Such beautiful scenery, and I feel as though I am right there with the horses. ~WaterGirl
way2blue
I set off on my first pack trip in July, four summers ago, deep into Kings Canyon National Park. We, an odd mix of high school & grad school friends, hiked in 17 miles from the pack station to the camp site while pack mules carried our supplies. We hadn’t thought, however, to carry rain jackets with us, thus were unprepared for hail at midday. Everyone, soaked & chilled, picked up the pace to generate a bit of heat. Rain returned a few days later, and continued through the night. I’d offered our groundcloth as a tarp over the kitchen area, so piled all my clothes under my sleeping bag to keep from getting soaked from water seeping into the tent as our trenching proved inadequate…
Needless to say, I’d been wanting a do-over. This pack trip, with extended family, was more posh. The pack crew brought in tents, cots, food, kitchen & a cook, plus a wrangler stayed with us. This time I rode the ~19 miles in from Kennedy Meadows to Emigrant Lake. We’d left for the Sierras the morning after a freak electrical storm in northern California, and saw a couple small wildfires on the west side of Crystal Springs Reservoir on our way north. Oblivious to the soon raging CZU wildfire close to home and a friend’s efforts to remove artwork & essential documents from our home, to water the yard…
View down the lake, looking to the northeast.