2 weeks to go...

Camp SOCK kicks off this Sunday with counselors arriving in the evening for a day and a half of fun, training, and fellowship before the campers arrive Tuesday morning on July 27th.



Sheila, the craft lady who gets everyone into tie-dye, is hoping the Coasties show up again in their Hawaiian garb... So are most of the other female counselors.



Walk 4 SOCK is still scheduled to kick off on August 5th... Tuesday, August 3rd, I will depart Klamath Falls, Oregon, on Amtrak's Coast Starlight train at 10pm and head southbound to Merced, California and catch a bus up to Yosemite Valley, arriving at 1pm or so on August 4th to the blessed 100 degree heat on the floor of nature's most famous "Ditch". The $95 train/bus fare amounts to the cost of gas in my pickup for the same trip, without the hassle of driving and the wear and tear on the vehicle. Plus I get to sleep all the way there.


Once in Yosemite, I'll grab my wilderness permit from the Visitor's Center. I reserved the permit way, way, WAY back on February 18th, 24 weeks prior to the departure date. Fewer and fewer hikers are allowed into the backcountry these days. I missed getting a permit for two of the days prior due to the request load. Even Half Dome requires a permit now to limit the dayhikers.


After snagging the permit, I'll head over to Camp Curry and carbo-load at the all-you-can-eat buffet at the Curry Village Pavilion, then curl up next to a tree somewhere and catch a quick nap... I will have to store my food in a bear box near the trailhead while I take a nap. Sometime around 11 pm, I will force myself up and out onto the trail for a midnight plus one minute start on August 5th down the 211-mile John Muir Trail. Or should I say "up" the trail, as the first 13 miles or so are all uphill. Hiking by starlight and headlamp, I hope to make it to Tuolumne Meadows, 20+ miles down the trail, by 10am. This, of course, is the "ideal" scenario...

The "not-so-ideal" scenario sees me arriving late to Yosemite, having to wait until the morning of August 5th to pick up my permit, and starting in the heat of the day. Time and the flow of Amtrak along their scheduled route will be telling of which scenario pans out.

I have been nursing my bad knee back to health. I am going to give it a good testing tomorrow up on Mt. Scott in Crater Lake National Park. Keeping my fingers crossed and the ibuprofen within reach. By the way, that's some other dude in the picture below running the Mt Scott trail... not me. I can only wish to be so slim.

More to follow... 13 days to go until Walk 4 SOCK 2010 kicks off. See ya 'round...

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}:[: ) Ken "Moose" Muller
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