Left the Bay Area early Thursday morning and made it to the valley Wilderness Center near opening and managed to get one of the last permits out of the valley, albeit to Illillouette.
My ambitious route was to try and do a loop up to Vogelsang and back.
The weather, despite forecasts, was nice, and the crowds were manageable up to Nevada Falls.
On the way up, I met a pair coming down who were also carrying winter gear. I learned that they tried to do the Red Peak pass loop, but got turned around in whiteout conditions and an impassable creek crossing before Lower Merced Pass Lake. Hmm, my Vogelsang ambitions just took a hit.
Carrying on up the Panorama trail, I continued onwards to a campsite up the Illilouette. Found a great spot with an established fire ring and a stack of wood next to it, but decided to just explore the area and sleep early instead of having a fire.
The next day I backtracked to Nevada Falls and up the Merced Canyon. The crowds started to increase, and I was frequently asked “are you going up Half Dome?” (I guess it was the first day that the cables were up). The horde became non-existent past LVY, until I ran into another pair towards the burned out end of the valley. Eager to get more trail info, I found out that this pair tried to go up the JMT towards Tuolumne Meadows, but turned around at Sunrise HSC. They ran into solid snow above 8800, slogging their way through alternatively hard and soft snow all the way up. They saw my face, but looked at my gear and said “dude you’ll totally make it!”. Undeterred, I resolved to go faster upcanyon, stopping only to take a few nice pictures of the water flowing through Bunnell Cascades, to give myself extra time for the expected snowline beyond Merced Lake.
And the snowline didn’t disappoint, as I hit it on the climb beyond. Fortunately the snow was firm and consolidated, until the trail steepened and I began to sink. Proudly whipping out my snowshoes, which I had lugged up valley through 70 degree weather and curious looks from ambitious would-be Half Dome summiteers I continued to climb. But things began to take an ominous turn. Wearing snowshoes and having to route-find slowed my pace down from almost 3mph down to 0.5mph. Worse, it was taking a lot more energy. Lewis Creek was flowing well, and I began to worry about cold wet wades through the upcoming crossings. Relying on snow-bridges seemed dicey considering the soft snow beneath the surface crust. Then the last straw….the sky above me began to darken, although everywhere else was clear and sunny. Boom! a cold rain, and brief hail.
Failure… and a hasty retreat down.
In Echo Valley, I ran into another solo hiker carrying an enormous pack. Turns out he was section hiking the JMT to Red’s Meadows. Resupply at TM was not possible, so he was carrying TWO bear-canisters of food. He ran into solid snow on the JMT on the way up to Sunrise, but instead of slogging through it, turned around after only a short time of sinking and difficult route-finding. I managed to make it to a nice camp site and promptly crashed soon after dark.
The next day, I figured to try to attempt Cloud’s Rest from the north route and o/n near the Quarter Domes. The good news was that the expected mileage was low, but I was prepared for snow over half of it, and I was tired from the previous day.
The snow-line was higher than expected, probably because of the impact of the recent fire. Fortunately the snow was patchy through the steepest part of the trail and remained firm as the trail leveled off and the snow coverage became complete.
(snow picture)
But alas, the skies darkened….. and a distant boom turned into….
Hunkered under a tree, I resolved to wait it out until I saw a bright flash just a couple hundred meters away and a loud boom!. I quickly ran downslope to another big tree until the hail and snow stopped.
Post-storm, the route finding was relatively easy until I saw this last obstacle to the top….
Making it up to the top I ran into two other groups who were surprised at seeing someone approach through the narrow ridge of snow from the north. Seeing another phalanx of dark clouds nearing, I stayed only for a few amazing panoramas and cruised downhill.
The next day was uneventful, with clear skies, warm weather and no wind. Except the holiday crowds materialized, thicker than supposed hordes of mosquitoes beginning to emerge in the valley. “Dudes” in fleece and down soon turned into hipsters with leather jackets and yoga pants. Is that the new high-tech hiking fashion?
Managed to enjoy a beer and burger in the valley. For a moment I wondered why I could enjoy a table to myself with a view of the 4 deep crowds on the deck. Then I realized that in my fog of food that maybe I should have taken a shower BEFORE eating, and that this dirty guy with the multi-day growth plus a pack that looks like it belongs up on Everest really didn’t belong with the Irish Spring and L’Occitane scents of the masses…
Oh well, I had fun up there, made it back in good form and nothing else really mattered.
Until I had to drive home.
Edited 3 time(s). Last edit at 05/31/2016 09:04PM by OL.
At which part did you need to put snow shoes on?
