Tag: hiking

Day 39: A wild day to William Bay

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Quarrum Nature Reserve (864.2 km) to William Bay (897.6 km)

Mileage: 33.4 km/20.9 miles

It was quite stormy last night with some strong winds, a couple of intense rolls of thunder and frequent lightning during the night. The Hexamid stood up reasonably well and I had a fairly low, taut pitch. That also meant some condensation though it was quite manageable. The rain continued this morning so a lie in was called for to wait out the rain. The forecast was rain this morning then clearing by 10 AM as the cold front cleared through. It is unusual to have cold fronts in WA in summer as they are considered more of a winter phenomenon but at least it’s cool.

The day began wandering through Quarrum Nature Reserve which was impressive. It is also known as the Showgrounds and I imagine the wildflowers are really impressive in the right season. There were lots of kangaroos, most of whom were very tame. The scenary was almost English-esque with only the Australian fauna giving things away.


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Day 38: Irwin Inlet by canoe

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Peaceful Bay (854.2 km) to Quarrum Nature Reserve (864.2 km)

Mileage: 10km/6.25 miles

Today was a long day.  Not just because of the drive but due to a difficult day yesterday.  We had to take my daughter to  the emergency department yesterday as she took a tumble and hurt her back. I didn’t leave the hospital until after 1 AM and Nicole ended up staying all night. Lauren turned out to be fine but, unfortunately it meant a long day today on next to no sleep.

Peaceful Bay is a 450km drive from Perth but a fairly pleasant one going through some nice little towns on the way such as Balingup and Walpole. We arrived at Peaceful Bay at around 3pm and got going shortly after.


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On the John Muir Trail

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Hiking the John Muir Trail

Hard to believe it is already two years ago I was hiking the John Muir Trail through California. The JMT is some of the most epic scenery in the US and winds for 211 miles from Yosemite to the summit of Mount Whitney.  The trail goes through the Sierra Nevada which were called by John Muir “the range of light”.

“Walk away quietly in any direction and taste the freedom of the mountaineer. Camp out among the grasses and gentians of glacial meadows, in craggy garden nooks full of nature’s darlings. Climb the mountains and get their good tidings, Nature’s peace will flow into you as sunshine flows into trees. The winds will blow their own freshness into you and the storms their energy, while cares will drop off like autumn leaves. As age comes on, one source of enjoyment after another is closed, but nature’s sources never fail.”  John Muir, Our National Parks, 1901

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Heading back to LA

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Our biggest challenge was getting back to LA from Independence. The bus only ran every three days and we would be stuck in Independence for several days if we waited for public transport. There was a bus up to Mammoth but that took us even further away from where we wanted to go.

We asked around the day before at the Post Office and was told there was a guy called Kurt who might be able to take us to LA. We gave him a call and he was willing to take us there for $200. Independence is pretty small and we were desperate to get back to LA so we took it.

The next morning Kurt rocked up in his pickup truck. It was tiny and I was sandwiched between Kurt and Ben and straddling the gear box so it was a pretty uncomfortable ride. Kurt offered to take us all the way but instead we asked him to drop us off in Lancaster which then meant a train ride to LA and a shorter and cheaper ride with Kurt.

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Day 12: A long day to Sapphire Lake

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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.

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Day 10: How not to ford a creek

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Vermillion Valley Resort to Rosemarie Meadow

Mileage: 12.3 miles (19.8 km), total 104.7 miles (168.5 km)

Today was a very tough day for a number of reasons.

We woke up and had breakfast at VVR with one of the PCT hikers who was staying at the resort. His name was Mellow and it was not hard to see how he got his trail name. After breakfast, it was time to hit the trail. Due to the low water levels, we had to get road transport out to where the boat to cross Edison Lake was stored. The boat itself was a small tinnie as the water level was too low for the main boat.

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Day 9: Vermilion Valley Resort

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Vermilion Valley Resort

Mileage: Zero

Today was a much anticipated rest day at Vermilion Valley Resort.  The place itself has a nice vibe to it and the day was a great experience. The resort was full of PCT hikers and JMT’ers enjoying relaxing and having a day off the trail. It is well and truly set up for hikers and has some great food and drinks – for a price! This was probably one of our more expensive days on the trail but was well and truly worth it.

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Day 5: Red’s Meadow

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Shadow Lake to Red’s Meadow

Mileage 11.9 miles (19.2 km), total 62.7 miles (100.9 km)

After the long day yesterday, today was a little easier. We’d had to change our original itinery a little as we weren’t able to camp in Tuolumne so we figured that with higher mileages the last few days we could take a zero at Red’s.

The scenery today was pretty good and fortunately it was cloudier and a little cooler.

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En route to Red’s

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Day 3: Tuolumne Meadows and Lyell Canyon

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Cathedral Lake to Upper Lyell Canyon

Mileage 16.4 miles (26.4 km), total 34.9 miles (56.2 km)

The start of the day was fairly easy with a long descent down into Tuolumne Meadows. For once, it was nice being the ones who were speeding down the descent rather than crawling up a pass at a slow pace. The descent down to Tuolumne was fairly busy. At one point, we passed a Ranger who was on his way up the trail carrying a strange piece of equipment with him. He was pretty friendly and mentioned he was heading up to conduct studies on the fish levels with the lakes. Nice job.

We reached the car park eventually and thought we might catch the shuttle bus but the sight of approximately 100 PCT hikers made us realise that we might have quite a wait so we decided to instead walk the mile or so along the Highway. Eventually we came to the Tuolumne Meadows Grill where we did a small resupply and ate to our heart’s content.

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Toulumne Meadows Grill

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