Taking a Sickie on the Trail

 As we pack up, Elena complains of not sleeping well and having some tummy issues, I feel fine for now. The program for the day is to climb up into Evolution Valley, which is rumored to be one of the most spectacular parts of the trail. It's not far outa camp the ascent begins, feel OK for a bit and then cramps begin.
Evolution Creek Tumbling Out of the Valley
The scenery going up is spectacular, Evolution Creek tumbles down to meet the San Joaquin in a series of waterfalls and slides, we're feeling worse and worse, Elena goes to poop on the way up, my cramps are getting worse, there's a crossing of Evolution Creek coming up and as we arrive I gotta rush off into the woods, shovel and toilet paper in hand.

Evolution Creek Meandering Through the Meadows
It's a croc crossing, no rocks to hop on. I'm now starting to feel very tired, a symptom of the body fighting the disease, whatever it is. We pass another hiker going North, no big pack and as we get closer we can see it's a ranger, he doesn't look like the National Park Ranger we saw in Yosemite though, more like the Forest Service Rangers at VVR, dressed in work clothes and he tells us he headed back to some meadows to check the grass length, the Park Service wants to know if it can support horse/mule grazing.
He doesn't ask us for our permits, nice.

It's another few miles to McClure Meadows, we manage to make it and get set up, more trips off into the woods shovel in hand, and we collapse in the tent exhausted, barely able to move at all. We don't wanna upset things any more than they already are so it's a very light dinner. We're camped in the meadow by the stream, it's a great spot, the meadow is lovely and the stream just ambles lazily along with little elevation change, a far cry from the raging torrent we saw earlier.
McClure Meadow in the Afternoon Sun

We try to figure out a plan for tomorrow, we're still on schedule since we left MTR early, even though the daily mileage total was only 5.7, McClure Meadow was exactly where the plan had us camping this night, that's the good news. The bad news is that we're sick and weak, and not sure how far we can get the next day, we now gotta make the resupply in 5 days at Woods Creek, without that there's no chance we can finish the trail.

We decide to go to the Rangers Station, which is close by, first thing in the am and see what our options might be if we can't hike out. It will also depend on how we feel in the morning, for the moment we're exhausted and go to bed early.

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