
Well, he has a strong chin and a stern, thin-lipped mouth, but he is solid granite. Not like the wired-together Old Men back in New Hampshire and South Dakota...
I booked some nights up at Tuolumne Lodge last week, and on Monday had a couple of hours to kill before it was time to arrive there and check in to my tent cabin. So I decided to check out the mile or so of off-trail terrain going north from Olmsted Point, connecting up there with the old Tioga Road (which is currently used as a trail between the May Lake trail head and Tenaya Lake). The idea was to hike up to catch the old road and then follow it to Tenaya Lake.
That was fine. It only took an hour and a half, including walking back to Olmsted Point along the new highway after being snubbed by the shuttle bus....it only stops at the trail head when going eastbound! That section of the old road was new to me. There are still bits of the asphalt paving along the trail, and an interesting uninsulated solid copper wire that was buried under the paving. It is fairly thick, gauge 8 or 10. It seems odd to see a ground wire, since the old telegraph systems used a single iron wire strung on poles, and an earth ground at each station (so that the return current could flow back to the source through the earth).
The bare granite in this vicinity is such a poor electrical conductor that making an earth ground could be problematical in places. A comment I saw in an old telegraphy journal states that linesman needed an occasional ground contact along the route in order to test for faults in the overhead wire, or as a place to clip in for talking to the station operators. In those rare cases where ground contacts could not be provided at the poles, it would be necessary to provide a ground wire for that purpose. It was rarely done, because that more than doubles the cost of wire and because an occasional short piece of buried wire near a pole would be a sufficient ground contact in normal soils. Iron is used for the overhead wire for its strength, but copper would be buried as the ground wire because it doesn't rust. Indeed, the buried wire has turned gray, but otherwise looks like new.
The following day we did a big off-trail loop hike: Over Pothole Dome, then down the escarpment at the next dome, to look at the Little Devils Postpile, then south cross country west of Daff Dome, in order to pick up the main hiking trail back to Tuolumne near the highway. That trail is, of course, also part of the old Tioga Road, running over granite and showing the same ground wire where the old pavement exists and is broken.
But the real surprise on Monday had appeared near the saddle above Olmstead Point. I came across a fine old mule trail that was not on my map or gps. Those of you who have read my thread on abandoned trails near Yosemite Valley (see: link) know that this is my favorite sort of thing to find. On Friday's return home, before lining up to sit and wait for the highway construction, we left a car at the May Lake parking area and went back to Olmsted Point to trace out the whole trail. And to check out the local Old Man of the Mountain, which is on the adjacent peak called "9203", or "9125" depending on which map you have.
Here are the two hikes:

The red gps trace is the old trail, except for a bit near the lower left, where its connection to the "Snow Creek to Tenaya Lake Trail" is shown as dots. More about the old trail later. The green and blue traces are Monday's and Friday's continuations. You will see highway 120 Tioga Pass Road on the map. In white is the old Tioga Road, which is the auto access road as far as the May Lake parking lot / trail head at Snow Flat. Beyond that, the old road is used as the hiking trail between May Lake and Tenaya Lake. The dashed line near Snow Flat is the (newer) pack trail from Snow Creek to the May Lake Trail Head. It goes past the quarries (see link). X marks the Olmsted Point Parking Lot.
Here is a google earth view of the critical part of the route finding. It's easy, but if you hike up the center of the drainage, you will find yourself blocked in places by various obstacles which force you up onto a series of ledges up on the right hand side. The old trail just stays up on those ledges the whole way.

If you pause on the old trail, near the middle of this photo, and look up towards peak 9203, you will see the old man:


Well, it looks like a face to me....
We walked up the peak to get some fabulous views (there is an easy route up the northwest corner of the summit) and then hiked the mile or so over to the May Lake parking lot. Either version of the hike is less than three miles long, and will be added to my list of short hikes "to do when you have only a couple of hours to kill". As usual, my buddy had to climb the wobbly boulder on top of the peak.
Of course, from up there you get all the views that Olmsted Point gives you, plus a full face view of Mount Hoffman, a fresh look at Tenaya Lake, and many peaks off to the north and east.... And no people. No signs of people. No litter. No footprints. It's pristine. The mob scene at Olmsted Point is just an easy mile away.
So, how can it be that a substantial mule trail could be missing from all the maps? When I got home, I looked it up. It's an interesting story. The Indians and the cavalry did it. I will put that stuff in a later message on this thread, for the handful of you who are not bored by all that history if somebody asks for it.
Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/21/2015 09:13PM by wherever.