There is something magical about spending an extended amount of time wandering through the backcountry. For me, it simplifies life to its most elemental form. What to eat, where to get water and where to sleep. Pretty simple really. The rest is just walking. Sure, sometimes the journey can be a little hard, but that's life. As Easty so perfectly put it, "It's not all Polemonium and Star Thistle".
Today would take us 23 miles as we continue on our trek to Lake Tahoe. I was really enjoying today knowing that everything I needed was right on my back. The Forestdale Divide is near the Kirkwood Ski area. Having snowboarded there before, I began to realize how relatively close to home we were getting. I could 'get my bearings' as to where we were. We passed many lakes today along the way as well as quite a few people.
At one point, Tam and Christi were a bit ahead of Easty and I. They had come upon a small group of hikers and were questioned as to where they were going and where they had spent the night.When they told the group that they had camped the night at Eagle Creek, one of the guys in the group tried to 'correct them', telling them that there is no way they had come that far so early in the day. It was not yet 11AM and they had done almost 11 miles already. "Two girls, no way". After realizing there was no way to convince this guy, they both just said "Have a nice day and you can ask our husbands when you see them." When Easty and I caught up to the girls and they told us the story, we just said "Get use to it." I can't tell you how many times Dave and I have been asked "You came from where???" "With THOSE packs???" Now we just laugh.
At one point today as we were walking along a ridge line overlooking Blue Lake I had a strange disconnected feeling. Here I was looking down on RVs and boats and blue coolers full of cold drinks and thinking that I was invisible to these people. They had absolutely no idea what I was doing or how far we had all walked. It was kind of strange to me. I'm not saying that a swim in the lake and a cold drink wouldn't have been nice but I would much prefer the trail.
Anyhow, after pressing past Lost Lakes and climbing up and over the Divide, we found a couple of small lakes which appeared to be unoccupied. They were very picturesque and inviting after 23 miles of hiking.
We set up our camp among some trees and after a refreshing cleaning up in the lake, we had dinner and shared some good laughs about the day and drifted off under the stars. Another perfect end to a day on the trail.
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