I really tried this time to acclimate to the altitude -- instead of jumping from sea level up to the trail I arrived to the park a day early to do a dayhike to get my blood pumping a little and then sleep in the Valley at 4,000. Ended up still not working very well, next time I'm looking into Diamox.
So I came to the park with Old Dood, set up in the backpacker's campground and then dayhiked partway up the Yosemite Falls Trail. From Columbia Rock:
From Oh My Gosh Point, middle and lower Yosemite Falls:
Next day I got picked up by Basilbop, JKW and Chick-On, and we headed up to the Mono Meadow trailead. Crossing Illilouette Creek:
From the creek we actually headed up towards the Panorama trail and then back to Illilouette, two long sides of a triangle rather than the single short segment, so that some in our party could check off some Trail Quest segments. First night's camp was a nice ridge just west of the Clark range:
Even though only about 7,300 ft and having slept at 4,000 the night before, I started feeling a bit of altitude at camp, not too bad though. Next morning, the sun rose from just behind Mt. Clark:
As we continued hiking up towards Ottoway Lakes I started to feel the altitude more, didn’t/couldn’t eat lunch, and later in the afternoon pulled off the trail. When the other three had gone through a round of “I thought he was with you”, Chick-On backtracked to me. We ended up camping near the Merced Pass lakes, nice views west to Starr King, HD, CR, etc:
And views back towards Red Peak:
Beautiful sunset:
The next morning we set out for Red Peak Pass:
The flotilla launched at Lower Ottoway Lake, while I hiked around:
The climb up from Lower Ottoway really isn’t bad, I had read about it being tough but it is nicely graded and supplemented with normal-sized steps in places:
The flotilla then took to Upper Ottoway Lake (in the background)…
…while I rested under the very last tree before the final push up to the pass. I still wasn’t feeling great but more importantly still wasn’t eating. Nonetheless, I was determined to bag Red Peak Pass:
JKW was very sweet, she kept feeding me energy chews and Cheetos, timing my water sips, and I do think it helped. The challenge with AMS is everyone tells you to keep drinking and eating, and yet AMS makes you feel like those are the last things you want to do. JKW kept me on track – thanks!
Almost to the pass. The trail is nicely cut into to approach – from here it looks like it will be a steep hand-over-foot scramble, but it’s actually a moderately graded, smooth trail. Do you see chick-on ahead of us?
At the top of Red Peak Pass:
The view back to the south where we had come from is amazing:
And yet it paled (IMO) to the new views around to the north and east, looking all up and down the Cathedral Range, the entire upper Merced River basin, and even the Ritter Range looked close enough to reach out and touch:
The trail down from the north side of the pass still had a decent amount of snow to traverse:
We don’t need no steenkin’ crampons!
Looking back up to the pass:
Descending to Red Devil Lake where we camped for the night:
Once at RDL the flotilla launched once again:
The next morning I parted ways with Basilbop, JKW and Chick-On, they headed back over Red Peak Pass to loop back to the car while I continued down to the Triple Peak Fork.
Crossing the Merced Peak Fork:
I still, still wasn’t eating, and I knew this wasn’t sustainable. There were times my stomach felt very hungry, but the dehydrated food I brought was just very unappetizing to me – I literally (literally!) was choosing to starve rather than eat it. I could feel the padding on my body had shrunk down to nothing, I probably had dropped about 10 pounds over the past 4 days. Whatever the reason, I knew I had to get back to civilization and get some food in me before I could even consider continuing on my extended trip. I decided to make it to Merced Lake HSC that day to see if they had a walk-up dinner available.
Reached the Triple Peak Fork and a blessedly level trail for several miles:
This area of the canyon is spectacular, where the Merced Peak Fork and Lyell Fork merge in quick succession, becoming the Merced River proper:
Eventually reached Washburn Lake:
From there it was just a few short forested miles to the HSC. And yes they had a walk-up dinner available! I chowed down on soup, salad, roast turkey, cornbread, veggies, and dessert. And about 10 cups of the electrolyte lemonade they serve. I literally (yes, literally) could feel my body putting the padding back on within a couple of hours. Slept at the HSC and ponied up for a cooked breakfast the next morning – pancakes, eggs, potatoes and fruit for me, though they also had oatmeal and sausage.
At this point I thought about regaining my original itinerary and going up to the Vogelsang area, but I felt that trying to go back to my dehydrated food would end up in me not eating again, so I decided to just head down to the Valley. Down past Merced Lake, fish were jumpin’ that morning:
The river again funneled into a canyon, and the trail criss-crossed the river as it descended through Echo Valley towards Bunnell:
Finally reached the burned-out areas of Lost Valley and the upper part of Little Yosemite Valley:
Soaked my feet at the top of Nevada Fall, watched idiots swimming just above the head of the fall, then descended the Mist Trail to the Valley:
Once in the Valley I called Old Dood to explain why I was done earlier than expected. We decided I should try to call the flotilla because they were supposed to be coming off the trail that evening as well, perhaps I could catch them coming down Glacier Point Rd and could get a ride out of the park with them. I left them a voicemail message and sure enough I got a call back a little while later as they were just getting into cell range but before leaving the park, and there were able to pick me up. Got back to Old Dood’s that night. Hung out at Old Dood’s the next day, changed my flight back to ATL for the day after that, and then headed home.
Maybe I could have continued to Vogelsang – sitting here now feeling better I’m telling myself that of course I should have. Maybe I would have found my dehydrated meals appetizing (as I have on past trips). But it probably was the smart choice to bail, and I still had done a classic hike around the Red Peak Pass loop, plus Vogelsang makes a nice itinerary unto itself for a future trip. So all in all a great time. Hope you enjoyed reading about it.
I’ll leave you with some of the beautiful flowers I found along the trail:
Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 07/27/2016 06:15AM by JRinGeorgia.
Glad you made it through generally unscathed. All the pictures are lovely (I'd love to do a hike through this region at some point) but I was especially intrigued by your shot lining up Starr King, HD & CR...I don't think I've ever seen them arrayed in quite this manner before...quite fascinating to me...all the more so because they make HD & CR look so far apart...almost all the views I've seen are from angles that make them appear right next to each other.
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