Date: June 20, 2017
Miles: 3.5 miles (5.6km) plus hiking down to Horseshoe Meadow.
Health: One of my toes is not getting along with the Altra's. Otherwise feeling great.

I slept poorly last night. The mosquitoes and the warm night made cowboy camping hard and around midnight I had enough. I needed to get out of my sleeping bag but not being eaten by mosquitoes so I just quickly put on my headlamp and threw up my shelter. I used the red light not to wake up the girls sleeping close to me.

It took me two minutes to haphazardly set up the tarp and just throwing my sleeping gear inside. That's better. I could cool outside my sleeping bag and be protected from the mosquitoes. They weren't that bad but just enough to not want to sleep outside of my bag.

We wake up slowly and get our gear together. We don't have to walk too far today as we're going in to Lone Pine today. Today is Katie's and Natalie's last day on trail but we get to hang in Lone Pine for a day.

We quickly hike the few miles to Trail Pass from where we descend down to the trailhead. The trail drops down quite a way so it's a steep climb. Once down we cross Horseshoe Meadow and then get to the trailhead.

It's not morning anymore and there aren't that many cars coming in, but it's still too early for day hikers to leave to give us a ride down to Lone Pine. We wait a good while to no avail.

I try to talk to the few people we see at the trailhead but none are going to town today. There's a small road close by so I take my backpack and decide to hike there to see if I could get us a ride from there.

As I get halfway through the parking lot a car passes me and I see familiar faces inside. The car stops next to me and it's a trail angel giving rides to and from Lone Pine. They take us aboard and soon we're heading down to Lone Pine. It's almost 30 mile drive down and the elevation drops from high in the mountains down to the valley floor. As we drop the temperature keeps rising and reaches 100 degrees (39c) at the valley floor.

Once in Lone Pine we get some breakfast and then a hotel room. We're all quite beat so instead of going out to eat we decide to have a nice picnic at our room.

I go out to check out the outfitters as I need to get a baselayer for the Sierra as I didn't send one with my Kennedy Meadows resupply. I buy a Montbell UL merino baselayer and I couldn't be happier. The price is great and the total weight is really light.

Then I head out to get my hair cut in a barbershop and to get some drinks for our picnic. I buy different beers, white wine, and ice. The girls go out and buy an awesome vegetarian setup. I'm happy to eat something healthy for a change.

We spend the rest of the evening drinking, eating, and talking. Before we know it, it's late and we need to get to sleep. Although I've had tons of fun, I also feel sad as I know that I have to say goodbye to Katie and Natalie tomorrow. I keep wishing I would've met them earlier on the trail so I could've spend more time with them.