Day 64

Mammoth Lakes to Rosalie Lake on the JMT alternate, (9 miles)

Cost: camped, free

Mr & Mrs Smith had been recommended a cafe for breakfast called the Stove so we arranged to all head there and meet Zigzag too at 8am. I had the Stove Special of bacon and eggs with French Toast and it was one of the best breakfasts I’ve had in a trail town – especially because the French toast came on a separate plate (usually it’s on the same plate and I have to be careful not to get the maple syrup on my bacon & eggs!)

The Stove special

I left the cafe first as I had to go back to the hotel, pick up my pack then go to the post office to pick up my new shoes and post my holey ones back to REI. My bounce box was also at the post office so I took out a new Opsak bag (my last one got chewed through by a rodent), and refilled my small bottle of bug spray then sent my bounce box onto South Lake Tahoe. 

My new blue shoes are the men’s Cascadia version 9 and the pink holey ones are the women’s. Hopefully the mens will last longer!

Zigzag looked at my ankle again and gave me stretching exercises to start doing because I have limited movement. He told me to buy a wider strap for it so I went back to the pharmacy and got one (as well as superglue to glue on new Velcro to my new shoes for my dirty girl gaiters). 

It was almost 1pm when I got to the trolley stop and I knew everyone else would be back on the trail again by now. Papa Smurf came to the trolley stop while I was waiting then Zigzag and Outland got on at the next stop. We repeated the same steps of taking the trolley to the village, then the bus to the mountain centre, then a bus back to Red’s meadow. 

Since Mt Whitney the PCT and JMT have been one but today they would split for approx 14 miles before rejoining. We had been recommended to take the JMT which followed the lower route and was apparently more pretty than the PCT which would take the higher route, so this is what we did. 

I started walking around 3.30pm with Zigzag and Papa Smurf after eating an icecream from the Red’s meadow store. I took a short detour to walk over and around the Devil’s postpiles which were very interesting then the rest of the miles were spent going up and down along a trail with many fallen down trees until I got to Rosalie Lake and met up with the gang. 

Devil’s Postpiles

The top of the Devil’s Postpiles

Devil’s Postpiles

Devil’s Postpiles

The JMT/PCT split

Over we go!

I arrived at camp about 6:45pm (the last to arrive) by Rosalie lake, and it was a pity I was there so late as it would have been nice to swim in. We all had smores by the campfire, thanks KC 🙂

Rosalie Lake

Trying to mejt the chocolate too

Mr Smith roasting his marshmallows for the Smore

Yum!