Day 81 (9 July) - Mile 891.76 - 906.63

Campsite on Lake Virginia to Red's Meadow (Staying in Mammoth Lakes)

We woke up with excitement that we will be in an actual town tonight with beds, a shower, good food, breweries, and of course, Tim.  We all woke at 6:00 AM as usual, but were ready to go by 7:40 AM...a lot sooner than most mornings...we really are anxious to get to town!

Ready to hike to Mammoth Lakes.

Today we have about 15 miles to hike.  There are a couple of ups and downs, but in general, today should be a somewhat easy day, especially since we don't have a pass to go over.

First we say goodbye to Lake Virginia:

Morning view of Lake Virginia

After an up and then a down we arrived at Purple Lake.  Wow...so beautiful.

Purple Lake

We sure are spoiled with this beautiful scenery as we hike:

Mountain view

Just after noon, we hit a new milestone...900 miles!!!

Proof I'm standing at PCT mile 900.

Mile 900 pose.

We were anxious to get to town, but we needed to take a break for lunch.  We found a nice shady spot and was lucky that there were no bugs to bother us.

Share Bear made a tuna sandwich between 2 corn tortillas.  I knew there was no way she could pick it up and eat it without the entire thing falling apart.  She then picked it up inside the corn tortilla bag.  Touché Share Bear...touché.

Share Bear showing how it is done.

Our lunch break went way longer than we planned.  We didn't get going until almost 2:00 PM  The spot was just too perfect to leave any sooner.

Less than 1 hour later we arrived at Horseshoe Lake trail junction.  Less than 3.5 miles to Reds Meadow!

Almost to Reds Meadow

We were quite surprised to see this Pacific Crest Trail sign at Horseshoe Lake trail junction:

Limp but cool PCT sign of the day

When crossing logs we usually watch each other cross to ensure we made it over safe.  When we are this close to town we...Brad...just keeps on walking.

Brad just caring about getting to town.

The last 2 miles always seems like they take forever and never end.  With the beautiful scenery we are OK with that.

Share Bear admiring the scenery

When we were 1 mile out from Red's Meadow, Tim appeared on the trail.  He hiked up the trail to meet us.  We hiked together towards Red's Meadow and was stopped by a gentleman just as we arrived.  He is working with a group of trail maintenance volunteers and wanted to know if we wanted a cold drink...well...of course.  Brad and Share Bear had a root beer while Tim and I had a beer.  It was great meeting and thanking a PCT volunteer in person.

15 minutes later we arrived at Red's Meadow.  We saw Mountain House here who was hanging out in from of the store.  He had a great stay in Mammoth Lakes and can't seem to get back to hiking.  I think we will feel the same in a couple of days.

Arrival to Red's Meadow.

I love when they have signs that tell how much further to Canada.  I can't believe we are almost half-way done i time, but still are closer to Mexico than Canada.  We have some serious hiking to do.

Getting there, but slowly

Tim rode his motorcycle back to the condo and we took the bus.  The road to Red's Meadow is closed to cars during the day unless you are staying at the resort, so we had to take the bus.  No big deal...we were just happy to be heading into town for showers and good food.  Plus, we are staying in a condo that sounds awesome.

We got to the condo and made ourselves at home....showers around, followed by going out for dinner, followed by sleep.  We are taking the next 2 days off, which we really need after a really hard 9 days of hiking we just finished.

Thank you Jodie and Don for the use of your condo...you guys are incredible!

Our home for the next 2 days.