October 10

The snow stopped falling much to my relief around 9:30 last night. If it continued at the rate it was falling all night there would be little hope for us to make it the 90 miles to Kennedy Meadows. It is only 9 miles over Kearsarge Pass to a possible ride to town from where we are so even if there was too much snow to go forward we always had the option to go back. As it is, the snow has accumulated to around 24 inches. Louis and I got up early and breakfast inside our respective tents, each of which, was straining under the weight of the snow creeping up the sloping sides. Around 11:00 am we both got out and decided it would be best not to hike, but to wait the day in our campsite and let some of the snow melt. We dug out our tents and freed them from the burden of the snow, and occupied our time trying to do anything other than eat all of the food and snacks we have for the next few days. I sewed the seams in my rain gear that were starting to tear, and tried my best to dry any wet gear while the sun showed itself to our campsite. It was sunny all day long, but we only had a couple hours as our campsite is well protected from the elements. In the afternoon I sewed up a pair of homemade gaiters out of the forearm half of my sleeves from one of my long sleeve shirts. We are going to be hiking in snow for at least the next couple days and these are going to be wonderful if they work. Yesterday, my ankles were freezing up with snow packing itself in under my rain pants and turning to ice. The gaiters will prevent this buildup from happening and I'll have a t-shirt for the desert. We are going to try to get over Forester Pass tomorrow and worse case scenario we end up back here tomorrow night. I'm feeling much more optimistic about the hike continuing at this point and it sounds like a nice day was forecasted for tomorrow.