Many commentaries and translations suggest that. Yet most of the time people continue to deal with the two events in one passage. Why? Because Mark lets the two flow into each other. The explanation for this fact would be that Jesus first intended to give the returned Twelve a short time (ὀλίγον, 6:31) of rest in a desolate environment without others being present (κατʼ ἰδίαν, 6:31), but he had to change the plan because the crowds had followed them. Gould1 even sees here a sign of Jesus’ humanity: he had not foreseen that his plan to give rest was not realizable. The Twelve disappear with their need for rest behind the crowds with their need for food!
On further consideration, however, there are reasons to challenge this idea. Jesus could also have sent the crowds away for the sake of the Twelve. He does, after all, send them away at the end of the day (6:45)! And after the people have eaten, Jesus does not as yet seek the moment of rest: in fact, the Twelve are even sent away on their travel ahead of him (6:45). It is also not true that the disciples disappear behind the crowds: they are used in preparing the food (6:35–38) and in handing it out (6:41). The miracle that happens seems a bit superfluous: after the meal the crowds are sent away so that a few hours later they could also eat in the surrounding villages and hamlets (6:45–46; 6:36). Moreover, the miracle is closely connected with the reason why Jesus wanted to take the Twelve along to a quiet environment. Many people were coming and going, so that “they had no leisure even to eat” (6:31). What the Twelve missed at their return they find unexpectedly in the desert in the midst of the crowds: a wonderfully proper moment to eat (6:42–43)! This miracle certainly had to say something to the crowds, but Mark shows first of all that it meant something to the returned Twelve: Mark later comes back to their (delayed) reaction (6:52) and Jesus later reminds them of the meaning that this miraculous meal should have had for them (8:17–21). There is every reason to see Mark 6:30–44 not as a story with an unforeseen disappointment in the course of happenings but as one that shows how Jesus gives a short time of rest to the Twelve when they have come back from their travels.2
30 The apostles returned to Jesus and told him all that they had done and taught.