Friday June 6, 25.6mi/41.2km

Lime Wash (735.8/6300ft) to Big Smoky Valley (761.4/5490ft) (NV)

It’s daylight so early now, so I was awake at 5:30 and hiking by 6:00. I had a few minutes of hiking up a steep old 4×4 track which got me warmed up pretty quickly.

The rest of the morning was all XC hiking going up and over the San Antonio mountains. It was never steep but it was almost always rocky. Some of the ridgelines even had neat little rock fins.

I could tell this area was recently volcanic due to the rock type, and I had to constantly step over and around them.

The scenery was beautiful though! I just couldn’t look at it while hiking or else I would trip on a rock.

In the distance I could see a Solar Concentrating plant, I had seen one of these before near Vegas and they are a pretty neat idea for generating power.

They’re surrounded by thousands of mirrors which focus the sunlight on a single point in the center. Neat! Since I was up at 8,000 ft I had views in every direction.

Instead of following the guidebook mapped line, I decided to follow my own line for the descent off the ridgeline. It would result in more of a direct descent and less side-hilling across a slope. Ironically when I got to my exit point off the ridgeline, I came across this cool looking rock.

It matches the photo in the guidebook which calls it “Spur Rock”, and says it’s the start of the descent off the ridge. I’m glad my independently created route agreed with the guidebook text, even though the guidebook’s maps don’t match at all. For almost a mile, I descended down a series of steep gullies.

And arrived at the old San Antonio mining area.

There were half a dozen old buildings scattered about, and I didn’t dare walk inside any of them. The floors all looked like they would collapse under my weight.

The rest of the afternoon I hiked on old dirt roads slowly descending down to Big Smoky Valley.

It was of course very easy hiking, and I got to watch the cloud formations grow and shift overhead as they always do in the afternoon.

Looking north, I could see the Toiyabe mountains, where I would be for the next few days.

Also in that photo is a really faint old 2-track road, or “wagon road” as the guidebook calls it. Initially it was difficult to see and follow, but I got the hang of identifying traces of it and connecting to them. After a few more hours of hiking, flat roads like that, sometimes sandy, I arrived at a spot where I could set up my tent. The last few miles of the day were near a ranch, so I couldn’t camp there. And then for a few miles the ground was extremely sandy, which would be impossible to stake in a tent. But I finally found a nice cozy wash to camp in.

I accidentally hiked a bigger day than I intended, especially given that it took me all morning to hike the 10 miles of XC. But the afternoon miles were easy and flew by.

Thursday June 5, 12.9mi/20.8km

Tonopah (722.9/5990ft) to Lime Wash (735.8/6300ft) (NV)

Sleeping indoors is always a little strange during a hike, I’m used to the mentality ” the sky’s awake so I’m awake”. But the motel room stays dark so I slept in until 7:30, grabbed a second shower, and some free tea and muffins from the motel lobby. This next section is 145 miles long, so I bought 7 days worth of food.

I packed everything up, and it’s quite heavy. This section also starts with a 45 mile water carry, so I’m bringing 7 liters. The guidebook has a source after 7 miles, but it’s a well and I don’t trust man-made water sources as much. Plus the last few hikers have had trouble finding it, and I’m sure I will too. I swung by the Tonopah brewery to rehydrate.

I had planned on stopping by the pizza place for a slice and a soda, but once I was there I noticed they had a buffet so I had to partake.

After many slices, breadsticks, and root beers, I slowly made my way out of town.

It was mostly hiking on dirt roads today through sagebrush, not the most interesting thing but it certainly is relaxing. I spotted these two radar antennas on a nearby hillside, kind of a strange place for them. I wonder what they’re used for?

As the afternoon went on, the clouds started to build up.

After 7 miles I came to the spot where Frazier’s Well was supposed to be. I found an old mine shaft.

And some old rusted metal troughs.

I poked around the area pretty thoroughly, and didn’t come up with anything that looked wet or that had water. I looked closer at my maps and noticed another drainage just 100 m away, so I explored that and found what I believe was supposed to be the well.

It was a dry metal trough with a black plastic tub that had grass growing in it. But definitely no water. Not even any damp soil. Darn.

I’m glad I carried all my water from the town! Continuing on, the sky seemed to get even cloudier in every direction except for the area I was hiking in. Weird.

After about 13 miles, the easy road walking was coming to an end, and there was a long XC climbing section coming up. So I decided to camp a little early, before I got into the XC section.

