Devils Path Day 2

May 23, 2014
Devils Path Eastern 1/3-  Indian Head Mountain (3600) & Twin Mountain (3640) & Sugar Loft (3800)
Prediger Trail Head - 7.85 miles - Mink Hollow Shelter

I was pretty bored last night being by myself and fell asleep early around 8pm after listening to my audio book. I was awakened at 12:30 am with heavy rain. I did not have a good night sleep since I just kept on tossing and turning. I just could not get comfortable along with the sounds of the rain made it a  long night. Did say I hate my Exped Pillow Pump for inflating my Exped UL 7 pad.  It will be up for sale soon. I ordered a new down pillow from Feathered Friends which arrive next week.

I was up at 6am and knew I had time to kill before meeting the group at 8am. It is still raining so it was good experience doing camp chores in while raining. I was able to use my hiking kilt to keep me dry.  I as on the trail by 7:20 and waiting in the lot by 7:30,

The group 

Maria - leader

David - co-leader

Alex short for Alexandra

Jerry

Miriam

David & Emily

This is my 4th time hiking with Maria and second time hiking Alex. Every seemed very nice and were very friendly. We left 2 cars at the trail head and headed to the east end of the trail dropping one car for bailout. We started hiking around hiking around 9:30 and yes it is still raining

The first mile of the trail was relatively flat until the it intersected with the overlook trail. In the next mile and a quarter the trail went straight  up 1250 ft on a loose rocky and wet surface to Sherman's lookout. Like yesterday, there was large mud pits and stream/trails to walk in so it was slow going.

 

 Over the next mile the trail slowly rose 250 ft to Indian Head Mtn (3573) and then quickly down 500 ft in a half mile to Jimmy Dolan Notch. I have now learned the devils part of this trail, what goes up quickly must be followed by a quick descend. Once reaching the notch it is right back up to Twin Mountain (3650).

The longest .7 of the trail that seemed to take hours in the rain was the  most difficult and dangerous part of the hike. The trailed descended 900 feet and it felt more like bouldering to Pecoy Notch. So for every notch there is another climb. This time 1100 ft to Sugarloag Mtn (3800)

Our final decent of the day was to the Mink Hollow Shelter.  I forgot to take pictures. I still trying to get used to this blogging thing. One really neat thing was I met Syrus and Miki who is going to Summit Mt Whitney the same day as me. We will be meeting at Guitar Lake the night before the final climb.

My first day of hiking lead me to believe this was not going to be too difficult. Now I know why the trail was named.