Hi Bill,
Sorry for the delay in responding. I actually have been intending to summarize my trip on here, but have been quite busy since getting back, but I will get to that soon hopefully. Briefly, My nephews (17 and 15) and I were in Yosemite from July 18 through July 30. Our itenirary:
July 18: Arrived in Valley midday and after tending to various errands hiked up the mist trail to Nevada Falls and back.
July 19: Took Tour bus up to Glacier point, the site of our trailhead. While there we hiked up to Sentinel dome before heading in along Panorama trail, then heading south along the base of Mt Star King for our required first night in the Illilouette drainage.
July 20: Back to Panorama and onward along John Muir to Little Yosemite Valley where we decided we'd spend the night. We left our stuff and hiked up to Half Dome and back.
July 21: Left LYV and headed up the Merced Canyon to Merced Lake where we spent the night in the backpackers camp. (This was a beautiful hike as the water volume was still very nice and the water was alongside us for most of the hike).
July 22: Merced Lake to Vogelsang along the Fletcher route. I had planned to do the Lewis route but the first few days were catching up with me and I was not viewing the considerable additional elevation and distance favorably at that point. Still want to do it though. Even on Fletcher, lots of going UP. My pack was heavier than I'd have liked. At Vogelsang: Mosquitos!
July 23: Vogelsang to Tuolumne Meadows via Lyell Canyon. Again, this was a very enjoyable hike as the terrain encountered was quite varied and beautiful. We pressed hard once in Lyell Canyon as we needed to get to the Post Office to pick up more food before it closed. We arrived with 15 minutes to spare. TM GRILL: Need I say more. Stayed in backpackers camp, where a camper who slept outside that night was awakened in the morning with a nice rub on the nose by the nose of a bear cub, with mama watching carefully a few steps away.
July 24: TM to Long Meadow, just north of Sunrise. Got a late start, encountered biblical plagues of mosquitoes at the lower Cathedral Lake, as well as a thunderstorm/rain, which alternated with hail on and off for about an hour.
July 25: Long Meadow to granite slabs south of Washburn Lake via trail that branches off from JM just north of Sunrise.
July 26: Continued on south and then west towards Red Peak, camping at Red Devil Lake, only it wasn't Red Devil Lake. We headed off trail towards the lake and soon my nephews spotted water which we headed towards thinking it was RDL. (Mosquitoes ). The next morning, checking my GPS, I discovered we were not at Red Devil Lake, but instead at some puddle east of there.
July 27: Across Red Peak Pass, where we lost the trail a few times because of snow (it's much easier looking down to piece the trail pieces together than looking up). We continued on, past Ottoway Lakes to the Upper Merced Lake, where we had an outstanding campsite on a chunk of granite up high looking down upon the edge of the lake. Took a swim in the lake -- very nice.
July 28: Headed south across Merced Pass then west past Buck Camp Ranger station, Johnson Lake, Grouse Lake, Crescent Lake ultimately camping near Chilnualna Falls. On this day we were pushing hard as we wanted to get to Wawona the next day. I had a moment when my nephews were somewhat ahead of me on the trail, I knew a junction was coming up near Chilnualna, and I needed to take the left trail. I stopped to check my GPS, which indicated that I was on the wrong trail. It was about an hour before total darkness and I panicked a bit as I thought maybe I had missed the junction and my nephews were perhaps somewhere else. This led to me leaving the trail trying to find the correct trail, to no avail, back tracking a couple times, etc. Eventually I decided to continue on original course where I eventually got a response to my calling for my nephews, who were also looking for me. I had been only a short distance from the junction when all this started. The problem I later discovered (other than not trusting myself), was that the GPS was using a map that was WRONG. I thought I was looking at USGS quads, but at that resolution, it was displaying the Delorme TOPO map. In this area it was completely wrong about the trails. Had I been actually looking at the USGS quads, this would never have happened. Again, here we had an awesome campsite (which I arrived at about 10 minutes before darkness) overlooking the lower Wawona area.
July 29: We went to Chilnualna Falls and headed down the long (LONG) switchbacks, arrived in Wawona, continued to the Wawona Store, ATE (!), boarded bus to Mariposa Grove and explored that for 3 hours or so. This had been the prime motivation for the final choice of trails on last day or two. We hitchhiked back to the Valley, enjoyed dinner in Curry Village, spent the night in the backpackers camp.
July 30, exited park on YARTS, Amtrak to Sacramento, and back home.
Hiking distance: 120 miles. climbing elevation: 35,000 feet; Descending elevation: 40,000 (elevations includes mist trail and sentinel dome day hikes).
Because we were moving quickly through the south part of the park to Wawona, we didn't get to really stop and look at things much. I'd love to do the hike you described above that goes by Buena Vista Lake, Royal Arches, etc.
As I was hiking past Buck Camp Rangers Station towards the junction to Royal Arches, I recalled a statement you made to me in one of your posts about the other people in your group protesting wildly at the proposition of continuing uphill to Royal Arches. Now I know why. The hike West of the Rangers station seems like an endless climb upwards.
Thanks so much for your advice. When I return to Yosemite, I plan to linger at some places that I moved on through this time.
It was a great trip. It was the first time ever hiking of any kind for my nephews. Yep, it was a big trip for the first time, but they loved it, and are hooked. They are now back in school, but dreaming of Yosemite. That was the point. I didn't want them to wait until they were in their 40's before they saw the place like for me. Hopefully this will be the start for them of a new and enriching part of their life.
Thanks again.
Frank