Of course, I’m camped in another wash. Better than being camped up high and exposed to wind and thunderstorms!

Wednesday June 4, 5.2mi/8.4km

Paymaster Canyon Rd (717.7/5520ft) to Tonopah (722.9/5990ft) (NV)

I’m usually excited to get up early on a town day, but I stayed up an hour later than usual last night watching some Netflix, so I didn’t leave camp until 6:30am. It was an easy and gradual uphill roadwalk to Tonopah.

Walking uphill to town is quite unusual, and I can’t think of another example trail town where this happens. I was in town at 8:30, but nothing was really open yet so I killed some time being a tourist and taking photos.

It’s a cool old Main Street and a historic mining town.

Some fancy artwork.

I stopped into a hardware store to ask about buying a fuel canister, they didn’t have it but suggested this place down the street.

A-bar-L Western store carried a little bit of everything, it basically looked like a general store but modernized and had Wi-Fi. The owner Paul was super nice, and even though the store didn’t sell fuel canisters, he called his wife at home to bring me one of his personal ones which I bought off of him. Amazing. He also gave me an extra cardboard box, which I needed to ship my ice ax and micro spikes back since I don’t need them anymore. I went to the post office next door and shipped those items away, and having done all my chores in this section of town, I walked to the southern end where my motel and the restaurants are. I was pretty sure the hotel wouldn’t let me check in to my room at 10 am, so I went directly to the Tonopah Station Casino, which had a cafe.

The decor was very old-timey, and it’s Nevada so of course you had to walk through the slot machine room to get to the restaurant.

I ordered a nice big breakfast, it was a small little diner type place with one waitress.

I was still hungry so I ordered more food.
This is what happens when you order a sundae at breakfast and the diner waitress only works the breakfast shift, and has no idea how many scoops to use.

It was a ridiculous amount of ice cream and I felt like that was my big win for the day! Strangely, the only laundromat in town is also in the casino, and the machines are ridiculously cheap only $2. So I hung out for an hour there doing my laundry, and then walked next door to the Raley’s supermarket to resupply. The cashier put my groceries in these old-timey flimsy plastic bags which I haven’t seen in a few years now, so I had to take a photo for novelty purposes.

I finally left that shopping center after noon, and they had a cool map by the front door.

Tonopah is located at my finger, and I’m eventually hiking up to the green section in the upper right corner of Nevada. I walked 5 minutes down the street to the Dream Inn motel, which was the cheapest in town and also quite modern. I had been too warm for most of the past week, so it felt good to just turn the AC on full power and see how cold I could get the room. After a shower I went back out and got another meal, and then spent the rest of the day relaxing watching shows and doing some trail planning.

Tuesday June 3, 24.0mi/38.6km

Clayton Saddle (693.8/5130ft) to Paymaster Canyon Rd (717.8/5520ft) (NV)

I got an early start at 6:30 and finished the paved road walk before the warmth of the day arrived.

After I turned off onto a powerline road, I started noticing all these hoof prints.

They’re much smaller than horses so I’m pretty sure there are burros around. A mile later, I spied the culprits!

Which also meant I was getting close to a water source since these guys never seem to stray too far from water. And I came around a hillside and there was the Alkali Hot Springs!

The pool on the right was the perfect temperature, while the one on the left was way too hot. There are ways to adjust the temperature, but it takes awhile and I didn’t plan on being here for more than an hour. It was a nicely constructed site with lots of little signs and walkways and posts for hanging shade tarps.

The outflow of the hot springs was captured by a little rectangular pool, where I grabbed 3 liters to get me the 24 miles to town tomorrow.

As I was packing up to leave, a woman pulled up in her conversion van which had clearly been constructed to live in. She was super friendly and explained how she’s taking a 2-month detox, and will be living out here at the hot spring and eating all sorts of overly healthy sounding things I’ve never heard of. She gave me some nice ginger tea, some powdered lemon juice for flavoring my water, and some sort of dehydrated sea saltgrass.

The first two things were delicious. The third one, not so much. I said goodbye to Allison and also to my burro friends as I left the hot spring.

The rest of the day was pretty much all walking dirt roads, most of them small non-drivable roads.

The landscapes out here really are huge and while there’s not much to see up close besides sagebrush, the distant views are really cool. After a while though, I put on some podcasts and enjoyed the afternoon, just easily hiking to my planned campsite about 5 miles before town.

