Yosemite National Park
The Yosemite.
How can I do justice to such a fabled place? John Muir whooped and danced with a wild burst of ecstasy the first time he saw it, and would go on to write about it extensively. Ansel Adams captured it's beauty on film and shared those images with the world. If this post can entreat but one person to make the pilgrimage to this park to see its beauty for themselves – I’ve done enough.
Rewind to five months ago, on January 15th. Campsite availability was being released for the month of June, at 8AM. It was 07:59:58, and both Vitali and I had campsites selected for June 3rd-10th. Our fingers were poised to click “Book”. The clock struck 08:00:00 and half a second later we clicked. "Sorry, that campsite is no longer available"... Frantically, we refreshed the page and grabbed whatever we could – which ended up being three nights -- June 3rd, 6th, and 7th. All different campsites. Well... we figured we could just get walk-up backcountry permits (for whatever was available) once we were in the park to fill in the gaps.
Time passed and occasionally I’d check the reservation page as plans sometimes change and sites become available. Nothing, for months.
Later, maybe in March, Yosemite announced they were implementing a day pass reservation system. Uh oh… That meant we’d be "allowed" in the park on the 3rd, 4th, 6th, 7th, and 8th with our campground reservation valid as pass, and now walk-up backcountry permits were advance reservation only.
Oy… As June 3rd approached we decided to go ahead and book campgrounds outside of the park for the days we were missing, since we didn’t want to chance not getting a backcountry permit. We booked two nights on the eastern side of the Sierra and two nights on the western side. It wasn’t perfect, but we would try to make the best of the situation.
Two weeks prior to June 4th I applied for backcountry permits. My first choice was two nights in Little Yosemite Valley – you can get up there, then hike Half Dome as part of your itinerary, outside of the daily lottery. Our second choice was Sunrise Lakes. I heard back a few days later and was approved for my second choice, but I got a generic email saying the trails in the high country were still likely 60% snow covered, so I didn't pick that permit up. I later hiked nearby and the trails were clear...
I then applied for our second set of two days that we were missing – once again, Little Yosemite Valley, with no second choice. I didn’t win the second application either. So it looked like we'd be stuck outside the park for four nights.
I applied for the Half Dome daily lottery while we were in Fresno -- for Friday the 4th, and learned later in the day that we didn't win. I missed the preseason lottery for Half Dome I think because when I checked it said the park was determining the process with covid and then when I checked again later the lottery had already opened and closed. So, our only option available was to apply every day for the daily lottery, and cross our fingers.
June 3rd arrived, and we packed our bags and made way for Yosemite Valley. At the entrance station we were given a blue pass for Numa, which had the next day as the day the reservation ended. Day passes were magenta, and the majority of the cars we saw only had day passes. I can't imagine coming here for only one day... but I guess if you weren't lucky enough to get a campsite that's the best you could do.
DAY 1 - Thursday
I will echo others in that nothing can ever compare to the first glimpse of Yosemite Valley after you exit the Wawona Tunnel, and take in the view at Tunnel Overlook. Perhaps the most iconic image of the valley, the broad U-shaped geometry, glacially carved, spread out before you – disappearing around a curve and into atmospheric haze. El Capitan looms on the left, a sheer granite wall that defies mental consumption. On the right, Bridalveil Falls rushes over the precipice in a silent burst. Half Dome lurks in the distance. A carpet of pine obscures the flat valley floor.
Vitali really had to pee though, so I couldn’t linger and take in the view. We sped down the road that would take us deeper into the valley and frantically searched for bathrooms. Nothing but an abundance of cars and people. Oh, and a controlled fire, which filled the air with its fragrant aroma.
Finally we made it to the campground gate and Vitali pulled up to the attendant. She started talking to us and Vitali’s impatience was showing. He looked at me with concern and then apologized to the lady and said “Sorry! I have to go!” He quickly exited the vehicle and sprinted away as the attendant starting laughing, while I was left to complete the transaction.
