Day 3 would prove to be the hardest day of the trip, at least on paper.
We went over 16 miles and climbed over 4000 feet, from Little Pete Meadow, down Le Conte Canyon,
up Palisade Creek, past Palisade Lakes, over Mather Pass, then camped in Upper Basin.
We lunched at the 10,000-foot level along Palisade Creek, and I remember being really tired.
It was here where we first met the "Iron Family", a family of 5 (mom, dad, 3 girls) who
were hiking the entire JMT, from Tuolumne Meadows to Whitney Portal.
They were pretty fast, and to our surprise, probably did around 15 miles that day.
We cruised by the Palisade Lakes, where everyone got a second wind.
At that point, you're sort of caught in an inconvenient spot.
You could camp at the first Palisade Lake, undoubtedly a great place,
but you've only gone 10 miles for the day, and we needed to cover more mileage.
Only problem was, the next obvious stopping point was on the other side of Mather Pass,
over 6 miles past the first Palisade Lake.
Luckily the weather held and the trail over Mather Pass was a marvel of modern
trail engineering, with a constant grade and nary a boulder blocking the path.
We found a lovely campsite next to a tarn at 11,500' in Upper Basin which gets lots of
evening and morning sun and has dandy views of Split Mountain.
day3
