Santa Barbara Weddings and Portraits

I just returned home from my second through hike of the John Muir Trail (the last time was in May of 2004)

I’m going to be blogging one day at a time for the next 11 days, entering my journal entry as well as photos from that day on the trail. So, sit back and enjoy. (quick disclaimer on the photos… I only brought my half dead point and shoot, so they’re just snap shots)

JMT 2008

Day 1 7.5.08

Phil and I hiked our first marathon plus… left the backpacker’s campground in the valley at 6:45 a.m. and arrived at the backpacker’s campground in Tuolumne Meadows after 8 p.m.

Hiking the miles wasn’t all that tough, it was more when I hit about 7,500 or 8,000 feet the elevation knocked me over and slowed me to a crawl for a while.

Our original goal was to reach the end of Lyell Canyon about 8 miles farther… Which would have put us well over 30 miles out the gate. But 25+ miles was a pretty healthy start.

We arrived at camp on night one absolutely trashed from the mix of elevation gain, long day and big miles. After drinking a bit of Gatorade I started to feel better and enjoyed some cous cous surprise, a cold beer handed to us by our neighbors in the backpacker’s campground, and a nice pipe of Nottingham.

Phil standing at the beginning of Sunrise Meadow on the John Muir Trail:

Me at the beginning of Sunrise Meadow

Check out this picture from the last time I through hiked the John Muir Trail and passed through Sunrise Meadow (we had about 75% snow coverage for the entire John Muir Trail last time):

Remember to come back tomorrow and so on for the next 11 days as I post up my journal entries, photos and thoughts from the trail.

Also, if you are the first person to comment under any of the posts about my John Muir Trail through hike and tell me how many blisters you think I got while hiking for 220+ miles over 11 days you will win a $20 iTunes gift card (you can only guess once, and if you are a close friend and already know, you can’t win)