Failed Attempt on Mt. Ritter

I woke up and headed out just as fast as I could, the soaking wet sleeping bag meant that I was less miserable once I was hiking out. I started before the sunrise but only had to use my headlight for a short while before it grew light enough to do without.

Walking back down Glacier Pass was an adventure, especially since the fog followed me down, making it impossible to see where I had been. The slickness of the rocks also made the going much slower.

I continued on down, passing two lakes,

and heading on down the canyon. I paused to take this picture of Mt. Ritter and then kept on hiking. Once at the bottom of the canyon, one could see that the weather had gotten much worse,

and it was a dreary hike back down to Hemlock Crossing. I thought about camping there for the night, but my wet sleeping bag persuaded me otherwise. So I began the long hike up and out of the canyon, with all of the many switchbacks that entailed.

I passed two hikers heading down, and picked up a discarded long sleeve t-shirt that someone had hung in a tree along the trail.

I stopped for dinner once I was completely out of the canyon and took a moment to appreciate the beauty and how far I had come.

At this point my sleeping bag was still soaked, so I hiked all of the ways back to the trailhead, and slept in the back of my truck, then drove back to Summit Adventure the next day.