Circle the Cirque Crest

The historic Copper Creek Trail, used by Native Americans for thousands of years, and one of the oldest trails in North America. It was used by John Muir and his mule to get to Simpson Meadow on his trip down the middle fork Kings River canyon.

The Copper Creek Trail

Circle The Cirque Crest - By D.W.Donehoo (All rights reserved)

We dropped our loads once the trail stopped switchbacking and began the traverse up the Copper Creek Canyon, and took a short break to eat our belated lunch. We started off again, welcoming the more shaded climbing. For once it was Dave sucking wind on the slow grind upward, and I was thankful for the Sphinx Lakes trip I did two weekends prior that gave me a jump-start on conditioning. The heat was encouraging foot blisters however, which was to plague us both over the next few hot days. Eventually the last steep section of trail was crested and I was at Lower Tent Meadow, the lowest and most dirty, overused and boring camp of the trip. I dropped my load and scouted out the remaining camp-sites (others were there), then waited for Dave. After Dave showed up, we scouted the area, and I discovered two people I had met two weeks before on the Sphinx Lakes trip! Small world.
We spent a hot, uncomfortable, fitful night, got up early and hit the trail.