>>429984My friend took more photos than I did. so he has the upper lake pictures, and then some.
On our way back down, we had to move quickly for two reasons. It's going to get dark at 1600, and the rain was making the many streams we crossed, and the hamma hamma river (crossed at two different points) more than twice the size.
My friend had just work sneakers, and was soaked out of necessity to cross the streams we were able to hop over before
This trail the entire way to the lower lake was basically like walking in a stream. By the time we reached the Lower lake again, rain had been falling for 2 hours. the lake looked like it was 1/3 bigger. Probably rose two and a half feet. The camp sites were covered in water. The fire pits were entirely submerged. It wasn't until then that we realized how dangerous it was to make the trek yesterday.
It was only raining moderately, too. I shudder to think what situation we'd have been in if it started pouring.
Hiked a total of 25.8 miles, with a gain of over 6000 feet (ant descent, obviously) We only saw one other hiker the entire trip. We trekked from 0800, and arrived back at my car at 1537.
Recovering today, as we pushed ourselves way harder than we should have, but i'm so glad we did it. My pack I had (day pack, with no waste support) weighed 16 lbs at the start. Weighed a lot less at the finish, as I polished off all 3 liters of water I brought right as we got to the road. (28oz of which was used for cooking)
6.5/10 trip overall. Can't wait to camp at lower lena this spring.
