- Day 1: Yosemite Valley to Florence Lake - 9 Hours ~20 Miles
- Day 2: Florence Lake to Mount Florence - 9 Hours ~3 Miles?
- Day 3: Florence Lake to the Valley - 7 Hours ~20 Miles
Hey! Ever since I got the view of Mount Florence from Mount Clark, I've been itching to try it out. I used Bob Burd's trip reports for most of my route finding. Mosquitoes were annoying, but not a huge problem. Mostly an issue around Merced Lake
First off, here's the route
Day 1 - Valley to Florence Lake
Climbing up and out of the valley was straight forward, the crowd dissipated at the normal rate. I saw one bear in LYV but all in all nothing out of the ordinary. The burn area of LYV was beautiful and quite.
LYV Burn Area - Does it have an official name?
Raging River
First view of Florence while comming around Bunnell Point. Well technically...I always thought this was Florence but its actually the false peak right before it. Florence sits right behind what we see here
Finding a spot to camp just below Florence Lake
Day 2 - Florence Lake up to Mount Florence
My plan was to head up to Lake 10,541 and then scramble up the "class 2" route to the false peak and then traverse over to the summit. However, there was so much snow that this was barely possible. I almost gave up when I saw the snow ridge (having only an ice axe on me). I decided that I'd rather climb then mess with the snow so I took my chances on the right. With multiple wrong turns and a couple class 4 moves, I finally made it to the ridge and I knew the only thing between me and the summit was shortness of breath.
View from Florence Lake looking up towards lake 10,541. If anyone attempts this route, stay as far right as you feel comfortable with. You'll save a ton of elevation gain.
The snow ridge I did not want to try and mess with. A pro could, but I'll take climbing over this
The view of a potential route when I decided to take my chances. It was either this way or turn around
Got over the ridge after earning some grey hairs. You can see the steepness of the snow ridge I decided not to take. I was still very glad I didn't attempt it.
Summit Registrar first entry, non-loose leaf
Views from the top toward the west
Views from the top toward the east
Day 3 - Florence lake to Happy Isles
Nothing exciting on this day. Beautiful views and another bear sighting. This one was close enough to see the tag on its right ear, marked #50. It took me 9 hours to get to my camping spot, and 7 hours to get down. I felt like I was flying down the mountain. I would have guessed I would have done it quicker, but I guess it was ~20 miles I was traveling and with lunch and breaks my average speed was a little less than 3 mph. I suppose that's about right.
Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/10/2017 07:26AM by gkam2.
