Date: June 13, 2017
Miles: 4.8 miles (7.7km), from Walker Pass to mile 656.9.
Health: Feeling excited to get back on the trail. Shin feels good but I haven't used it at all so I'm a bit worried how it's going to feel under stress.

We woke up late. There was nowhere to go or be in the morning. I lazily get up around 7am and go to hang out with Fyre and Blis who are both up already. The plan is to walk a mile back to town to get coffee and breakfast.

As we're about to leave, the camp manager comes over and reminds us that the sprinkler system goes off in about an hour and we should move our tents and gear before that, if we don't want to get them all wet. We just pack all our gear as we're leaving sometime later today.

We take our packs to a shade and start walking to the breakfast cafe. As we get there we see it's absolutely slammed. We're hungry so we start looking for a new breakfast option. Fyre and I go to Subway while Blis gets some chicken from the gas station and joins us in the air conditioned Subway.

We do nothing but sit around and have goofy conversations. The Post Office opens at 10am so we have time to kill. We take turns guessing what each other's bedrooms look like. We start with Fyre's. Blis is way off but I nail it almost perfectly. Then we do Blis's and mine. That takes about an hour and the Post Office opens soon.

I have two packages waiting for me. One from Gossamer Gear and one from Pa'lante Packs. My new backpack has arrived! And we ordered foam pads from Gossamer Gear to add some warmth underneath us on the Sierra snow.

Just as we're outside the Post Office talking how we've not seen a single Pa'lante Pack on the trail, another hiker comes by with the same pack. It's Roadrunner and he got his pack here as well.

Crimson and Chillstep are having some difficulties with their packages. All the PCT resupply infos use General Delivery as the address for the Post Offices but this only works with USPS. When you order something from someone like Amazon, where you can't select the delivery company, your package can get lost or not delivered unless you use the actual physical address of the Post Office. It feels silly that a company like UPS can't find the Lake Isabella Post Office without the actual address on the package.

I'm so happy to have my new pack so I just head back to the RV park to test it out with my gear. Everything fits in perfectly and the pack feels great on my back. I was thinking of hiking the 50 miles from Walker Pass to Kennedy Meadows with the new pack and carry my old pack inside, but after Fyre called that plan "stupid", I went back to the Post Office and Priority mailed the old pack to Lone Pine.

I'm trying to see if I can fit my Sierra gear in the Pa'lante Pack in Kennedy Meadows. It's only three days from KM to Lone Pine so I'm sure I can make that no matter what.

On the way back from Post Office we stop by the Subway again and have lunch/dinner there as well. When we're leaving, we see Queso and Pony hop out of a car and going to the Post Office. We go say hi and then walk back to the RV park with them.

By now Blis has gone on with Wilder, Crimson, and Chillstep. When we get to the RV park we start wondering how we're getting up to the Walker Pass where the trailhead is. It's a 37 mile hitch up the mountain. As we're wondering this, I see a car pull up and a bunch of our friends piling out. I ran over to say hi and casually talk to the person who drove them here. I ask if she would be willing to do one more trip up the mountain and she agrees. Wohoo!

I call Fyre over and run to get my gear. Three sisters, who are section hiking, join us on the ride and we stuff all six of us into the car. The drive takes a while but we're finally up at the trailhead. We thank our driver, give her some money for the gas, and then shoulder our packs and start hiking. Man it feels good to be back!

The trail is basically all uphill and we climb up as the sun is slowly setting. We don't want to push it too much, and it's already late, so we only do 4.8 miles. We find a nice little camp spot on a saddle and set up our camp. Someone has build a small wind shelter there and we take advantage of that.

We look at the sunset but as it's cold, we quickly get into our sleeping bags. We've rested so much that we don't feel tired and end up talking late into the night while looking up at the stars. It's just Fyre and I. We wonder where everyone else is.

In few days we're going to be in Kennedy Meadows and officially be done with the desert. I'm already looking forward to Sierra.