was relatively benign for us. The water reached no higher than knee level and although the current was reasonable, it was no problem to reach the other side.

Eventually, we reached Evolution Valley which was one of the most stunning parts of the whole trail we had seen so far. Unfortunately, pretty much every campsite we came across was already full. We were pretty tired by this point but we made the decision to carry on to Sapphire Lake to camp for the evening to bring Muir Pass tomorrow a little closer.

After such a steep climb, the remainder to Sapphire Lake was a little hard but we took it easy. The campsite at Sapphire Lake was really beautiful and, apart from one other person, we had it all to ourselves with everyone else choosing to camp at Evolution Lake.

It was a fantastic spot and it was great it was so quiet with everyone else in the valley below. After the daily chore of filtering water, it was time for dinner and then sleep watching the sun setting and the alpenglow on the nearby peaks.