Ediza Lake

PCT at Agnew Meadows was practically a traffic jam with steady stream of people poured out of High Trail. It must be the peak season in this section of the PCT. It's already June and people who started in April-May were arriving there. Good thing that there isn't much snow in the Sierras this year. It would've been a tough hike through the high Sierra in June if the snow level was normal. Still, there was enough snow to cover some of the trail when I hiked to Big Pine Lakes on May 21.

The trail today followed Shadow Creek pretty much all the way. After trekking for an hour, I met a fellow slow hiker who has been on PCT for 5 months. He must have left Mexican end of the trail in January. He was not going to get to Washington before the winter obviously, but he was not concerned. It was about experiencing the trail, not getting to the end of PCT, for him. He was probably who I will be if I ever do PCT.

Shadow Creek was more like a river than a creek. Impressive volume of water roared down the canyon and then widened into gently flow at places. It flows from Shadow Lake, which in turn gets it's fill from Iceberg Lake via Ediza Lake. When the trail veered from the creek and started to climb up, it became a waterfall gushing out of the canyon. I went off the trail, went down to the river and hadmy lunch there.

I'd have loved to camp by Shadow Lake. Its shallow, crystal-clear coves with sandy bottom would've been great for dipping too. But the destination was Ediza Lake, so I had to move on. No camping is allowed by Shadow Lake in any case. They must've wanted to keep pristine lakes pristine. Ediza Lake has clear water too, but debris and moss were floating around the edges where camping was allowed. The area around the outlet was clean and easily accessible, but no camping was allowed there. The inlet was supposed to be nice, but I had to hike further to get there. I was tired, so I pitched the tent by the easily accessible part of the lake. In all, it was about 10-mile day.