Hike the JMT: Bear Creek Junction to Marie Lake (Day 11)

Marie Lake

Highlights of Day 11

Afternoon thunder storm that featured 40 minutes of continuously rolling thunder.
Set up camp earlier than expected (at Marie Lake) due to not feeling well, & due to weather over Selden Pass.
Witnessed one of the most beautiful sunsets I’ve ever seen, in one of the most beautiful places I’ve ever been. Seriously, it was so subliminally beautiful that I cried.
Fell asleep to the sound of coyotes howling.

Trail Journal

5:33 pm

Today’s big excitement was an electrical storm that had the most intense thunder I’ve ever heard. The thunder just went on and on and on and on. We were sitting in a little stand of trees next to a meadow, and the storm closed in on us from three sides–dark, ominous clouds, intermittent flashes of lightening, and thunder from all sides.

At first I tried to count seconds between each flash of lightening & the corresponding thunder, but the thunder was so continuous that it was impossible. So, I started a new game–to count seconds to see how long each continuous thunder roll lasted. The longest continuous set of thunder that I timed lasted over 9 minutes, and even then it was only broken by a few seconds of silence before erupting elsewhere in the sky.

It was crazy. I’ve never heard anything like that. Thunder on all sides, and peal upon peal of it all rolling on top of each other in a marvelous stereo effect.

When the lightening & thunder eventually stopped (after about 40 minutes of continuous thunder, & over an hour of storm), we continued south toward Selden Pass. We decided to set up camp just below the pass, at Marie Lake (gorgeous!), and hopefully will cross the pass first thing in the morning before the thunder cells have had a chance to amass.

We probably could continue on today, but I haven’t been feeling well thanks to the hormones I’ve been taking to regulate my cycle (editorial note: I definitely don’t recommend starting any new kind of medicine/treatment in the month or so before leaving for an extended backpacking trip!) so we decided to stop here. We’re already a little ahead of schedule, even with the zero day we took in Mammoth to replace our solar charger (& let our blisters heal a bit)–so there’s no reason to push it. Other days we may need to, but tonight I’m going to enjoy….

Addendum: 9:26 pm

Holy shit, this is the most beautiful place I’ve ever seen. I couldn’t tell at first, because everything was drenched by cloud-cover, but holy cow. Once the clouds blew away and the mountains appeared, the most miraculous landscape was revealed. The mountains looked like pyramids, and everywhere I looked–360 degrees–was so beautiful it made me cry.

Marie Lake

I don’t feel that my words can do it justice, but I’m trusting that the approx. 2,000 photos I took will at least begin to convey what I mean. 🙂

I wish my parents could see this place. I can’t wait to stitch together all the panoramas to show them! Not the same, but still pretty good.

There are a bunch of coyotes howling outside our tent. Beautiful & haunting sound.

All the discomfort, extreme fatigue, mosquito bites, illness, etc. are worth it for this evening. Funny how things work out sometimes–had I been feeling 100%, we probably would have crossed the pass before the clouds blew off & never would have seen this.

Thank you, universe!

Day 11 of the JMT: Photo Gallery

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Laundry day! We washed our essentials (socks & underwear) plus our hiking pants at Bear Creek before leaving camp. There was a great rock that was perfect for scrubbing our clothes! Nature’s own washboard.

When we arrived at Marie Lake, the mountains were completely obscured by clouds. It wasn’t until the clouds began to blow away that these gorgeous pyramid-like peaks emerged.