Linkies to the whole enchilada:
Intro and Days 1 & 2
Days 3, 4, 5
Days 6 & 7
Days 8 & 9 and finish
Plants & animals
Wed 7/24 – Day 6
I loaded up 6L (over 13 lbs) of water because I was expecting no source until the next afternoon. Hiked up to CR, it’s steady uphill but not bad at all. Though it was hot again.
Traversing the arête was no biggie, only thing that made it difficult was trying to hold the video camera instead of watching my step. Spent 2.5 hours up on top, just soaking it all in.
That included about 15 min where I had the summit all to myself:
Finally headed down CR. Crossing under the southern pinnacle...
and bushwacked over to Quarter Domes. This was tough going – everything underfoot here is very loose, either deep gravel or deep duff, so a lot of sliding around and energy loss with each step. Also very slopey, always seemed to be the wrong angle for where I wanted to go, and lots of fallen trees and some boulders to work around or over. I wasn’t sure if I would come out in the right spot but I knew if I kept heading west I would hit the lip of the canyon somewhere. Scored a bullseye, came out right between the two QDs.
Watkins, from between the QDs
Hitchhiker and Shark:
Looking across to Barf Gully
Climbed up each QD, then down to the next bump (“Eighth Dome”?), then the next bump (“Sixteenth Dome”?),
then picked up the Half Dome trail. Camped at the foot of the subdome.
Starr King:
Different angle of Cloud’s Rest:
Purple mountain’s majesty:
Thu 7/25 – Day 7
Summited Half Dome. I took my full pack up, needed the pack for water anyway and didn’t want to leave my tent, quilt, pad, etc in a trash bag at the base. Yeah it was a schlep but nothing compared to losing my gear.
Wow, really steep!
At times I found it hard to keep going, but then somehow I found an extra measure of motivation to continue on. Hmmm, can you figure out where this extra motivation came from?
I brought gloves with me for the cables and these worked really well. Ultralight, about $5 at Home Depot.
Only mild abrasion from one r/t on the cables.
Reached the top around 9am. Obligatory visor shot:
Watkins straight-on:
There were insect infestations at some of the larger rock pilings – out on the visor, one at the spot where you take someone’s picture while they are on the visor, and one at the northwest corner looking down into The Valley. All the same kind of insect, not sure if they were flying ants or some sort of wasp/hornet. Looked like they had stingers but were smaller than wasps. Swarms of them. Some folks said they were bitten/stung, I was pretty well covered up so escaped unscathed, but I did keep hearing them pop-popping as they collided into my backpack.
Descended Half Dome starting around 10:30am. Had become considerably more crowded by then around the top of the subdome. Down the trail a ways I found a perfect boulder for lunch, right-sized indentations for sitting and propping up my pack, in the shade.
Back side of Half Dome:
Continued down through LYV when thunder started rattling so I was very glad to have summitted in the morning. Water had rationed out perfectly, needed a refill just as the trail came along the river:
Then continued on the JMT down to Yosemite Valley. I flew down this section, had a lot of energy and my mind was really sharp, so I never slowed down to pick my footing, just kept forward momentum and a place to put my foot was always there. Dayhikers I whizzed past thought I was crazy.
In the Valley caught the shuttle bus and experienced something very strange – air conditioning! Picked up my next day’s permit, bought a GP shuttle one-way ticket for the next day, mailed some postcards, and met a friend for a beer at the Loft (I met this guy last year on my first YNP visit, he works for NPS).
From there to Curry Village for pizza, natch.
Then went to camp at the backpacker’s camp. But by then it was dark, there are no signs for the BP camp, it’s not on the Valley map I had, so it took a while to find it (for those wanting to know: go into and through North Pines campground, stay right, you’ll eventually see a sign for a place to park for backpacker unloading, bridge over the river behind that unloading zone, cross it and you’re there). I got a spot in the campground, might have been the last one and, lucky me, it was right next to the latrines. Score!
Edited 3 time(s). Last edit at 08/08/2013 10:43AM by JRinGeorgia.
