John Muir Trail Day 18/19: Burrito Regret and Silver (Staircase) Pass 

After eating ourselves into a food coma and sleeping on the ground in Mushroom City, my husband, Cliff and I received the best possible news on Day 18 of the John Muir Trail. A vacancy had opened up at the tiny motel at Vermillion Valley Resort and we would be able to sleep in a real bed, in a real room, with an attached shower, with running water. 

We counted down the minutes until we could access the room and then stampeded towards the door. Within an hour, we had both taken showers, done laundry, eaten a profoundly good lunch, and were tucked into a bed for the best nap of our lives. 

We had no interest in being social when sleep and food were tied for first place on our short list of priorities. We were comically first in line each time VVR’s restaurant opened and we ordered an obscene amount of food, pricing be damned. Our plates were clean by the time we were done and, with a bed waiting for us that night, we were fast asleep long before the sun went down.

When we woke up on the morning of Day 19, we both felt like superstars. We were well fed, rested and clean, and ready to hit the trial.

As we climbed aboard a jam-packed pontoon boat to be ferried across the lake, I finally understood the power of VVR and the dreamy looks on the faces of all the hikers, rejuvenated from their own visit, that we had passed. VVR had earned its cult following based on damn fine dining, clean rooms and well-run organization. We felt amazing and had VVR to thank for sending us down the trail feeling better than we had in several days.

When the ferry docked, we hopped off and went on our way down Mono Creek Trail, making short work of getting back to the JMT.  Getting up and over Silver Pass was our goal of the day and we were ready.

Fast forward exactly one hour and I was regretting every bit of the monstrous breakfast burrito I ate, while sitting in the dreamy haze at VVR. Now, on the ascent from 7,904’ to the 10,902’ Silver Pass, I was suffering in a way that was indescribable. Everynow and then, Cliff, who was behind me, would ask how my burrito was doing and I would emit a threatening groan in response.

The truth was, that amazing burrito was sitting like a lead weight in my stomach and threatening to revisit me via a violent round of vomiting with every step. To say the least, Silver Pass was the worst ascent of all on the JMT.

As we climbed, the temperature turned broiling and the trail, typically fashioned as a continuous slope upwards, was instead, an endless series of steps. So. Many. Steps.

It was the first climb I had ever encountered in which some overzealous trail builder had gleefully crafted an unfathomably endless amount of steps to form a tortuous staircase straight to vomit-inducing, thigh-torching, sweat-inspiring, lung-burning hell. They should rename this asshole pass Staircase Pass. It should not have an innocent sounding name like Silver Pass, I thought to myself, and come with a warning.

Silver Pass should be the cautionary example in every thru-hiker’s training of why it is absolutely necessary to train on sloped inclines and step-style ascents…and to not eat a burrito the size of a 1980s Suburban before doing so. My god.

In the end, I managed to keep my burrito down as we went up and over an insane FOUR false summits, with Silver Pass buried in there somewhere, in that burrito-causing, hallucination-filled nightmare before finally heading consistently down the actual descent.

When we arrived at our campsite that night, I hobbled in with nothing left to give that day. I wondered, as we ate a light dinner of snacks (because that damn burrito was still hanging around), if VVR had just been a mirage and our recovery just a weird fever dream. 

…and as I sat watching what appeared to be large bats swooping high in the sky over Fish Creek Camp that night, I decided that must be a sign that, yes, VVR and the entire day we just had was a giant case of delirium. 

But later in our tent, when I rolled over and my mattress squelched out what sounded like a mocking laugh to remind me that I had signed up for all of this – the revenge of the resupply days, the bat hallucinations a la Hunter S. Thompson, the suburban-sized burritos that doubled my base weight, but also the profound magic the JMT had sprinkled throughout these meandering days- I gladly mumbled back to my mattress, that indeed I had and would continue to sign up for each day’s mad adventure until the very end.

Stats for the Hiker Nerds (Like You and I)

Day 18/19- September 3/4, 2024 

Vermillion Valley Resort to Fish Creek Camp

Mountain Pass/Summit: Silver Pass (Elevation 10.902’)

Elevation Gain: 3,028’

Elevation Loss: 1,754’

Mileage: 10-ish

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Comments 2

  • Jess : Jan 2nd

    “…and to not eat a burrito the size of a 1980s Suburban before doing so. My god.” 😂😂😂

    Reply
    • Bernadette Rankin : Jan 2nd

      I was a kid carpooled in the 1980’s in said Suburban with zero shocks just barreling through school zones, jumping speed bumps and skidding through s-turns…and that’s exactly what that burrito acted like as it wrestled with my stomach and careened through my intestines. EXACTLY LIKE THAT and it deserved its own theme song as it did so, my goooood.

      Reply

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