I had quite a few questions and comments on our hike to the Plain of Six Glaciers. I’ll respond to some of the questions with this post.

Q. Did you and Vicky wear those tie-dyed shirts so you would be easier to find in an avalanche?

A. That would have been pretty smart but we had no idea we would be hiking through avalanches, so no we didn’t.

Q. Was that the same tie-dyed shirt you wore when you hitchhiked up there back in 1972?

A. No. I didn’t own a tie-dyed shirt until my mother-in-law gave me this one for Christmas 2008. She purchased them in Pinecrest on the way to Yosemite at a small store called “Tie-Dye and Jerky” (as in beef jerky).

Q. Are you crazy? (for doing that hike)

A. Do you mean as in – “still crazy after all these years”?

Q. Why didn’t you turn back and go home?

A. We were having too much fun.

Q. If you were off by yourselves, how come you had trouble finding a place to sit at the Tea House?

A. Not that many people hiked up to the tea house, but that was everyone’s destination. It was normally an easy hike. And we left before all of them, but they managed to keep on the trail. By the time we took our side-trip adventure out to the Abbot Pass Viewpoint and back, everyone else had already arrived at the tea house.

Q. If your hike to 6G was the second most exciting hike of your life, what was the first?

A. Back in late October 1974, Vicky and I made a back-packing trip to the Sierra. We hiked the Rae Lakes loop trail which is in Kings Canyon National Park. It’s a 46 mile loop through granite-walled canyons and along cascading creeks and rivers and past beautiful high mountain lakes. Part of the trail is the John Muir Trail and part of it is the Pacific Crest Trail which goes from Canada to Mexico. The trail is rated “difficult” by the park service. It starts at around 5,000 feet elevation and gains almost 7,000 feet when you pass over Glen Pass which is 11,978 feet high. It’s also an active “bear” area.

We went in October with a big storm coming in. We were advised to not go into the area by the park service. But we had been in drought conditions for three years and we were skeptical about the storm. The park service told us that only 11 people had signed up to enter the area, including us. They said that if we got into trouble, there wouldn’t be many people around to help us. We went on the hike anyway. My pack was 55 pounds and Vicky’s pack was 35 pounds. My pack stayed at 55 pounds for the trip while miraculously, Vicky’s got lighter every day.

We got to Rae Lakes late the day we arrived. Upper Rae Lakes is a bit over 10,500 feet elevation. I was pulling 6-7 inch rainbow trout out of the lake with every cast. It was the best fishing trip I ever had. And standing near where Upper Rae Lake empties into Lower Rae Lake was the best spot that I ever fished. Anyway, we went to bed at Rae Lakes and woke up to find our tent just off our noses. I thought I must have done a poor job putting up the tent the night before. But it had snowed and the tent was weighed down by the snow.

Rae Lake is at the 27 mile mark of the 46 miles – in the direction that we were hiking. Vicky wanted to go back the way we came, but I wanted to go over Glen Pass since it was the shortest way back. From Ray Lakes to Glen Pass is one very steep switchback trail. The trail was covered with snow so that we couldn’t tell where it started to switch back and the cliff was steep if we went too far. It started to snow heavily soon after we started up the trail. About one third of the way up, I noticed two guys coming up behind us. They caught up to us a little over half-way up the mountain. I told them I had broke the trail so far, it was their turn. These two guys were hiking the Pacific Crest Trail from Mexico to Canada and were in shape and well prepared. They had gaiters and all the things that we didn’t have. Anyway, they took the lead to Glenn Pass.

From Glen Pass, someone said we could see some 40 lakes. We could only see about four feet. It was white-out blizzard conditions. The two hikers asked us to take their picture, so we, in turn, asked them to take our picture. That was the toughest and most exciting hike I ever took. It’s normally a 5 day hike and we had planned on seven days to allow for plenty of fishing. We ended up taking eight days and created some great memories.