A friend and I went backpacking for six days - Onion trailhead over Kearsarge pass, down the JMT to Whitney, back down the west side and then out to the car we left at Horseshoe Meadow.

We saw rain in the distance for the first day, got a few sprinkles. It was scattered clouds the next day, we went over Forester pass and stopped at Wallace creek for the night. Reached Crabtree ranger station to catch the ranger before he left on patrol - he said the night temp at Guitar was supposed to be in the teens, and wind on the crest was anticipated to be 60 mph.

Since my friend had a (supposedly) 20 degree bag and was cold at 30F the second night, we had a chat while eating lunch and decided to just go. Wind like that was not something we cared to mess around in, and neither one of us could justify trying - the mountain will be there.

We hiked on over to Rock Creek and camped, and made it to the car on the fourth day at dusk. after heating water to clean off before changing into street clothes, we went for a burger in Lone Pine and drove to Mojave for a Motel 6, then on home in the morning. The winds that night were so bad we were being pushed off the road just driving in the desert. The pass was probably worse.

I even told her we could pick up a released permit and day hike it - we'd been doing 15+ miles per day with 25 lb backpacks, after all. No soreness, blisters or anything. After Forester without issues related to altitude, we'd have whistled up the switchbacks and down again. But she's self employed and once off the mountains she couldn't resist the pull.... Also it might have had something to do with hiking over New Army pass with every stitch of clothing she had on, and still being cold. It sure looked like snow would come down on us any moment. We saw a ranger on the pass too - she was wearing one of those heavy bomber jackets and a hat complete with furry ear flaps, and she looked cold!

I think the only real loss I felt was seeing all those golden trout in the water every time I looked, and being too focused on hiking or too tired to pull out the fishing gear. Went down to rinse my face at Rock Creek and almost put my hand on a golden right in front of me. And then to hustle through Cottonwood Lakes without even throwing in a lure... but it was really cold.