We woke up still surrounded by snow this morning. We slept in because we barely got any sleep before summiting Mt. Whitney yesterday.

Before truly beginning today’s hike, we had to cross a dangerous stream. Luckily, the water level was lower than last night, so we crossed without getting wet.

The trail looked like a winter wonderland as we hiked through the trees.

Eventually, the trees thinned. As we hiked through an open field of snow, we could see Forrester Pass.

We also noticed bear tracks that crossed the path. Then, we saw a black bear! He was far away when we saw him quickly and easily climbing a mountain. He’s near the center of this first photo.

Right before Forrester Pass, we hiked up several steep switchbacks until we reached the famously sketchy approach.

Quickly after traversing the chute, we reached the summit.

We then began descending the southern side of the mountain. We hiked through several snow fields and crawled over rock scrambles.

A few hours later we hiked to level enough trail to remove our microspikes.

We found a beautiful alpine lake a touch off trail. We looked around for fish, but there were none.

We then hiked through woods for some time before it started drizzling. We quickly donned our rain gear and then passed by a river.

Despite the rain we spent some time by the river so that Sean could fish.

The rain increased as we resumed hiking. We hiked down near Vidette Meadow and set up our tent rapidly, motivated by the rain. We got soaked, but we’ll be heading to Bishop, CA tomorrow!