I started my day taking CanCan and Bandit to Mammoth. We stopped for coffe and breakfast and then headed for donuts (2nd breakfast). I then dropped them off at their hotel to get town errands complete.
I thought about seeing a movie but did not realize the theater only played day time shows on Saturday. Maybe tomorrow I will relive the movie experience again.
I headed to Von’s to purchase some non needed items and headed back down the valley to Red Meadows Campground. Along he way I saw two PCT or JMT hikers walking the road and stopped to inquire. They had planned to walk five miles on the road to the trail head… Silly hikers! I had Holland and Oates at the PCT trial junction in 15 minutes.
I spent some time arranging the acquired firewood I had to make it easy for me to maintain later. My backpacking friend Joe would have been proud!
And then something odd happened. I realized I had been sitting for over an hour looking over this beautiful meadow in front of me. Nothing on my mind really… Maybe a few fleeting thoughts about missing Butterfly and wishing I was on the trail but even those were distant. Just me and the meadow with the wind and birds as my music.
In the middle if the night at about 1am I was walking back to my tent when I noticed two eyes watching me to the right. I continued walking towards my camp and then stopped. We had a stare down for about a minute. In then turned and started walking into the meadow. That was not the coyote I was expecting to see… I had just seen my first mountain lion! I slowly went to my tent turning back every few seconds just to make sure nothing was there…
Very lucky to get to see a Mountain Lion in the wild. Doesn’t happen often. Makes you realize your not at the top of the food chain, and your in his backyard!
Good luck on your continued journey.
I am glad you are away from that mountain lion! It must be an awesome moment, to look into those eyes though! What an incredible experience!!
I understand! One of the rare moments in 50 years of hiking was seeing a mountain lion up close. I was camped in the middle of nowhere and it was almost dark so was walking very quickly back to my camp. Suddenly a mountain lion came out of the brush walking the opposite direction down the trail, which was about the width of a 1 lane road. I continued walking at the same pace but moved to the right if the trail. The mountain lion moved to the opposite side of the trail as we passed each other. She was a beautiful animal up close. Since then I’ve had a respect for mountain lions that is hard to describe.