Sunday July 25, 2021
Start: Dusy Basin lake, partway up to Bishop Pass on the side trail
End: South Lake/Bishop Pass trailhead
Miles: 7.8
Gain/Loss: 1749’/2680″
After a decent night of sleep, we were up at 5:10am and on trail by 6:15am, though Toby was feeling nauseous. We walked up past the lake and did our final climb up to Bishop Pass, just shy of 12,000′. We saw a few marmots and enjoyed their cuteness, especially since we knew it’ll be a while before we see more of them.
As we started descending, we began seeing more people, starting with ultrarunners and then ambitious day hikers, and then dog walkers and folks with kids. We knew we were almost to the trailhead when we saw parents in flip flops with toddlers.
At the trailhead, we changed our stinky hiking shirts for our sleep shirts, and then started soliciting rides to Bishop. Two kind women from San Diego on a camping and hiking vacation cleared out their backseat and gave us a 20-minute ride into Bishop.
From there, we called the Eastside hostel and bivy, and reserved a room for the night. Then we headed to Schatt’s bakery, on the way to the hostel. The deli was a completely mob, but we managed to get sandwiches without having a panic attack, and the sandwiches went down smoothly.
At the hostel, we enjoyed showers, laundry, and town clothes. In the evening, we went to Vons and bought food for the next few days, and then bought dinner at Carl’s Jr. The next day, I spent a lot of time modifying my PCT section hiking plans, due to 2 large wildfires burning on the PCT north of Sonora Pass and nearby Quincy, closing the PCT as well as creating very poor air quality conditions.
Transcending Mountains 