TRT Much needed rest day

It was hard to go to sleep last night because my legs were uncomfortable. But tiredness took over and I slept solid until 7am. We arose, continued our laundry and went down to the main building to officially check-in and pick up our resupply box which had the pancake mix in it.

So, The Echo Lakes Chalet is a green building that provides many services. They have a postoffice and small grocery store with great ice cream. They have boats, canoes, and kayaks for day rentals and they offer water taxi rides across the lake. Many hikers enjoy the water taxi because it saves you about 2-3 miles of walking along the lake, especially for day hikers that want to get to Desolation Wilderness quickly. It also services many of the cottages around the lake which do not have any road access. The chalet also has 8 chaletlees which are small cabins that each have their own kitchen, bathroom, and bedroom and a huge walk around porch to sit in the sun on. We got good at sitting that day. We planned for lunch to be deli sandwiches from the store, followed by ice cream. We sat and watched the fisherpeople.

Inside our cabin, we put two bar stools in the kitchen so we could sit as we made dinner and continued the laundry. Dinner was fabulous. A box of cheap red wine accompanied our veggie chili with pan fried corn bread (no oven) and fritos. We sat outside to eat and enjoyed the lake. We talked about coming back with Jen and Craig, two friend from church and PSR, or other friends from far away that might come visit us some day.

Looking ahead to tomorrow, 48 miles to the car. 4 days to go. We haven't been able to get an updated report about the snow. We don't know if it is safe to go across Dick's Pass yet. If not, I hope that we are smart enough to turn around and come back. The climb will be steep, 1000 ft in 1 mile. Right now my body feels pretty good, the feet only hurt when I put on the shoes. I will have to tape up my blisters before will leave tomorrow.

The only bad thing so far about rest and resupply is that the pack gets heavier with the new food. We tried to pare down the extra food and mail it home. One more night in a bed and then it is back out into the wilderness.