We set up camp (#120), and decided to go check out Yosemite Village. We’d need to cover as much ground as possible with our less than ideal camping arrangements so no time to waste! I did make sure to apply (time #2) for the Half Dome lottery for Saturday.
We got to the village and saw that there was a free bike share in the Valley, neat! We downloaded the app (reception was good in the Village, but non-existent everywhere else), and decided to walk to Yosemite Falls and then come back and pick up a bike and head over to Mirror Lake. We also noted that there were paid rentals too, $30 for half day or $40 for full.
Around Yosemite Village there are excellent walking and biking trails. Sometimes they are separated and people walk on the bike path anyway – but it’s still really well done. We walked to an overlook of Lower Yosemite Falls and I was immediately disappointed that I had forgotten my tripod in the car. Oh well, we’d have to come back later in the week. This waterfall is the tallest in North America -- it begins its dance with gravity 2,425' above the valley floor.
We opened up the bike share app and started to hunt for these mythical bikes. We walked to a corral where some were indicated and couldn’t locate any of the four bikes that were supposedly there… Hmmm. We continued back towards the Village and finally found two bikes back at the sign in the parking lot, where we first saw them. We hopped on and started riding towards Mirror Lake.
Except… the bikes were really hard to pedal -- stuck in a very high gear hard, and it didn’t get much easier once you were up to speed. They were cruiser type frames that were awkward to steer, and they hurt our butts. But! They were free.
We rode the few miles over to Mirror Lake and looked around. A lot of people. A stream. A meadow. We walked a little bit further and found something that could be construed as a lake. There were a lot of people in the water though, so I didn’t get to see much of the Mirror part of the name. Half Dome was looming over all of us , and the sky was darkening in the distance.
We rode back to the village (mostly downhill, thankfully), and returned the bikes and vowed they weren’t worth the trouble. I'd been in the habit of checking the campground availability whenever I remembered... hoping against all hope that something might pop up... and when I checked at the car a site was available for tomorrow night!
We immediately jumped on it and were so relieved that we wouldn’t have to pack up and leave the park already the next day. I also received an email saying our application for Half Dome was unsuccessful. We knew Saturday was the most popular day of the week to apply for, so I wasn't too disappointed when I saw it. In 2019, just 2.5% of the daily lottery applications were successful for a weekend day. A weekday had a little higher success rate, maybe double that.
We decided to check out one more place that evening – the Royal Cascades. We walked over to near the Ahwahnee Hotel and looked and looked – where was the waterfall? We could hear it, and then saw a sliver of water through the trees. Meh. We were tired at this point so we turned around and left. I later googled it and the Cascades were a long ribbon of water that dropped for hundreds of feet... oops! We stopped at some meadows on the way back and watched the sun set over Half Dome.
DAY 2 - Friday
The next morning, we packed up our lite version of camp, which was basically leave everything in Numa except for the mattress and sleeping bag, and headed down to Mariposa Grove, another grove of giant Sequoias. On the way out of the Valley we stopped along the road to look for climbers on El Cap and asked a person there what he was looking at. Turns out it was his son, his third day on the wall. I pulled out my long lens and sure enough – a tiny red dot – making his way up the nose. That someone was climbing this for three days defies comprehension.
I wanted to try and visit every area of the park at least for a few hours, and given the locations and days we’d be in and out of the park – Mariposa Grove made sense to visit first. The Valley was very warm for the first few days we were in Yosemite -- maybe mid 90s every day, before dropping to the low 80s for the remainder of the week. Mariposa Grove was hot.
We got to the grove somewhat early in the morning, and started out on the trail. This was similar to the other groves we'd been in recently in that there were multiple trails that met up and divested at various points so you could wander and create any length loop you wanted. We planned to do about 6 miles so we could do another hike later, but fate had other plans…
We are hiking hiking hiking, pass a big group of young men on the uphill 💪and then we come up to the second parking lot. This must be the accessible lot that only cars with placards were allowed. Great! We should be at the start of the grove trails now.
