Bugs: Hardly any.
Water: Good flows in many but not all seasonal flows.
Permit Process: If your permit is reserved then the Bridgeport Ranger District appears to print them out prior to your pickup. This is great, it makes the pickup process extremely efficient for reserved permits, they just find the permit they've already printed and sorted, you sign it, you're on your way.
Campfire Rules: When I picked up my permit in Bridgeport on Tuesday morning I was told that campfires in the Hoover Wilderness would be prohibited starting midnight the end of the day Tuesday (8/30).
Campfire Morons: On Wednesday morning (8/31) I saw a helicopter hovering for a while up ahead - beyond where I was hiking. Later I met someone on the trail who asked me if the fire was out...no idea what he meant, so he said he had hiked by an area where he saw someone with a fire on top of deep forest duff. He tried to help them put it out but the fire spread underneath the duff becoming too much. So... 1) Don't light a campfire on top of forest duff, existing fire rings on mineral soil only, or better yet don't bother, and 2) Don't light a campfire the morning after they become illegal.
Swimming:
Fremont: Nice rock entrance where I was, which was good because the bottom-squishies are a bit deep.
Dorothy: Perfect. Nice bottom conditions, nice temperature despite the wind stirring up the water, perfect.
Wilma: Perfect. You wouldn't think so given the grassy borders and lower elevation, but the bottom conditions are great, deep water is quickly reachable in the central and eastern portions.
Tilden: Perfect as well.
Roosevelt: The water clarity suffers a lot at this extremely popular lake 2 miles or so from the trailhead, but the bottom is reasonably firm, deep water readily reachable, temperatures near perfect.
Pictures...
Sunset from Fremont Lake. Probably because this was a Tuesday I had this rather popular lake to myself.
Lake Harriet:
Dorothy Lake, just inside Yosemite:
Upper Grace Meadow:
Lake Wilma:
Tilden Lake, and a view of Tower Peak:
The skies turned cloudy late Friday and stayed cloudy through Saturday mid-day, with the winds picking up a lot. When I reached Mary Lake the skies were still cloudy, but as I hiked around that lake they cleared, giving me a nice view.
The route up the col between Mary and Tower is a walk-up, with Mountain Willow being the only obstacle. Going down to Tower is also Class 2, though there's some talus to pick through, and I suppose earlier in the season snow would be a problem. The snow field at the top of the north side of the col was avoidable by walking around, and there were flowers growing beneath it.
There is a second area of snow just below a steep area closer to the bottom, that snow is a bit rotted.
Tower Lake:
One more...at the trailhead there's a new, higher, foot/horse bridge over the Walker River. This one is anchored only at the top of the banks on each end. It appears the reason for the replacement was that one of the footings for the older, lower bridge is being undermined by high water on the West Walker:
Edited 4 time(s). Last edit at 09/08/2016 06:21PM by ttilley.
