We’ve been gradually accumulating our backpacking gear over the last couple of years, and one of our first purchases we made were sleeping bags – they have down tops but synthetic bottoms, the idea being that down loses its insulating value when compressed whereas synthetics do so less. Our pads are lightweight air mattresses filled with fist sized holes and are designed for use inside one’s sleeping bag, again the idea being that the bottom insulation will loft through the holes and the pad will be as warm as the bag’s interior. Nice ideas, these, and we’re sure they work for some – however, they did not work well at all for us. Side sleepers we are, and our hips bottomed out through the pads unless we were on back or belly, and the thin synthetic undersides of our bags did not insulate well if, in our stirrings to find comfort on our pads, we exposed the bag bottoms to the nighttime air by twisting to any position but a horizontal plane. Long story short, both nights at Pear Lake were not at all comfortable, so now gear-junkie Chris has Jane’s approval to improve our sleep systems post-haste – a nice problem to have in the end. We took our time packing up camp, so long in fact that we were the last party to leave, save one other couple – taking some final photos at the water’s edge, we bade farewell to Pear Lake about 11:30am, proceeding north and west down the gentle grade and exiting the cirque. Our backs, of course, had been to the west on our way up Friday, and it was striking to see the western views now to our front – we had similar vistas yesterday on our way back from Moose Lake, but these seemed much more up-close-and-personal. We followed the trail as it rounded Pear Lake bowl’s west ridge, dropping southward into the Emerald Lake basin and exactly retracing our steps eastward from Friday afternoon. We passed a handful of day hikers and two backpackers heading up to Pear, and we soon found ourselves at Heather Lake again – we had planned only energy bars for lunch and we considered stopping at Heather to eat, but, once there, we met an eastbound solo hiker who reported seeing two bears on the trail near Wolverton. That news put Jane on high alert and killed her appetite, so we kept going, choosing to follow The Hump trail back west out of the Heather Lake basin. This trail, although lacking the grand views of The Watchtower trail, offered plenty of shady forest to walk through – the gradient on the west side of The Hump, however, was steep enough going downhill that we were happy we had chosen The Watchtower trail as our eastbound, uphill route. Other than being on bear alert, the trip west passed without much sensation – we crossed a spring-fed creek before dropping further south down the mountain, and we took an extended break and ate our light lunch at the edge of some large open meadows. Resuming our walk, we dropped further down, crossing another creek and rejoining The Watchtower trail – now on familiar ground, we picked up the pace a bit and finished the trip back to Wolverton without seeing any wildlife at all, much less any bears. Despite the sleep deprivation, our first backpack trip together was a great success – Jane got to visit some of the remote alpine country to which it’s really quite difficult to day hike, and we both completely enjoyed the experience of hanging out in the high country, cooking our simple meals and taking in the stunning scenery. A couple of our pack items are not worth the weight and will not be making any weekend trips in the future, namely our battery pack (device batteries easily lasted all weekend and did not require recharging), extra food that we didn’t eat, and a paperback book we brought but didn’t read. That said, a couple of other items were well worth their weight – our Alite Monarch chairs (a pound apiece) were awesome to have in camp, our Crocs were super-comfortable, lightweight but durable camp shoes (Jane’s been wearing them for years, but Chris is a more recent convert), and our Snow Peak titanium double-wall cups kept coffee hot for 45 minutes on 45 degree mornings. We’re already talking about adding another weekend trip to our summer itinerary, so hopefully we’ll have much more to write about here in the near future. In any event, we can attest to how Pear Lake stands out as a wonderful destination, whether visited by longtime trekkers or newbies – a fantastic trip.