We continue on the trail, and then we run into another parking lot. Wait… if this is the accessible lot, what was that back there? I went and looked at the map again and realized we had inadvertently hiked 2.5 additional miles (for a total of 5 extra, roundtrip), because the gate was closed to the upper parking lot. Well... we were already here, so we decided to stick to our original plan of making the big loop. We saw the Grizzly Tree (a very large Sequoia which had a grizzled appearance, where Vitali met three flight attendants from Israel), the Clothespin Tree, didn’t see the Telescope Tree, (I think it was recently felled in the windstorm that had knocked down so many others in this grove), the Faithful Couple tree (two trees that had grown together), a log that someone turned into a cabin, and various other named logs, trees, etc.
We headed back and before we knew it we were back at the Visitor Center. It was newly constructed and very nicely designed. That was where I saw the quote from John Muir about the Sequoias that I mentioned at the start of the Sequoia NP post. The entrance gate was right near the grove so we exited the park and re-entered to get a new overnight tag since we were staying the night.
Back at the campground, we pulled in for the second time to check in, this time for #55. We told the attendants we’d see them tomorrow! After we set up camp we went back to the Village to look at the campground reservations. Maybe we’d get lucky again!
We learned we didn’t win the Half Dome lottery (again). I didn’t bother applying for Sunday since I knew the chances. I sat there for an hour while Vitali ran and refreshed the campsite page periodically… and somehow, I was able to book two more nights! I believe it was the 5th, and maybe the 10th. So we were missing only one night, the 9th.
Things were looking up! The 4th and 5th were weekend dates so I guess people were just changing plans at the last minute. Of the three campgrounds in the Valley (non-lottery), I only rarely saw availability come up for Lower and North Pines. All the cancellations were in Upper Pines, which had the most sites.
So we were feeling accomplished, and Vitali went to bathe in the river.
DAY 3 - Saturday
We started Saturday morning with breakfast sandwiches at Degnan’s Deli. I had seen on findmeglutenfree that they would change their gloves for you and make your sandy with gluten free bread, so I thought I’d give it a shot. Amazingly, they had been trained on cross-contamination protocol and I was able to enjoy a bacon egg and cheese! Yum. We took this opportunity to apply for Half Dome for Monday (time #3).
We drove up to Glacier Point, which had a spectacular view from the south rim of the Valley. You could really see the profile of Half Dome from up here, which was surprisingly thin. We watched hang gliders take off and head towards Vernal and Nevada Falls before heading west through the valley. Watching them pick up their wings and then run down the steep granite was something else entirely...
Heading back towards the Valley we stopped at Sentinel Dome, which was a short hike up to the top of a small granite dome which also had spectacular views of the Valley, in addition to a view of El Cap. We also stopped by McGurk Meadow which was a short hike down into another meadow. They're a dime a dozen here!
We would have liked to hike down into the Valley from the rim but there were no shuttle busses running.
We got back to camp and checked in to our new site, #88. We went to the Village and checked for Half Dome – unsuccessful again, and for our missing campsite night. Miraculously, a site became available while Vitali was running and there we had it – seven consecutive nights in Yosemite. That wasn't so hard, was it?
We had met someone at the Centennial Stump in King’s Canyon who said they met someone else who drove all the way from Ohio and didn’t know about the day pass reservation system and had to go to King’s Canyon instead. If only he knew he could wait for cancellations!
DAY 4 - Sunday
The next morning, we packed up again (this was getting annoying), and headed up to Hetch Hetchy Valley, hoping to escape the weekend crowds in Yosemite Valley. We’d check our next campsite every morning to see if it was vacant but we were never that lucky. A few nights all the other campsites around our next site would be empty, but ours would be occupied.
We stopped by the Village on the way out to apply for Half Dome for Tuesday, for time #4. Each time I applied it cost $10… in 2019, something like 30,000 people applied across the summer for the daily lottery. I knew Wednesday was the least popular day and therefore the most likely to win, followed by Tuesday and Thursday. Fingers crossed!
