Bishop Pass Trail - Bishop Pass Trailhead

It seems that if there's any place to have to leave the John Muir Trail, it's Bishop Pass. I was set for a somewhat easy hiking day (after a really steep ascent) that would probably be a lot less spectacular once we got up over the pass and out of Kings Canyon, so I took a ton of pictures of Le Conte Canyon on our way up the pass. It's the tourist in me, I guess, thinking that all the most beautiful things will end up being inside the national park. But the whole day was filled with unbelievable views, basins, lakes, streams, and Inconsolable Ranges (well, just one of those). The set of lakes that stairsteps down from Bishop Pass on the north eastern side of the Sierra rivals parts of Kings Canyon with a whole different style of spectacular. It's a combination of desert and alpine that doesn't exist at all on the western side of the Sierra. They should make it into a national park or something so I know to take pictures.
Bishop Pass is also an easy place to re-enter society because after cresting the pass you start gradually running into more and more people. Everyone we talked to helped us feel good about our hike, even though we didn't make it to Whitney. One woman we passed had left her camera a few miles below her on the trail, but didn't want to go back down for it because the trail was so steep. After leaving her, we began a treasure hunt for a few miles until we found the camera. Hopefully she picked it up at the bait shop where we left it when she came back down the trail. Too bad she couldn't take any pictures, though.

The amount of day hikers on the Bishop Pass Trail gave us hope that we'd be able to find a ride from the trailhead to Bishop, CA (over 20 miles from the trailhead). Although we had to wait for a little while, we got extremely lucky that Judy, a guide for Elderhostel who leads tours in the area, not only gave us a ride to Bishop, but also gave us a tour of Bishop and dropped us at a cheap motel with a pool. Neither of us had hitchhiked before, and I'm not sure we were expecting to be confronted by that kind of generosity. Thanks, Judy!

True to my dreams of the last five days, we ate everything the Bishop Pizza Factory had to offer us for dinner. Then we called our parents, watched the news, and BATHED (maybe that one came first). It's definitely weird being in a room with a bed and a television, but also extremely comfortable. Really, this is unparalleled comfort. It makes me unable to really worry about how we're going to get to Whitney Portal tomorrow to pick up Lucy's car.


[Matt]
Miles: 10-ish non JMT
Total: 135.8 (JMT)