Day 56 - BEAR!!!!

Mile 793.5 to Mile 811.8 - 18.3 miles

I'd wondered if I would ever encounter a bear on this trek. Wonder no more!! About 2/3 up the long haul to Pinchot Pass I got to a flat area with some grass and rocks when just like that....a bear wanders in to my line of sight no more than 20 metres away - a black bear although this one was tan coloured and large. I stopped and reached in my pocket for my phone to take a picture but as I keep it in a zip lock the sound alerted the bear who gave me the once over (figured I looked old and chewy) and wandered off in to the trees and out of view. Whoah!! That got the adrenaline flowing...
The rest of the day wasn't quite as dramatic as we had a long 7.3 mile uphill to rise 3600 feet to reach Pinchot Pass at 12139 feet.

While there was a bit of snow, it was not as bad as Glen Pass & the view ahead from the top held no fears either

I've got as far as the base of the climb to Mather Pass, which I can tackle first thing tomorrow. I'm camped next to the South Fork of Kings River.
Earlier in the day I had a rare surprise. Having spent the last week crossing creeks on stones or logs or just ploughing through them in my jandals, we had......a bridge!!!!

I still had to ford at least 4 rivers today in my jandals.
Also, just after the 800 mile mark at the beginning of the climb, I came across this water shute in Woods Creek

The water was fair barreling down this rock slide. In fact, for the first 3 miles of the climb, we had the creek for company as it roared with snow melt in endless cascades, waterfalls & rapids...very impressive. Weta