Re: TR: Mono Pass (YNP) to Tuolumne Meadows

I learned an important lesson on this trip: triple verify the mileage before starting! I managed to convince myself that this was a ~26mi hike, perfect for 3days/2nights. In reality the total was closer to 37mi, and an extra day or two would have allowed for a much more comfortable pace as well as some additional exploration. Next time. Despite that, it was an enjoyable trip through Yosemite and the Ansel Adams Wilderness.


Made a nice loop around Kuna, Mammoth, and other peaks. It was cool to see them from two sides during the trip. Interactive map here


That 12k ft pass was a tough challenge for day 1! Days 2 and (especially) 3 weren't quite as punishing.

Day 1


Flowers everywhere!


This area smelled so good!


Flower field near Parker Pass.


Looking back towards Parker Pass. Clouds provided some shade without being threatening.


Mono Lake shows through the haze.


Heading down from Koip Pass. More flowers and the moon rising. I would camp on the elevated section in the middle of the lake.

The tail end of day 1 was not pretty, as I was definitely feeling the effects of AMS. This was compounded when I ran out of water part way up to Koip Pass. Fortunately I came across a little trickle on the way down, which helped me keep going. Basically just fell into a camp site, had a little to eat and went to sleep.

Day 2

Woke up feeling much better! Since my camp site was not at a visually exciting location, I packed up and walked another mile down the trail to the smaller Alger Lake. There I had a tasty breakfast with excellent scenery.


Sun is rising.


Heading back to the trail.


Nice to view to contemplate over breakfast.


Love these lakes.


At Gem Pass.


Flowers everywere!


Prior to this intersection I had seen basically no one else. After this point, I was sharing the trail with many others.


Waugh Lake.


Not going to run out of water today!


Climbing towards Donahue Pass.


When I imagine the Sierra's, this is what I see...


Interesting to have started the day on the other side of this range.


Yours truly. Feeling pretty good despite the effort.


Not my best tarp pitch. That's what happens at the end of another long day.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/24/2013 12:33PM by vitaminC.

Day 3

Being completely flat, the hiking on day 3 was pretty easy. However, due to the miscalculation mentioned above, it still took some effort to cover those last ~8 mi, as I was spent from the previous days. Despite that, I was on the trail a little after 6am, and this time hiked a couple more miles until I found a nice breakfast spot.


Waiting for the sun.


Cookin' up something good!


Can't lose this trail!


Made it back to the Tuolumne Meadows Wilderness Permit station by 11am, and had an uneventful drive back home. Now I keep thinking about how next year I need to (with proper training) do the JMT.

The rest of the pics are here



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/24/2013 12:42PM by vitaminC.

Thanks for the excellent trip report and all the photos. Glad you took the time to share them. Reading the trip reports of others is always enjoyable and informative for me.

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Thanks for the lovely photos and the detailed trip report. I think we might have run into each other on the trail just before Tuolumne on Saturday. I was the woman in the red shirt who looked a wee bit scruffy after two weeks on the trail. Pleasure to meet you!

Yes, that was me! Nice to meet you as well! Are you going to post up about your trip? It sounded like an excellent adventure

Quote
vitaminC

Mono Lake shows through the haze.

With Grant Lake middle right and (I think) Parker Lake at the bottom.

Here comes my one million and second question: Could someone
post a link to a discussion about how to post photos in this forum?

I have a 5 day trip coming up in September and would love to
contribute some photos of the hikes here. I'm a tech dullard,
so it will have to be a simple procedure for me to pull it off.

Dave,

Not sure if there's a formal "how-to" posting somewhere on this site but, in a nutshell, you technically don't post pictures in this forum, you post links to pictures. In other words, you need to upload your photos to Picasa or Flickr or some other site and then use the "Insert Image URL" button when posting your message (it's the one that looks vaguely like a mountain landscape, pretty much smack in the middle of the icons at the top of this forum's message-composition window). Depending on your hosting site, you may need to make a couple of adjustments there (for example, when I link to Picasa pictures, I have to set the image size to "large," select "Image Only" (so I link to the photo instead of the Picasa page containing the photo) and then choose the "Embed Image" URL...I do that in Picasa and then grab the generated URL to link to this page).

Hope that helps...

And once you have the link to the image you can insert with the button from the tool bar about the posting window.

On posting pictures - Flickr doesn't work for me


I normally use http://yosemitephotos.net Right click to get the image url and then use the insert image URL button.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/25/2013 04:15PM by SoCalCPA.

We do have a separate discussion forum on this site specifically for photography advice. Most folks might find what they need by scanning through some of those posts.

Attempting to add photo.....

This thread is getting a bit derailed at this point, so why not add in...

To add a photo, first you need to host it on a server somewhere. I use smugmug.com, which costs money but is an excellent service. In fact, sign up with this link and we'll both same some $. Otherwise, try something like picassa.

Second, get the URL for your uploaded photo; this will depend on the service you use. Often, you can just right-click on a photo and select "copy image URL" or something along those lines.

Third, you can push the little mountain button and paste in the URL in the pop up window. Alternatively, you can just code it yourself in the main text by typing [ img ]your link[ /img ], without the spaces inside the brackets. Press "quote" on any message with an image in it and you'll see what it should look like.

