Day 11 – 7/11/18
~15 miles
Brown Bear Lake to lake below Shout of Relief Pass

I’m very tired. Writing is difficult on this route, because in the 15 minutes or so before bed that I would normally write, we read our “letters from Steve [Roper, the route creator/guidebook author]”. The ‘letters’ part is a joke: last year we went to a bro-y ego-fest of a presentation by some guys who attempted to hike the SHR and shared their “letters to Steve” that they supposedly wrote each day of their trip. (I mean, when you quit after less than half the route, you gotta fill an hour+ long presentation somehow, right?). Anyway, I’m generally just making a list of things from the day I want to write about, then do the actual writing in town.

The climb over Gabbott Pass was easy enough, though my legs are still tired from yesterday. I came across an adorable little bird that didn’t move even when I got my camera right up in its face. I hope it was just scared and not injured.

Much of the descent into Second Recess, a hanging valley carved by glaciers, was not very pleasant. I’m really glad we went down it instead of up. It was steep, and the bits of “trail” left over from once upon a time were so intermittent they really weren’t worth trying to follow. And, sadly, the mosquitoes came back.

Thankfully there were clouds much of the day, making it cooler, especially on the long, mostly exposed climb out of Mono Creek.

It was getting late in the day but we decided once again to push over another pass. Two passes actually. After climbing to Bighorn Pass, we were to traverse 2/3 mile to Shout-of-Relief Pass. Based on our last experience from Potluck to Thunderbolt passes, we decided to just drop 400’ down to Ruby Finch Lake and climb back up 600’. This turned out to be a good choice.

Steve Roper calls this “Shout of Relief Pass” because from here to Red’s Meadow, it’s easier walking. I’m calling it Yawn of Relief Pass, because I’m tired!

Despite how hard we’ve worked the past couple of days, we’re stupid enough to think we might make it to Red’s Meadow and Mammoth tomorrow. That’s 21 miles away, but a fair bit of it is on trail. Dreaming of a being in a place without mosquitos.