It feels so good to be back on the PCT! Today I came up from Long Lake, over Bishop Pass and then up towards Muir Pass. I covered 13.5 miles, 21.7 km to rejoin the PCT. Surprisingly, I had no issues acclimating and easily made it to the pass, descending down the other side was still pretty hard on the knees though.

In the morning when I left camp, the valley was perfectly still and clear. The mountains reflected off the glassy lake surface, and the shade on the water made the reflection indistinguishable from the real thing.

As I got closer to the pass, the switchbacks began, but I was surprised to find that they weren’t so hard. The grade of trail remained nice and easy. With no acclimation problems, this climb turned out to be much easier than I expected.

From the pass, I descended back through the Dusy Basin. Heading down this section was pretty smooth and it wasn’t long before I was at the bottom of the basin.

After the last lake in Dusy Basin, I began the long and steep descent back to the PCT. The trail took me back over the small bridge which I remembered stopping at the other day, and then alongside the the steep waterslide into the valley. Despite being much quicker than climbing, it still took several hours to make the descent.

I reached the PCT junction at about 2:30 pm. This left me with a couple of hours to see how close to Muir Pass I could get to camp. As I walked further up the valley, I could admire more of the view behind me.

After about 3 miles walking up the Middle Fork Kings River, I met a steep climb next to a waterfall. At the top of the waterfall, there were two large campsites. The first one was full, but I’d been eyeing up the second one just a half mile further.

The upper campsite was only about half full, and I met some really cool people camping here. A really cool part of this experience is getting to meet and interact with so many people out there. I had a great time chatting and hanging out with these guys before making dinner and heading to sleep.