Yosemite

"No temple made with hands can compare with Yosemite. Every rock in its walls seems to glow with life...Awful in stern, immovable majesty, how softly these rocks are adorned, and how fine and reassuring the company they keep: Their feet among beautiful groves and meadows, their brows in the sky, a thousand flowers leaning confidingly against their feet, bathed in floods of water, floods of light..."

- Jphn Muir

At the top of Sentiniel Dome overlooking Half Dome (Nevada Falls is hidden behind us)

We met up with Tamara, who went to UCLA with Cody (friend we stayed with in Chicago). She works in the park and lives in El Portal which is only 20 minutes from the valley. We stayed 4 nights with her and her roommate Meg.  Yosemite is breathtaking.  It's without a doubt one of the most impressive and inspiring places that I've ever seen. (I know I say a lot of places are the most beautiful, and it's true, but this Yosemite really is) I couldn't imagine visiting during the summer or the “busy season” though. It was like a zoo in mid October. We had great weather and were really lucky to see the waterfalls with a decent amount of water flowing. It had rained a few days earlier in the week and then snowed a few inches too. Adam met up with us again and he had been in Yosemite just 2 weeks earlier and said the waterfalls were hardly a trickle of water. We hiked back to Mirror pond and up to the top of Nevada falls. Tamara's boyfriend told us about this secret trail that the trailhead had been covered up by a rockslide, but you can still climb up it. We had a hand drawn map and we felt like we were going on a treasure hunt. When we got to the top we felt like we had found a treasure too. We didn't see a single person climbing up and when we got to the top we had a panoramic view of the valley and 4 waterfalls. It was breath taking. We wanted to hike to the top of half dome, but the path was closed due to the snow and you need to get a permit a few days in advance. 

El Capitan, Half Dome, Bridalveil Falls

 

 One day we drove up to Glacier point and Sentinal dome and hung out for a few hours just admiring Mother Nature's masterpiece. Hanging out around El Capitain was pretty mind blowing. You'd just look up and search for people half way up the mountain. There were tents hanging 1000s of feet up in the air. It was almost a full moon and we stayed around the mountain until after sunset. It looked like lightning bugs all over the face of El Cap. The climbers had their headlights on and were spending the night on the wall. It was pretty wild to see. Meg is a climber and she had some friends over at the house that evening. It was awesome talking with them and hearing their climbing stories. Another night Tamara had some friends from San Diego that were up to visit. They were a ton of fun and we joined them at this party at the community center in El Portal. It was a good time with live music and free drinks to finish the night off.  

Yosemite Park is a place of rest, a refuge from the roar and dust and weary, nervous, wasting work of the lowlands, in which one gains the advantages of both solitude and society. Nowhere will you find more company of a soothing peace-be- still kind. Your animal fellow-beings, so seldom regarded in civilization, and every rock-brow and mountain, stream, and lake, and every plant soon come to be regarded as brothers; even one learns to like the storms and clouds and tireless winds. This one noble park is big enough and rich enough for a whole life of study and aesthetic enjoyment. It is good for everybody, no matter how benumbed with care, encrusted with a mail of business habits like a tree with bark. None can escape its charms. Its natural beauty cleans and warms like a fire, and you will be willing to stay forever in one place like a tree.  - Muir