August 9

Red’s Meadow to Rush Creek – 20.1 miles

Lisa opted to hang at Red’s Meadow a bit longer, so I struck out early, again on my own. First up was Devil’s Postpile, quite close to the Red’s Meadow campsite. The trail then takes a long gradual climb to Rosalie Lake before dropped down to Shadow Lake, then climbing again to a series of lakes, culminating at Thousand Island Lake. Climbing from Shadow Lake, Banner and Ritter Peaks appear, peaks first seen a couple of days previously from Silver Pass. They both stand as backdrop to Garnet Lake, a site I had long looked forward to since we have a photo of Garnet Lake prominently hung in our family room. At the time we purchased the piece, I had no idea where Garnet Lake was, but once I learned where it was, I’d been eager to visit in person.

Sadly, a fire had recently broken out nearby, first noticeable the prior day as the valley at Red’s Meadow increasingly filled with smoke, and while the smoke thinned toward Garnet Lake, it still obscured the clarity of the views. Nonetheless, I was exhilarated to be there at long last.

Further down the trail were first Ruby, then Emerald, and then Thousand Island Lake. I looked for a while for a spot to camp on the north shore, but finding no permissible site available (the view sites were taken), and not wanting to violate the “no camping” signs along the shore, I opted to push on. It was only early afternoon, so there was plenty of time to cover more ground, and make the next day into Yosemite shorter. I went over Island Pass and then found a site by Rush Creek at the base of the climb up Donahue Pass. I’d thought I’d again been beaten to a good site, but when I asked hikers already camping if there were any sites left, I was shown a stellar site just off trail which I couldn’t see from my initial vantage point. I ended up camping near a guy from Hayward who as it turned out had been doing a lot of training at Garin Regional Park just as I had been doing. He was ending his first day on the JMT, heading SOBO from Tuolumne Meadows.