As usual, it’s always a little windy out here so I was fortunate and found a small hill for a windbreak. And even better, there’s a wash at the base of it. Camping in washes is basically my default option in the desert, they’re kind of perfect for camping as they’re usually mostly level and free of spiky plants.

Monday June 2, 26.4mi/42.5km

Cave Spring (667.4/6160ft) to Clayton Saddle (693.8/5130ft) (NV) -3.0 mi vehicle

This summer daylight seems to always wake me up at 5:45am, which means I’m hiking by 6:30. I poked around the area a little more, just to make sure I didn’t miss any water sources. All dry. I did find this neat mining shaft, which for some reason they call a cave.

It was a nice cool morning on a gradual uphill, and I only had a mile and a half of hiking until the Coyote spring water source.

Unfortunately when I got to that water source, it appeared that the metal tanks had been removed, and all that remained was a silty and muddy cow pond.

I thoroughly investigated the area and found some new looking piping buried under bulldozer tracks that led right to the pond. Someone must have reconfigured the water setup here, bummer. There was quite a bit of cow poop around, and the water had a weird ammonia smell so it’s probably at least 20% cow piss. I grabbed an emergency liter, but didn’t run it through my filter since that would probably kill the filter. It’s only 12 miles to town, most of them downhill, where there is good water. The rest of the roadwalk was uneventful except for this little guy was sunning himself in the middle of the road.

I easily finished the gradual little climb and took a nice long break on the pass before starting the descent. There was a cool breeze and some shady junipers that beckoned to be sat under.

Initially the descent was steep…

And then flattened out, while the small town of Silver peak came into view.

Silver peak is a tiny town, and home to the country’s only lithium mine. I assumed they would make good money mining a rare element, but the town looked like a disaster zone of shipping container homes, rotting RVs, and just generally junk lying around.

But I got a photo of the town’s famous directional sign.

I’m heading towards Alkali Hot Spring. By now it was about noon so I went to the town park and took a break in the shade of the pavilion.

It was a pretty nice spot, with picnic tables and benches and even outlets to charge my phone. There was a school group using the adjacent pool, so I had access to the bathrooms there and refilled my water bottles. One of the adults in charge of the school’s field trip was also the grillmaster, and asked me if I would please make room for all the kids when they got out of the pool to eat. I moved to a further picnic table and he gave me a nice double cheeseburger with bacon and jalapenos. Amazing.

Eventually the school group left to go home, and I had the shady pavilion to myself. I took a couple hours break and waited out the hot weather. I would have been tempted to use the pool, but it’s privately owned by the mining company and the school group locked it up once they left. On my way out I stopped by the fire station and got more water.

I started the 5 mile roadwalk through the lithium mine area, I was excited to see what all the fuss was about, as I could see the brightly colored evaporating pools all morning from above.

I got about 2 miles into the roadwalk and one of the mine’s security staff stopped to chat with me. He was quite friendly, but said pedestrians weren’t allowed to use the road. I had been forewarned by some hikers ahead of me this might happen, and I even had email confirmation from the Esmeralda County roads supervisor that this road was a county-owned road, and indeed open to pedestrians. We were chatting for long enough that his supervisor pulled up also, and after a brief polite discussion, I got a ride through the mine area. I was kinda bummed that I missed 3 miles of the trail, but I view the gap like the boat ferry on the PNT or Te Araroa. Necessary to get across. The rest of the afternoon I followed a powerline road, and was glad to be walking in the direction that I was, since behind me looked quite dark and stormy.

While in front of me it looked okay.

I joined the deserted paved road for a short bit, and even started seeing Joshua trees again, cool!

Once I arrived at a low pass, I ducked behind the hillside to setup camp where I would be shielded from the wind.

After I set up my tent and finished dinner, I noticed the wind had died anyway, so it should be a good night of sleep.

Sunday June 1, 28.1mi/45.2km

Trail Canyon Lake (639.3/8050ft) to Cave Spring (667.4/6160ft) (NV)

Today was a pretty easy day of hiking, and I covered a bunch of miles even with a few long breaks. I left my campsite at 6:30 and had a quick descent through the riparian brush.

Once I was below about 7,000 ft, the terrain reverted to the sagebrush landscape.

A few miles later and I left the Inyo National Forest, and was shocked to see this monstrosity of a house.

I was listening to audiobooks all morning and then the next thing I knew I had crossed highway 264, which meant I had covered 13 miles and it was only 11am. Dirt roadwalks are pretty cruiser.