Good luck!

My apologies for being such a tech dullard and making a mess of
this thread. In an effort to get the train back on the tracks.....

Great photos and text. Looks like a super hike. Loved the shots
of wild flowers. Gotta get a detailed hiking map like the one
shown.

Superb overall hike. Long live Yosemite.

Quote
AnotherDave
Attempting to add photo.....

Thanks for posting your photo of Half Dome.

.

Wow. It (kinda) worked!

The URL for your Half Dome photo was just fine.

The problem with your original post was that somehow you managed to garble up that URL with not only the [img] tag but with also an incorrect use of the [url] tag. You probably clicked on the URL link icon () in addition to clicking on the Image link icon ().

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Wow. I didn't know it was a faux paus not to post trip reports and photos, but just to ask advice. I went to May Lake, Glen Aulin and Waterwheel Falls but I thought everyone has been there, it's nothing remarkable, so I shouldn't post.

Mom,
You are not expected to file trip reports but they sure are welcome, no matter where you go. A picture is as good as 60,000 words.

Quote
Mom

I went to May Lake, Glen Aulin and Waterwheel Falls but I thought everyone has been there, it's nothing remarkable.

May Lake, Glen Aulin and Waterwheel Falls are nothing remarkable? Au contraire, they are QUITE remarkable.



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What I meant was "Is there anyone on this board who hasn't been there?"

I didn't go off trail. I didn't scout old roads. I didn't look for long, lost, no longer used trails or old campsites from the 1930's.

Maybe, I was wrong. But a trip report on a heavily used trail just didn't seem to be in the same league as the rest of you.

The only 'new' information to report is that the falls did not have nearly as much water as in past years, judging from other photos I'd seen.

Quote
Mom

Maybe, I was wrong. But a trip report on a heavily used trail just didn't seem to be in the same league as the rest of you.
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It is.

I've been to most places in the partk multiple times and enjoy reading trip reports.
The dearest ones are those done by first timers as they contain the most enthusiastic commentary even though the route may be less than Chick-onish.

"I took my kids to the bridge below Vernal Fall and they loved it," stands with "I hit every 12K peak in the park this last weekend."

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Old Dude

Quote
mrcondron

Quote
Mom

Maybe, I was wrong. But a trip report on a heavily used trail just didn't seem to be in the same league as the rest of you.
.

It is.

I've been to most places in the partk multiple times and enjoy reading trip reports.
The dearest ones are those done by first timers as they contain the most enthusiastic commentary even though the route may be less than Chick-onish.

"I took my kids to the bridge below Vernal Fall and they loved it," stands with "I hit every 12K peak in the park this last weekend."

You mean stands above. By12K at least.

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To Orange Juice:
Sorry about all the gunk in your thread. I tried to split out the whining about posting TRs.
It didn't split out everything so I gave up.
Pretty much been frustrated in the past about people more or less not saying please
and thank you and posting wth they did after they asked a million questions.
Even have posted such threads as "Just Lurking", "Do you want photos on this site",
and such... sometimes maybe you have to use a bigger hammer.
For the record I am not associated with this site at all (it's eeeeeeeeeks) and I
have yet to be paid anything. Although I've meet some great people thru this site
who I think will be friends for a long time (or as long as they can tolerate me).
And for that and for the people who have shared many gems in the past I am
forever grateful. Gotten a lot of additional ideas here and have given back quite a bit.
At least that is my take on things.
Anyway, this will be the last time I complain about it. It's my prerogative.
(I had a teacher tell me that when I was goofing around in class in high school
to which I said "cool... then I will continue to goof around"
Have fun Goofing Around

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A little complaining once in a while is probably a good thing. It seems to get more people posting.

Have you ever met eeek. His avatar looks like a James Bond villain. Is he trying to take over the world with yosemitenews?

It is always cool to see what conditions are like at the familiar places.

I agree with all of the above. So I tried to upload photos to Picasa. Instead of just uploading the file from my last trip it started uploadiing all my photos, which upset me, especially after I read the thread from last year that somehow that had deleted some people's photos from My Pictures. I read the thread on posting photos from Facebook. I don't want to do that to protect my privacy.

So I may just have to be a 'lurker'. Putting photos up is just too complicated and I don't want to take the time to figure it out.

On Picasa I just click the "Upload" button at the top, I get an "Album Name" textbox and a giant area with a "Drag Photos Here...or if you prefer" in faint text, and a "Select photos from your computer" underneath. I click the latter, and am good.

Picasa auto-directs to GooglePlus[tm][grr], but on an initial presentation there's a yellow box with "Click here for"...something...PicasaWeb Classic, or somesuch...near the top-center...I just click "here". That seems to solve any problems I have with the site.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/29/2013 08:59PM by ttilley.

I like words, and I think words can paint beautiful pictures, too.. TechieSteve's trip report had great pics, but they wouldn't have told the story about how he felt during the trip. I especially liked reading about how he overcame internal struggles and fears. I think most can relate to those..

It's each person's unique little story about their particular trip, that particular time... I've gone to Waterwheel Falls innumerable times now... and I still love reading about it and seeing it with different water levels and conditions - and different stories each time!

I'll be happy to read your trip report without a single picture in it!