Muir described Hetch Hetchy as a perfect copy of Yosemite, and the similarities are uncanny. However the valley was dammed and filled as a reservoir for San Francisco. Muir was very against this but Big Water won out. Hetch Hetchy comes from an indigenous word for a type of grass.
There is a large granite face on the left, just like El Cap, but not as dramatic, and then to the right a large cone shaped projection, like a pointier (and full) Half Dome. It's as if this was the first mock-up for Yosemite Valley. There’s also a 1,000’ waterfall on the north wall of Hetch Hetchy, similar to Yosemite Falls.
We would hike to the Wapama waterfall. We started up on the trail and immediately ran across a rattlesnake. There's this thing you can do with cats -- when they are turned around you place a cucumber on the floor behind them. When they eventually spy the cucumber they usually become very alert and leap straight into the air. This is a defensive posture to avoid snakes. Humans do the same thing, and it's pretty hilarious. I have both witnessed this happening and done it myself in these mountains.
After the snake was navigated we continued on and gazed at the calm water of the reservoir, which was maybe 50 feet down below the trail and I spied a giant fish -- maybe 24” long. "Of course!" Vitali shouted, as he didn’t have his fishing gear. He paid for a 10 day fishing license (-$52) for Sequoia and King's Canyon and didn't catch anything.
The hike ended up being extraordinarily rocky. Jagged rocks comprised the trail surface, so it was a little slower going. Eventually we made it to the waterfall, and it was very impressive. Several bridges crossed below at it’s base, and the spray of the waterfall was delightfully cooling after enduring the heat of the hike in.
On the way back to Yosemite Valley we exited the park and stopped for gas, as well as to renew our overnight pass (again), and upon trying to re-enter we found there was a huge line. It only took some 20 odd minutes to progress through it but people were leaving their vehicles, walking around, acting like fools... I overheard multiple people say that their experience had been so much better since the reservations system had been implemented – fewer crowds, parking available at the trailheads, and it was great! It was crowded, but not overly crowded like I had seen RMNP and other parks get, so I was grateful.
We headed back to camp and checked in, this time for #96, and then went back to the Village to check the lottery, which was once again, unsuccessful.
DAY 5 - Monday
On Monday we drove up to the Tuolumne Meadows area (two awl luh may). As usual, we stopped by the Village on the way out to apply for Half Dome (time #5).
The views along the scenic drive were spectacular. The elevation was closer to 10,000’, and in the distance you could see the gentle waves of the granite domes all the way to the horizon. Beautiful lakes too, every which way. Muir described the rocks up here as shining in his essay, The Yosemite, published in the August 1899 issue of The Atlantic, and I didn’t understand what he could be referring to. Now I do. Water seeps from the cracks in the granite and the sunlight bounces off it, making for very shiny stripes on the rock formations.
We hiked up to the Gaylor Lakes Basin, which was a very short and very steep hike to a series of lakes where Vitali tried to fish but was unsuccessful. We also stopped at Tuolumne Meadows proper and experienced the pleasure ground that Muir would bring his friends to see. We also saw Soda Springs, which was a small spring where carbonated water issued forth. Pure, until it hits the surface and is contaminated by whatever is on the ground.
On the way back to camp we stopped by the Village and were disappointed again on our unsuccessful attempts to get a permit to Half Dome. We decided then we didn’t have enough time left to do everything we wanted and then leave on time on Thursday, so we gave up on Half Dome and decided to hike Vernal & Nevada Falls on Tuesday, and then Cloud’s Rest on Wednesday. We wanted to do one big hike here, and Cloud's Rest fit the bill -- no permit required, and even more dramatic views than from Half Dome. Thursday we’d be free to dawdle in the morning and then drive to Pinnacles at our leisure.
We checked in to our next campsite (#154) and picked up from the market a ribeye steak, a pack of mushrooms, and an onion and made the most delicious dinner we’ve had in awhile.
