Sonora Pass to Echo Lake

Ferd's shin has been bothering him so we did a shorter day-- about 11 miles. It's crazy how that's a short day for us now. We met a gentlemen named SloMo who is hiking solo. Storms looked like they wanted to pour on us but the clouds never made it over the mountains. We saw Shiny and HD and then made camp. We set up camp and then saw the girls! Caught up with them and then made a fire and ate some yummy pasta sides.

Dangit made it her goal to keep Ferd talking while hiking so he wouldn't think about his shins and it worked! we talked about childhood memories and favorite characteristics of loved ones. Next thing we knew, we had hiked 10 miles without a break. Woohoo! We moved out of the way for some faster hikers and realized they were our friends we met in Pullman-- Mike and Erin (Chappy and 2-Step). We camped with them near a lake and set up our tarps for the night. We now know our tarp's weakness-- wind. We need to make some adjustments because the wind separates our two tarps.

Washington represent! Chappy and 2-Step with The Children

Lots of rain and thunder.

It rained quite a bit today. We had to hunker under a tree while we ate and then decided to keep hiking so that we would stay warm. While hiking we heard some hollering and realized Chappy and 2-Step were under a cave waiting out the storm. We hung out with them for about an hour and hiked another 7 miles when the rain stopped. We camped with Shiny, HD, Was, Gourmet, Lady Mac, Thumbs Up and SloMo (who was already in his tent sleeping).

We left before everyone else. Dangit gets super proud and happy because we can leave camp in 15 minutes. :) We hiked over treeline pretty fast because we didn't want to get rained on and ended up running into the girls and Grad! We hung out on top for a bit and then hiked down lower and ate some lunch... then continued on to Carson Pass where the ranger station volunteers were giving out fresh fruit and sodas! Best. Trail Magic. Ever! We stayed a couple hours and then hiked another 2.5 miles on then set up camp. When we started to get dinner ready to cook, Dangit realized that she had left our pot at the trailhead. NOOOOO! She ran back, grabbed the pot and then ran back to camp before dark. When she got back, Ferd was soaking his shin and while walking around him, she slipped and fell into the creek. haha. We ate and got to bed. Not a very restful night.

We woke up at 5am and headed on to Echo Lake parking lot to be picked up by our friend Betty! Thanks Betty and Barb for the yummy foods and for picking us up! We went back to Betty and Randy's house, did laundry, took showers (Dangit finally shaved her legs and armpits) and ate some yummy steaks.

The next day was a very much needed zero. Betty and Randy let us use one of their cars (actually it's Kevin's-- thanks Kevin). We ran a bunch of errands-- got new shoes for Dangit, went grocery shopping, ate some yummy Chik-Fil-A and shopped at some thrift stores.

Now we are finishing some tasks, trying to figure out if Dangit's older and youngest brother came meet up with us in a couple days (hopefully!), packing up and getting ready to head back to Echo Lake!