It was kinda a primary dirt road, so a car would pass me every 20 minutes or so and most of them stopped to offer water. One guy from the local electric co-op even offered me all these electrolyte mixes, and some cold bottled water.

All my water was kind of hot, so it really was quite a treat. Just like yesterday, around midday the clouds started to gather and get dark and rumbly.

I quickly hiked past a rapidly building thundercloud, and made it to Fish Lake Hot Springs in the early afternoon.

It was a nice little constructed tub and I had a good long soak in the perfectly hot water. The tub drained into a couple of ponds, so the first pond was warm water and the second pond was cool water.

After an hour, I noticed a couple of tanker trucks had pulled up and were pumping water out of the pond.

Not sure if that’s legal or if they had a permit, but the guy was interesting to talk to and said it takes about 18 minutes to fill his 2,000 gallon truck, which he’ll then drive to the local mine and spray down the roads for dust control. He seemed concerned that I was drinking the water, because apparently it’s full of parasites, but my water filter is supposed to remove most biological contaminants. The next round of thunderclouds was moving in so I decided to hike on, initially on a brief XC segment.

And then the rest of the day was on a dirt road.

It was a relief to hike out of the wide open plain and back into the mountains, where I was no longer the highest point under a thundercloud.

At the end of the day I came to Cave Spring, which after much searching, I determined to be dry.

Both of the troughs were dry, and neither of the blue handled spigots worked either. I traced various pipes and tubing lines uphill, and found the source of the water inside of a cliff. But it was dry.

There is another spring in 1.5 miles that I’ll hit tomorrow morning so I’m not too concerned. I headed back down the hill and explored the little cabin that was nearby.

It looked like it had been recently fixed up inside, with a fresh coat of paint on the walls and a nice wooden ceiling. The cabinet even had a bunch of spices and water bottles.

I decided to set up my tent at a flat spot a couple hundred feet from the cabin, which should be far enough that no mice are tempted to come over here. At the end of the day the sun broke out of the clouds, and there was a neat lighting contrast between the dark sky to the East and the lighted cliff.

And a few minutes later a rainbow came out!

Watching the sunset made me realize how huge the terrain is out here.

Most of Nevada is so remote!

Saturday May 31, 18.5mi/29.8km

Benton Town Park (625.1/5380ft) (CA) to Trail Canyon Lake (639.3/8050ft) (NV) +4.3mi alternate

I was awake really early and packed up my tent by 6 am, since I wasn’t certain I was allowed to camp where I was. I walked back into the park and hung out at one of the tables for a couple hours, eating first breakfast and reading my book. Once the cafe opened at 8am, I went and had second breakfast.

The post office opened at 8:30, which was perfect timing and I went and picked up my replacement air mattress.

My current air mattress has the “bulge of death” which means the internal seams are becoming delaminated. The company sent me a free replacement. Actually, they mistakenly sent me two free replacements. I definitely didn’t want to carry two air mattresses, so I mailed one away. I enjoyed talking to Sasy, the postal clerk, she was almost 80 years old, very chatty and knew all the town gossip. By now it was 9am, and time to leave town and start hiking. As I was leaving town, I noticed an actual working payphone!

It kinda makes sense since there’s no cell reception in the whole valley. I had a 3-hour roadwalk along US highway 6, which was pretty quiet except for the occasional truck. And also the herds of wild horses that were roaming around!

After 2 hours on the road, I had a small celebratory moment for entering Nevada.

Eventually I left the highway and turned onto a dirt road that led up into the mountains. The turn-off was marked by a famous defunct brothel, “JR”.

There were more wild horses roaming around this area.

The weather was a little warm so I was thankful when some clouds moved in and provided some shade. Shortly after, I entered Queen Canyon, with even more shade from the trees.

I saw tons of paintbrush and it was curious that it was growing in clumps here, usually it grows pretty scattered.

On the upper end of Queen Canyon, I came across some curious old buildings, I assume related to the defunct mining operation.

I took a nice long break, snacking and exploring one of the buildings. The other building had an old rotten wooden floor, so I definitely stayed out of that one. I had another hour of hiking to finish the climb up to the pass, it was surprising to look back down Queen Canyon and see how far I had already climbed.

I was nearing the top of the climb…

When I got to the pass, the clouds I was so thankful for earlier had turned into thunderclouds.

The view up ahead looked only slightly less threatening.

I quickly descended down the other side, or at least tried to, as the old road was steep and full of very loose little rocks.

