July 30, 2016

We arrived at the Tuolumne Meadows in the wee hours of the morning. Despite having driven the last 3 hours, Sadie was in business mode and volunteered to head over to the ranger station to get in line for permits for Katy and herself. The rest of us went to bed.

Sadie returned victorious at around 11:00am and we all rallied to greet her. Having confirmed that the girls had successfully secured the permits, Sadie's aunt and uncle said their goodbyes and got on the road headed home, another long drive ahead of them. Sadie was ready for some sleep at this point and turned in. Katy and I headed over to the store to charge devices and hung out there for a while before coming back and napping some more.

We woke Sadie up for dinner. This turned out to be a longer affair, as first dinners on trail tend to be. There were also plenty of other hikers in the walk-in campground to talk to. One of these was an interesting man, Bob, who we learned we would be hiking the JMT on the same schedule as us. He was a little strange and only really talked to me, the male in the group. Whiskey was offered but, again, only to me. Another trail personality to add to the list.

We finished cleaning up after dinner just in time to make it to CAMPFIRE! Campfire is an education program run by the park rangers each night around (you guessed it) a big campfire. I had seen the amphitheater gathering my previous nights bumming at Tuolumne Meadows but had not actually attended. I would highly recommend it.