Most of the questions I asked recently have been building up for this trip. Thanks for the advice and knowledge. Had a wonderful time in the valley July 1st - July 5th. Wasn't nearly as crowded as I thought it would be. Warm weather but we chilled out in the river when it got too bad. Here is a quick recap of what we did:
Monday - Alcove Swing
Totally nuts. This swing is on another level of what I've done before. I read that it was a 10min hike from the parking lot...it wasn't, a lot longer.
Tuesday - Tenaya Canyon
Didn't make it too far into the Canyon but we had a great time going all over the rocks and messing around in the water. If I were to do this one again I would leave a little earlier and not mess around as much, just straight hike to get further.
Tuesday Night/Wednesday Morning
I was with a pair of people that wanted to night hike half dome and watch the sunrise up there. I've done this before and it didn't attract me as much. I opted for hiking up clouds rest and then over it to Tenaya Canyon (hitch hiking question). The nice thing about all-night no-sleep night hiking is that you get kind of delirious and the hike blows by like you're half asleep. Anyway got up to Clouds rest at 445 and chilled out for a bit. It took 5.5 hours to get there from the valley. The mosquitoes were bad even up there. I couldn't really sleep without them bothering me. I was the only one up there till about 545 and another sole backpacker came up. Beautiful sunrise. Got some cool long exposures. Left the top around 615 and headed down the north/east side of Clouds rest. Mosquitoes got worse...and then worse. It wasn't as fun as it could be and I couldn't really rest without them giving me a hard time. I forgot how much elevation gain and climbing there was going up to clouds rest from that side and I was just happy to be going down it. Got to the lake around 915 and went out in it. Lovely time. Then I made my "valley" sign and went out to the road. Got picked up by the first car that went by. Funny how things work out sometimes. Very nice German couple that was on their way to the valley for the day.
Thursday
Started off with doing Sierra Point. I thought this would be a whole lot easier than it was. Found the trail no problem and was on it for a good amount. I was with a couple other guys that thought they knew what they were doing but we ended up getting suck some where near the top. After we gave up I found the trail again and decided to take another option on my own. I kept seeing ducks and hints of the trail but I got to a point where I decided to turn around. As I was leaving the group I didn't make it clear that they should just go on without me so I didn't want to make them wait. Figured I would check out this forum and get the real information on it and keep going another time. We then went to Curry Village and did some quick bouldering.
Friday
Took off with a nice drive home back to the bay. Almost did the swing again but chose not too.
Thanks for all the info again.
Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/07/2013 10:35AM by gkam2.