After a mile, the descent eased up and I was traveling through a nice pinion-juniper forest.

Pretty soon I came to Trail Canyon Lake, one of the few water sources in this section. It was shocking to see so much water in a generally dry landscape.

I had drank a ton of water on the 4,000-ft climb, so I refilled my bottles and camped a short distance later.

I found a nice spot in some trees that was protected from both wind and rain, as the thunderclouds had now become very rumbly and sprinkly. New state, new weather?

Friday May 30, 19.1mi/30.7km

Wilfred Creek (607.0/7630ft) to Benton Town Park (625.1/5380ft) (CA) +1.0mi forgotten gear

I had a quiet night in my campsite, with no small animals scurrying around. My first task for the day was to hike up 2,500 ft on a steep hill, hiking XC.

It woke me up pretty quickly as I had to pay attention to weaving around all the different clumps of sagebrush. Once I was at the top I had an amazing view back to the Sierras, where I started in Mammoth a couple days ago.

I had a little more climbing to get to the top of the ridge.

And then thankfully I was hiking on a road, after all that XC climbing.

Surprisingly, there were still little patches of snow remaining up here at 9,800 ft elevation.

It was just a super scenic walk and I could see the road weave along the ridgeline for miles.

After a couple miles I came to a little forest, it was nice to have shade now that the sun was out in full force. Some of the trees looked very ancient.

Nice forested walk.

As I gradually descended, I left the forest and was back in the sagebrush.

I love looking at maps, and the view from up here into the valleys up ahead was like staring at a map.

I wasn’t sure what the white section was, perhaps some salt flats. The scenery up close was interesting too, these tiny purple flowers were everywhere.

After a couple hours I left the dirt roads and descended a couple thousand feet, again XC, though this time much easier and with less brush.

At the bottom of the descent I joined up with another dirt road, and had a pleasant but hot walk through the valley.

Pretty soon that road ended and I was on paved Highway 120 for a couple of hours. It was actually fairly enjoyable as there were almost no cars driving this road. And there were these cool rock hoodoos along the way.

I always see these elevation signs on road trips but I’ve never seen one on road walk before. Neat!

About halfway through the roadwalk I came to the historic town of Benton Hot Springs.

All the buildings looked ancient and historic and closed, I assume it used to be a mining town, but not sure. The one building that looked modern and open was the Inn at Benton Springs, which is a Hot Springs resort.

I stopped in and chatted with the staff for quite a while and got some ice cold water and lemonade. The three of them seemed very interested in the Hot Springs Trail that I was hiking, and one of them had even bikepacked across the length of California. Cool group. They were getting ready for a busy weekend of guests, so I left to finish my roadwalk. Unfortunately I forgot a hiking pole so I had to turn around and that added a mile to my day. I almost never carry hiking poles, as they don’t seem to have much use besides river crossings and steep downhills. Finally reunited with my hiking pole, I continued the roadwalk and said hi to lots of friendly faces.

It was pretty hot on the pavement with no shade, but I pressed on to Benton.

There are two convenience stores. One of them was already closed for the day, so I went to the Smalley’s convenience store just a couple minutes south of the main junction. Lots of cold temperature calories ensued.

It was nearing the end of the day, and I had to find a place to camp locally. I have a package at the post office which I will pick up tomorrow morning, which means I can’t leave this town quite yet. The guy at the convenience store said sometimes people camp in the Town Park, so I went over to check it out.

It was a pretty nice park with grass and shady trees, tables, and bathrooms with running water. I felt so civilized to sit at a proper table while eating dinner! I did all my usual evening chores, and even found an outlet to charge my phone. I didn’t really want to camp in the park in case people came in during the night, but I decided to camp on the other side of the fence from it and set up my tent after sunset. It’s technically a weekend, but this is a tiny town of only 200 people, so I don’t expect any rowdiness in the park tonight.

Thursday May 29, 19.5mi/31.4km

Laurel Creek (587.5/7430ft) to Wilfred Creek (607.0/7630ft) (CA)

I left my little campsite in the pine forest and immediately entered sagebrush terrain.

I had a pleasant roadwalk for a couple of hours, even passing by a little duck pond.

After crossing Highway 395, I noticed an increase in traffic on my little road, it seems everybody was driving to some hot springs in the area. I took a little detour to follow Hot Creek for a half mile to check it out.

After descending a couple of switchbacks, I had a pretty nice view of the river canyon.

