Day 81,    15 miles

Reds Meadow to Virginia Lake

After a great sleep at the hikers’ tent site with several other PCTers and JMTers, I packed up and walked the 10 minutes to the small restaurant.  Pancakes, 2 eggs, 4 strips of bacon, coffee.   I sat and let it settle.  Still hungry.  2 more eggs, toast, more bacon, more coffee.   Sat and let it settle.   11:30 am lunch menu starts.   Double cheese burger, fruit salad, strawberry milkshake.  Finally I’m not hungry any more.

Left at 2:30 to hike through a burn area.  Then into pine Forest.

Once again it was after 7pm and I hadn’t reached my intended tent site for the night.  I was moving fast.  I was looking up.  I could see the beautiful pink sunset.  I wanted to see it on Virginia lake.  I had to move quickly or I’d miss it.  That’s when it happened.

First of all, let me tell you, I fall often.  I stumble, trip, sometimes catching myself, sometimes landing on hands and knees or rolling over to let my pack take the brunt of the fall.  Sometimes on the dirt trail, or rocks, in steams and creeks.  It happens daily so I don’t mention it in my posts.  This time was different.  There was no correction.  Full body slam to the ground, like a pancake.   My toe had caught a root.  I thought, this is it this time.  Ouch.  My elbows and shins.  So cut, sore and bruised.  We’ll see about this.

I brushed off and limped onward.  It was beautiful at the lake.  I washed off and had dinner.  I woke in the night in pain.  The next morning I was stiff, but I hiked on and I loosened up!  I really had thought my trip was over.