DAY 6 - Tuesday
The next morning we treated ourselves to a breakfast sandwich again, this time a sausage egg and cheese. Yum! While we were waiting, a dude came up behind us and tried to order a lunch sandwich -- a salmon sandy. The woman preparing sandwiches told him nicely that they were not serving lunch until lunchtime -- 11AM, and that he could order from the menu on the TV screen. The guy said "I want a salmon sandwich," and walked away while muttering under his breath "Thanks for nothing." How rude!
We went to photograph Lower Yosemite Falls in the AM and wandered around for a bit as I wanted to visit Vernal & Nevada Falls in the PM, as the sun would be in a better position.
We hung around the Village for awhile and then headed back to camp around noon to check in for our next site, #116. We set up camp efficiently -- it had already reached peak annoyance at this point and was now declining. We were able to start the hike to Vernal & Nevada Falls from camp, which was nice.
These two waterfalls were along the Mist Trail, the first portion of the hike to Half Dome, were we able to secure a permit. We were saving these falls for last just in case we were successful with the lottery – we could see them along the way.
It was steep! 25% average for quite a ways, and then 600 granite steps (half of them wet), from the bottom of Vernal to the top of Vernal. We powered up it though, only stopping to photograph the waterfall and a rainbow. This was Vitali's favorite hike.
We just noticed looking at the photograph that there was a DOUBLE RAINBOW!!!
After the top of the Vernal Falls the crowds thinned out and there was almost no one at Nevada Falls. We took some photographs and then left, and by the bottom of the trail my knees were in poor shape. We decided to not do Cloud’s Rest the next day in an effort to prevent actual injury to my knees... We’d just hang around the valley, enjoy our last day and take photographs, and then hopefully get up to Inspiration Point (where I had been trying to go to watch the sun set every evening but had yet to make it there).
DAY 7 - Wednesday
We took our time the next morning and started our photo tour of the Valley. We started with El Capitan, and then moved along to a beautiful overlook over the Merced River to Bridalveil Falls (which was great, considering the trail to the fails was closed for construction). We watched a very sweaty influencer film a workout with this view as the backdrop.
We stopped for lunch at Degnan’s – I had a roast beef sandwich and Vitali had a crab roll, both excellent, and beating the lunch rush by minutes -- after we sat down there was a line of 20 people. We walked around Cooks Meadow to digest, and enjoyed ambling about with full bellies.
We stopped by Sentinel Beach which had more meadows and a beautiful view of Upper Yosemite Falls.
We checked in to our final campsite, #153, and set up for the last time. This was our last chance to get to Inspiration Point so around 6PM we hopped in the car and headed up to Tunnel Overlook to wait. I was able to google Inspiration Point though (wanted to make sure that 1,000' of elevation gain in less than a mile was worth it) and turns out the view was not more inspiring than the Tunnel View, so we just parked our car at the Overlook and waited.
Gradually the light changed, became warmer, and clouds rolled in. It stormed in the distance. As the sun approached the horizon, the sky lit up like homemade vanilla ice cream. We didn’t get anything spectacular, but the pastel colors were a nice show. We did get a little bit of warm red on the higher cliffs around the valley though.
A perfect end to our trip to Yosemite. I think you could easily spend a month in this park (although there’s a 14 day camping limit), and not run out of things to do. We only spent a few hours in each area and barely sampled the wide variety of hiking and trails and sights. I would have loved to do Half Dome, yes. Cloud’s Rest, too. I could spend an entire day at an overlook, watching the light change.
These are all just reasons to make it back. The beauty of Yosemite is incomparable. To have so many beautiful arrangements of nature in one place is astonishing. The waterfalls, the granite cliffs, the meadows, the trees. Yosemite became both of our favorite parks, one we will definitely return to. Half Dome is unfinished business!
In the mean time, we were looking forward to our stay in a hostel in San Francisco, but still had one more National Park before then -- Pinnacles. Stay tuned!
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