This trip was a bit shorter than originally planned. We started off hiking up the McGee Creek drainage to Big McGee Lake to make our first campsite. It was a good location, up on a ridge but protected. However, the huge Perseid meteor shower that was supposed to peak that night never arrived, so we set our alarms for 4am for nothing. The next morning we left the trail and headed up a Class II slope (no trail, but no ropes required) Getting proved to be a lot easier than coming down, as the talus slope proved to be extremely unstable, with each step sending rocks sliding down a few hundred feet. As we got toward the bottom we then had to negotiate some ice crossings. We decided to hike out through Convict Lake drainage instead of crossing some more Class II slopes to get to Mammoth Lakes. We practically ran the final 6-7 miles down the hill to reach someone that had a phone to call for a pickup. The final mile I ran out of water, and got to experience some hallucinations of animals following me.. good times. :)
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