Several months ago, Chris secured a permit to one of the locations that had been on his bucket list for a long time: the Ritter Range, specifically Ediza, Garnet, and Thousand Island Lakes that lie in the eastern shadow of the range. The mountain ridge lies west of the Sierra crest northwest of Mammoth Lakes, across the San Joaquin River valley, and is most impressive when viewed from Minaret Summit just northwest of Mammoth Mountain – we had stopped at this vista point on our way back from our Yosemite High Sierra camp loop trip back in 2016. Unable to get an entry date on Friday, Chris’ permit was to leave the Agnew Meadows trailhead on Saturday of Labor Day weekend and first head 7 miles west to Lake Ediza, which sits directly below the Minarets at the south end of the range, for two nights, followed by a longer 8-mile Monday hike up the John Muir Trail (JMT) to Thousand Island Lake below Banner Peak at the north end of the range, before returning 9-10 miles to Agnew Meadows the following Tuesday. Got all that? Cool. Originally, we had four spots on the permit, but Jane ended up deciding to spend the long weekend in Wrightwood – in the end, we were just three, Chris, Pedro, and Carter, the latter two having yet to do a genuine multi-day backpacking excursion carrying both shelter and food. We spent Friday night at a cheap-ish hotel in Mammoth Lakes, rising early enough to be at Schat’s Bakery for breakfast and coffee at 6am before heading west to the Agnew Meadows trailhead, at which we arrived about 6:30 (if you pass through the Devil’s Postpile gate before 7am, you can park directly at the trailhead and not have to mess with the shuttle buses that service the area, which was a primary objective for us). After finishing coffee and making final gear checks, we started hiking at 7am sharp, passing quickly by the namesake meadows before beginning a mile-long 200′ descent into the San Joaquin River gorge – it was still quite chilly in the shade, but the day began to warm as we passed by the placid Olaine Lake and reached the Shadow Creek trail junction about 2-1/2 miles in. From here, we headed west over the river at a wooden bridge before starting the 650-climb up to Shadow Lake over the next mile – predictably, Chris was the slowest of the group in this section, but he caught up with Carter and Pedro as Carter was preparing to get a fishing line in the water. The lakeshore fishing spot was perfect for an early lunch break, so we all ate while Carter caught and released the first two of what would be 10-12 fish through the weekend. The lake is gorgeous, but its proximity to civilization has led to the area’s overuse, and camping is no longer allowed here. After about 45 minutes, during which the end section of Carter’s telescoping fishing pole went flying into Shadow Lake on his last cast, not to be retrieved, we resumed our hike west along the north side of the lake, treated to views of Volcanic Ridge to the south and the higher peaks up the valley to the west. At the lake’s west end, we met the JMT, along which we walked westward for about half a mile until we reached the next junction – here, we turned left and continued up the gentle valley on the Ediza Lake trail proper. We had heard a couple of weeks prior that a key log bridge over Shadow Creek below Ediza’s outlet had washed out in the surge of spring snowmelt – we had expected to have to ford the creek, but we found that they’ve rerouted the trail to an alternate creek crossing on some logs and (mostly) convenient rocks. This crossing was, of course, preferable to wading through, but quite a bit of the 30-yard tiptoe rock-hop was on smallish stones some distance apart – pretty sketchy without trekking poles to help stabilize one’s balance. Carter and Pedro had outdistanced Chris through this section, and he was alone when cresting the top of the trail at Ediza’s outlet – here, a ranger checked his permit, having let Pedro and Carter pass through earlier and taking their word for it that their paperwork was with the old guy behind them. They were waiting for Chris near the lake’s southeast corner, the east and south sides of the lake being closed to camping, meaning that we had to nearly circumnavigate the lake to find a camp site on the western side. The ranger had referred us to several level sites in a stand of hemlocks and lodgepole pines below some high rocks along the lake, and we quickly settled on two adjacent, well-shaded pads not too far from the lake’s inlet stream where we’d get our water. After setting up camp, Carter wanted to fish, so we spent the rest of the afternoon lounging about and enjoying the fantastic views before cooking dinner. Bedtime was not long after 8pm, the sun having set an hour before behind Mt. Ritter to our west. A full day, but the early start gave us plenty of time to rest and recover. Chris’ GPS inexplicably froze twice on the way in, but we figured the distance to be a little over 7-1/2 miles with about 1,400′ feet of total gain. More tomorrow…