February 2nd, 2010: Tuolumne Meadows or Bust

I believe this is what 4-season tents are actually intended for: camping on the snow. Granted, in this case it is actually on about 4 inches of snow above a highway, but it is snow nonetheless. I was very thankful to have given the tent a test run in San Francisco, because trying to figure it out in the dark with limited energy could have resulted in a cold night sleeping in the snow. Kevin and I had been going on a cumulative six hours of sleep for Day One, which resulted in a late start to day two. We didn't get on the trail until 11 AM. But we did sleep well in that tent.

Camp One (and only...) was around 8700 FT, so we passed the 9000 FT sign early in our day, though not early enough to get us to the Tuolumne Meadows Ski Hut in daylight. Progress was slow on the ascent and we did not reach Tioga Pass until 3:30 PM. Sadly we had another 8 miles to ski, albeit downhill. Kevin and I indulged in a hot soup to accompany our peanut butter wraps and were back on the road by 4 PM. The sun set shortly thereafter and we pushed on by headlamp, hoping to reach the hut before 8 PM. The descent was not quite steep enough to go skinless despite the tracks that had been broken earlier in the day by a couple on their way out. Having tried all permutations of skins on and off, I eventually settled on one skin on and one skin off. We call it The Scooter. At 7:30 PM we reached the hut and happily discovered that there was plenty of wood for the potbelly stove, which would keep us warm all night long.