I hiked along the river for a little while, and there were tons of people fishing for trout. Apparently this is the number one trout stream in California.

I talked to one guy who shared a bunch of information about fly fishing, types of fish, and the history of this creek. I continued on and soon came to the hot springs that give the creek its name.

From this point downstream, the water is too hot for fish and I saw no more people, except for one guy Mike. He said I looked familiar and that he commonly helps people on long distance hikers, he is currently supporting his friend Andrea on her hike from the East coast to the Oregon coast. We chatted for a bit and he sent me on my way with a nice cold Coors light. Maybe a mile later, I arrived at my first soakable hot spring for the day, Shepherd Hot springs.

It was very nice and there were a couple other people there, including a guy Randy who maintains a lot of the hot springs in Nevada. He was very knowledgeable and knew all of the hot springs and little towns that I will be visiting in Nevada next month. And he had built this neat contraption that cools down the water, since many of the hot springs are above 110° F, which is way too hot.

A couple other people showed up just as I was leaving, and they offered to take my photo. That’s a rare occurrence on this trail!

I hiked on, using an old dirt road and enjoying the amazing snowy mountain scenery.

And 10 minutes later I was at the next hot spring, Crab Cooker.

This one was way too hot to even put my feet in, probably how it got its name. I sat on the little bench there and ate lunch, and after awhile a couple showed up and offered me an ice cold Pepsi. Nice.

I moved on and enjoyed a short bit of XC hiking before arriving at Hilltop Hot springs. That one was a great temperature, but I only spent a few minutes there as a large group had just arrived. All of these hot springs are easily accessible by car, so there’s people everywhere. I hiked for another hour and came to my last one, Wild Willie’s hot springs.

This one was the most developed, it had a specially built parking area, boardwalk, and half a dozen rock tubs.

The temperature was perfect and I sat there for a while enjoying the hot bubbling mineral water. From there, I had an easy little XC hike to the Owens River, most of it was on dried mud flats, short grassy areas, and even some desert pavement.

Once I got close to the river I had to duck under a barbed wire fence, there was a fence on each side of the river and that was probably the hardest part of the river crossing. The river itself had some deep channels on the outer curves, but there were plenty of straight river sections that were shallow. I found a crossing spot with some gravel bars that made it quite easy.

Looking back, at where I had just crossed:

It was kinda the ideal crossing spot, never more than shin deep, and a nice gravelly bottom without any mud. From there I had a couple hours of hiking on dirt roads.

I was gradually climbing up toward the next mountain range, that I would cross over tomorrow. When the road ended by a creek, I stopped and camped.

It’s definitely convenient to camp near a water source, but usually hikers avoid these spots as they also attract mice, insects and other wildlife. Hopefully no visitors tonight!

Wednesday May 28, 5.1mi/8.2km

Mammoth Lakes (582.4/8020ft) to Laurel Creek (587.5/7430ft) (CA)

My body is used to the habit of waking up at 6am, so I had a leisurely morning in the campground before leaving by 7:30. One of the people I had met around the campfire at lake Isabella RV Park had agreed to meet me at a coffee shop here in Mammoth, where they live. I ordered my usual flat white coffee and we had a fun chat before he had to go off to work, and I had some errands to do around town at the post office, library, and gear shop. It was so scenic walking around town seeing the snowy mountains.

I got my warranty replacement battery bank at the post office, updated my journal at the library, and then went to Mammoth mountaineering gear shop to pick up my warranty replacement backpack.

So much new gear! And I get a warranty replacement Thermarest mattress in the next town. I ran into some PCT hikers at the gear shop and we walked over to the Vons grocery to resupply. My route splits from the PCT here in Mammoth, and I’m going to miss having other hikers around. I took the free trolley to the West end of town where this section officially starts, and stopped into the brewery for some rehydration.

I walked through the town of Mammoth Lakes, stopping by Schats Bakery to get a cinnamon roll.

They also had these ridiculously tiny jars of Nutella, they make my hands look huge, ha!

It was an easy hike out of town and then I followed a paved road for a couple of miles.

I stopped by the Sherwin Creek campground and filled my water, and now my backpack felt a little heavy, since I’m also carrying 7 days of food to get me to Tonopah, NV.

I debated stopping to camp at the campground, but it was only 5pm and they also wanted $16 and they only took cash. So I hiked another half hour and camped in the nice pine forest.

I’m guessing this will be the last forest I see for a long time, so I’m soaking it in tonight.