Emigrant Wilderness
Date: July 21-22 2012
Temps: Day 80's Night 40's
Elevation Starting at 9628Ft(Sonora Pass) up to about 11,000Ft
We left San Francisco 6am on Sat and drove to Sonora pass. Our goal was to climb up to Leavitt Peak via the PCT trail. We Started the climb up the first ridge from the road. There are 2 routes, one was a very steep short hike the but we took a less steep more round about route.
Top of first ridge
We continued to follow the the PCT trail to where we were going to leave our packs so we could summit.
A look at the lake, we were going to leave our packs before the summit and where we were going to camp for the night
We left our packs and started our trip to the top of Leavitt Peak. It started to get really windy, but it was a beautiful day.
A first look at the climb we had in front of us.
As we got closer we started to see our dreams of getting to the peak dwindle. It was 5:30pm and we still had 2 miles of switch backs to the top then 3 miles back to camp. We were only averaging 1 mile/hour. I think we underestimated the effect the altitude would have on us and it really slowed us down. We started at pretty much zero elevation in San Francisco that morning. We were really going slow.
We had to make the tough call and decided to summit a closer and slightly less high peak.
Susan making up our peak with Leavitt Peak in background.
Though it was not the place we wanted to go we made it pretty high and the views were great!
At the top of the peak she said "YES"!!! We got engaged!! My grandmother's ring, thanks to my mom!
Here is the location where we got engaged on my SPOT
http://www.findmespot.com/mylocation/?id=8kKue/38.26141N/119.61284W
Our hike back to camp went by fast and spirits were great.
We finally got back to camp and were so tired. We didn't hike far but did some climbing. We ate some dinner, drank a whiskey and coco, and were in bed before dark.
On the hike out we ran in to a couple who were doing the whole PCT starting in Mexico. They had been on the trail for 2 month. They said they were a little behind schedule.
On they way out we took the shorter, but very steep trail out the trail. It really was very steep, so we had to take it slow.
Though we didn't get to the Peak as we wanted, we did get to a peak and she did say "Yes" so all ended perfect. We already have plans to try the summit again, but will give us a little more time to acclimate.
