SMT (Sanjay Malunjkar Trail) a.k.a. JMT (John Muir Trail)
Why No, this is not a midlife crisis, nor a pandemic thing. I have been baking sourdough for a long time and doing outdoorsy stuff for the past 2+ decades. First time I heard about John Muir was back in 1999 when I first climbed Mt Shasta over the avalanche gulch route. A book on Mt Shasta mentioned how his party survived bad weather atop the summit in late 19th century. That sealed his badass-ness in my books. Fast forward nearly two decades of backpacking/trail running and noticing JMT signs all over the sierras, I was convinced that JMT has to be the stepping stone of me foraying into long distance thru hiking. JMT was an ideal candidate because of its unparalleled beauty, relatively easy access from San Francisco bay area and not being as long as PCT/AT. I first trained for JMT in 2015-16 by running 70 miles per week. But I failed to start my planning in a timely manner and it was not to be that year. By 2020 I was running reasonably long distances pretty co...