31 May Day 39 – Solitary Man

At mile 1125.7. Hiked 21.6 miles. 

I’m happy with the number of miles I put in today considering that I had a lot of snow to cross in the morning that required trail finding. I had to stop regularly to use Guthook GPS to locate the trail. A lot of my hiking in the morning was off trail meaning that besides snow, I had to make my way across terrain that was overgrown or steep or with boulders and ledges. You can’t move in a straight line. Eventually the trail reached a long stretch that was snow free and with a gentle grade. This is where I made up for the slow miles. Late in the day I had to cross a number of areas of snow, but they were small enough so I didn’t lose the trail. Another new challenge was stream crossings. I crossed at least 3 good size streams above knee deep. Only one stream crossing was a little tricky., I crossed this one by finding à wider spot downstream. Even so, it pushed hard enough against one leg to make it hard to keep balance. 

I didn’t see another person the entire day. Nobody! This was a first for me on the PCT.

View looking back south from Dicks Pass

Snow on Dicks Pass

Here I am in the snow up on Dicks Pass

Here is a view of Dicks Lake from Dicks Pass.

Other views of Dicks Lake and mountains.

First trail with no snow along far end of Fontanelle Lake. I still had a long walk of missing snow covered trail on ridge below the lake, but at least there were a set of foot prints so I didn’t spend much time checking GPS.

Near Fontanelle Lake

Here is one of many lakes and ponds.

My tent site. See pile of snow in background. It is taller than me. There are many places where I have to walk across large piles of snow.

Lake Tahoe view from my tent site