JMT Day 0 (and before) – Planning and Prepping

I hiked the entire PCT last summer. I squeaked through fire closures and road-walked when necessary. It was an amazing experience. I remember a thought I had on a day in early June as I was post-holing down Muir pass into a swarm of aggressive mosquitoes. The thought (that may have been more of a daydream) was, “I’d love to hike this section with no snow or mosquitoes.

And then, just a few months after completing the PCT, I managed to snag a John Muir Trail permit from Happy Isles SOBO beginning on August 16th. After a quick confirmation from my PCT hiking partner LP, we had the dates scheduled, and planning began.

I like hiking with LP because we both tend to approach our hikes the same day. We both wanted to keep our pack weight down as much as possible, and we both wanted to avoid hiking out any of the passes for resupply. So, we sent a box to Tuolumne Meadows, another to Red’s Meadow, and a bucket to Muir Trail Ranch (where we booked lodging for August 24th – more on that in a future post). We made all of our own meals, picked our favorite snacks, and shipped everything off a month ahead of our start date.

On August 15th, we got up very early and drove to Mono Basin Visitor Center. I called ahead to confirm that we could park there, and YARTS picked us up soon after for the two-plus hour into Yosemite Valley. We got there, and (mostly) kept at the day zero chores – picking up our permits for the JMT and Half-Dome, getting a camp site in the backpackers campground (more on that later), and having a little food.

From there, we set up camp (LP pitched my self-standing duplex like a boss), and we hung out in the Merced for a while waiting for dinner.

Dinner was an event worth exploring. During our planning, we discovered that the Ahwanee Dining room has a vegan tasting menu. We also discovered that the Ahwahnee has a strict(?) dress code, and I was told by more than one person while making reservations, that “hiking attire was not appropriate, and that I needed to wear long pants and a collared shirt”. So, after a quick visit to Junkee vintage clothing in Reno earlier in the week, I dressed up in powder blue tuxedo sweats (sweats with a blue stripe down the legs), and a matching powder blue collared shirt (and matching sun glasses as well). We were seated, and enjoyed our 9-course meal while we excitedly discussed what was coming up for us in the following days.

And the day 0 story continues. We walked back in the dark to our campsite. Not only did we pay for both of us and reserve our campsite, but we talked to a ranger who checked our permit and told us a hilarious story of a bear that got locked in a car with a pizza at a bachelorette party. Despite doing the right thing, we saw that an entire family had moved into our camp site, setting up two tents in our reserved site, shoving their stuff into our bear box, and had equipment sprawled all over our picnic table. We went to bed listening to their over-tired kids screaming at each other.

And it was ok, because we were starting the JMT in about nine hours.