[pct-l] Hiker division out of Kennedy Meadows

[Eric Lee]

Lucky Man wrote:
>
Some others were leaving the trail at KM or WP for a few weeks, eg one guy
to attend his graduation in SL Obispo and another guy to work in LA, then
planned to resume northbound from where they left.
Many were planning to keep going into the Sierras, including some who
admitted they had no ice ax or crampons or microspikes.
>

At the risk of re-opening old and painful wounds, I'll observe that there
was a reason why start dates used to peak dramatically toward the end of
April (and it wasn't just the Kickoff).  Between the desert heat and a
normal snow year in the Sierra, there just isn't a very big window for good
start dates.

The permit system has done a great job of spreading people out evenly over
~8 weeks, with many people starting mid to late March, but now there's a lot
of people who have a big honking gap in their schedule when they arrive in
KM in early to mid May and aren't prepared/equipped to mountaineer through
the Sierra.  Last year's freakishly low snow levels masked the problem but
this year it's much more apparent.

It is what it is, and I think the permit system is (unfortunately) necessary
and beneficial; but the community needs to work on normalizing this, i.e.
making it common knowledge that you'll probably need to schedule a few weeks
off when you hit KM.

Eric