Distance hiked today: 1.9 trail miles + 3.5 to exit over Mammoth Pass = 5.4 miles / 8.7 km.
Today is town day, but we need to exit over Mammoth Pass to get there. This one isn't nearly as long as Kearsarge, only about 3.5 miles from the PCT to a trailhead parking lot. There's a trolley that comes every hour from town, so everyone's racing to get there to make sure they don't miss the first one at 9:30am. A hot town breakfast is calling after all.
It was a mellow and short hike out, and we arrived with lots of time to spare. We had breakfast at a restaurant before heading to a hotel hoping for an early check-in, and luckily they gave us the room at 11am so we could shower and get started on town things.
The best part about the town of Mammoth is the free trolley, like a public bus but with open sides. It runs through town every 15-30 mins so we can jump on it to get to the grocery store, restaurants, and hotel without walking. This is very important when off-trail... They also have the scooter rentals, which we rode to the post office and to the other end of town.
To snack on, we had Bear Can Charcuterie: meat, cheese, olives, dip, and pork rinds in plastic hotel cups, stacked on a bear can. Very gourmet.
We had a lot of extra food accumulated, and extra in our mailed resupply box since we're doing bigger miles, so I sent a box of food forward to another town. We send resupply boxes to "General Delivery" in most towns, which get held at the post office until I pick them up.
Because I need low carb food, it's harder to resupply locally where food options are mostly limited to traditional hiker options like ramen, instant mashed potatoes, chocolate bars, and candy. Instead, we make our own low-carb freeze-dried meals (Flat Out Feasts), chia seed breakfast puddings, buy keto protein bars at Costco, and I'll occasionally buy meat, cheese, nuts, and sugar free chocolate or other snacks if I can find some locally.
Total trail mileage: 903.3 miles / 1453.4 km