Moments in Dirt and Ink

Yosemite National Park DAY 1  |  DAY 2  |  DAY 3  |  DAY 4  |  DAY 5  |  DAY 6  |  DAY 7  |  DAY 8 Purple line for day 7. Click for interactive map While we thought we'd met quite enough people on the previous day, we were prepared to meet even more on this day. Still, it is super annoying to have to wait for a bathroom miles into the backcountry where no fewer than 4 are provided side by side. It's on the side of the camp where the day hikers, with their precious permits won in a lottery or their hopes that someone with an extra spot will let them through, slide past and they frequently stopped for it. Half Dome looms over the camp at Little Yosemite Valley, just about to get hit with dawn sun. We headed back to the trail on the opposite side of camp from the stream of day hikers. That trail joined the John Muir Trail soon enough and every few minutes another group came along. The Merced River...

Yosemite National Park DAY 1  |  DAY 2  |  DAY 3  |  DAY 4  |  DAY 5  |  DAY 6  |  DAY 7  |  DAY 8 Blue line for day 6. Click for interactive map The location of the Merced Lake Ranger Station is deep in a canyon in a thick forest and it wasn't much less dark and dreary in the morning than it was in the last of the light. I know Daniil would have preferred to go that last little bit to Merced Lake the night before. There's only a few little things we would have missed in the last of the twilight. Following bridges and trails through the flats above Merced Lake, surrounded by tall trees. Then everything opens up as the rocks take over the bottom of the canyon. Merced River pours into Merced Lake. We found the High Sierra Camp in its winterized state, and some of that in a bit of disrepair. Apparently these haven't been open since 2018 although 3 of 5 opened briefly last year. The park service...

Yosemite National Park DAY 1  |  DAY 2  |  DAY 3  |  DAY 4  |  DAY 5  |  DAY 6  |  DAY 7  |  DAY 8 Green line for day 5. Click for interactive map Morning came and we needed another early start because it would be the longest day of the trip. We didn't get it because we were feeling the long day prior, if only a little bit. And anyway, it's all downhill. Morning on the upper unnamed lake by camp. The lower lakes and Triple Divide Peak and neighbor sporting a last piece of snow. We found our way to the trail to start the long day's downhill. The long downhill begins. We soon came to a junction that clearly told a tale that most people turn left. Petr already took much of that trail the prior year, so that was not the plan. We would be following the higher trail instead. While lesser traveled, it was still very clear and had plenty of footprints to tell of recent users. On a thin and well...

Yosemite National Park Sierra National Forest DAY 1  |  DAY 2  |  DAY 3  |  DAY 4  |  DAY 5  |  DAY 6  |  DAY 7  |  DAY 8 Yellow line for day 4. Click for interactive map It was noted that we had started at 8:13AM on each camped day so far and maybe we should try to get along a little bit earlier. So we did. Following the rough, then just faint, trail back to the main trail. We arrived at the junction at 8:13AM, which somehow didn't feel like actually getting started earlier. And then we proceeded up, dallying at every little new thing as two of us are apt to do. A look back at the pond and the somehow better hidden, though much larger, Breeze Lake. The rockfringe willowherb is not actually new. And the Shasta knotweed is new even if it does look a bit like beach knotweed. We arrived at the top of Fernandez Pass, the very edge of Yosemite National Park. I had noted a "Mon 133" marked...

Yosemite National Park DAY 1  |  DAY 2  |  DAY 3  |  DAY 4  |  DAY 5  |  DAY 6  |  DAY 7  |  DAY 8 Orange line for day 3. Click for interactive map We set off from Royal Arch Lake determined to get a little more miles under our feet than we'd been doing, with some talk of going all the way to Rutherford Lake. There was also some skepticism about committing to Fernandez Pass so late in the day. First, we had to wander a little further downhill before catching a new trail up and over an unnamed pass. Along the way, we encountered the first people since Buena Vista Lake. Getting a start on the day. There's no view going over this pass. /> A mule deer ponders if it is worth running off. Over the top, there were meadows with a few flowers and views.

Yosemite National Park DAY 1  |  DAY 2  |  DAY 3  |  DAY 4  |  DAY 5  |  DAY 6  |  DAY 7  |  DAY 8 Red line for day 2. Click for interactive map Yosemite bears are legendary, so the middle of the night sounds of one roaming up the creek were mildly concerning. It is true that most bear-at-night sounds are actually deer, but deer rarely roll rocks around with each step or two. It went right on past without checking out our camp, rolling rocks off into the distance. With morning, we found our bear cans undisturbed. Breakfast was had and we packed up and got moving. A view across the valley. The dead trees may be from the 2016 Lakes Fire. We saw several lesser used camps along the way, but none with obvious water access. While we were looking forward to checking out Buena Vista Lake, we had the few lesser puddles of the Chilnualna Lakes to check out on the way. There are three, but only the two sm...

Yosemite National Park DAY 1  |  DAY 2  |  DAY 3  |  DAY 4  |  DAY 5  |  DAY 6  |  DAY 7  |  DAY 8 Brown line for day 1. Click for interactive map Petr had a delightful trip around Yosemite last year and planned a new delightful trip around Yosemite for this year too. He planned a large loop out of the Ostrander Lake Trailhead off the Glacier Point Road. The return would be via Mono Meadow Trailhead, a short road walk from the start. It is a narrow road with no shoulders and typically low National Park speed limits that no one feels remotely obliged to obey. But it's short. Daniil got invited and could invite others and that ended up just me. We know Petr because he's the sawyer and cook extraordinaire who has been on/in charge of all the best Bigfoot trips . We got ourselves up and out early to pick up our permit at the wilderness center at the Wawona Visitor Center only to find we had to wait until...

Yosemite National Park Being near Glacier Point and having someone along who had never been to Yosemite, we had to take the little extra drive to the end of the road and have a look around. We started at a nearer lookout point before getting out to the main feature view point. It's not as jarring as looking up at 3000-5000 foot cliffs, but it's still an impressive way to look at the grand valley. There's some of the Yosemite Valley with the cliff of Half Dome standing over it. And over here, if you know where to look on a lower cliff facing the photographer, is Nevada Fall below a smaller dome. It was smoky, as we expect of an August day. Except, hold on! When I was very young, they had many smog days. When I was older, they had signs about how they used to have bad smog days and what was done to clean it up. As a teenager, I had a few backpacking trips in these Sierra Nevada mountains and not a single one of them was smoky even though they were in August. But no...