Yosemite National Park

Drew gave me a few wonderful gifts for our anniversary.  I got a fun night on the town, a beautiful new charm for my charm bracelet, and a trip to one of the places I've wanted to go my entire life... Yosemite National Park.

A year ago we took our kids to Zions National Park with a few friends and it ended up being pretty fun, but the hikes were horrible.  The kids whined a lot, and by the end of them we were carrying at least two children.  Not fun.  So I didn't really want to repeat that experience.  The fact that I could do real hikes and enjoy Mother Nature without any whining, was about the greatest gift I could have received.

Getting reservations in Yosemite is really challenging.  You usually have to get them a year in advance.  But somehow the stars aligned and Drew was able to make reservations with only two weeks notice.

We headed up I-95 in our awesome convertible.  This is the route we took:

Mapquest told us to go clear up to Tonopah and then head West, so I decided to make an executive decision and follow a different route.  It was pretty good until we got to the California boarder and jumped onto Hwy 168.  That road is CRAZY.  Super curvy and parts where the road seems to disappear below you making it impossible to see anything.  Drew and I screamed a few times on some of the turns.  This is the road:

Near the end of the road there is one part that requires both directions of traffic to squeeze through the mountains on a skinny one lane road.  Problem is, you can't see if cars are coming up while you're going down.  It was nuts!

After getting through that we could see the BEAUTIFUL Sierra Nevada mountains.

The other side of this mountain range is the Sierra National Forest.  When we hit the I-395 we headed North again until we got to the Tioga Pass (Hwy 120).  IT IS THE MOST AMAZING DRIVE EVER!!!  Here are some photos of it:

 It was loaded with breath-taking views and gorgeous meadows.  And driving it in a convertible made it all the more unbelievable.

These are actually the last shots I took with my SLR camera.  I switched to my tiny point and shoot camera for the rest of the trip.  Why?  Because I was lazy.  So the photos really don't do it justice.  I could go there every day for the rest of my life and still be blown away by the beauty there.

We arrived at our campsite at Dusk.  We stayed at the White Wolf campground, just off the Tioga Pass.  So we came into Yosemite from the East side of Hwy 120.

  It's basically a tent with a concrete floor, and a wood burning stove in the middle.  No electricity, except in the community bathrooms, which shuts off at 11 pm.

We were in tent # 21.  No food was allowed in the tents.  They had bear boxes just behind the tents, to hold all food.  After we dropped our stuff off we went to the lodge for the family style dinner.  We sat next to a couple from the UK, another one from France, and one from the US.  The food was bad and the service was even worse, but it made for great memories.  After dinner we packed our gear, lit the fire, and went to bed.  We had to wake up once in the night to restart the fire, but it wasn't too bad.  We got up at about 5 am to set off for our hike to the Half Dome.   As you can see from the map above, we left White Wolf and headed west on the Tioga Pass, then south and East again into Yosemite Valley.  It was an unbelievably beautiful drive.

Half Dome...  I'm not quite sure where we got the idea to hike that thing.  I had seen pictures of it in Ansel Adams photos, but didn't know much about it.  And didn't think that hiking it would be a very big deal.  Naive, for sure.  In order to hike the Half Dome you need a permit.  Drew applied for it two days before our desired hike date and we were "lucky" enough to get them.  It's an 8.5 mile hike to the base of Half Dome.  It climbs about 5000 feet in elevation from the trailhead to the peak.  And it usually takes hikers about 12 hours round trip.  Most of the hike is regular trail hiking with great views and amazing waterfalls, but the last part is more like mountain climbing.  It requires hikers to ascend an extremely steep staircase up the sub-dome, and finally finish climbing by holding onto a set of cables and pulling your way up the slick rock to the top.

Here's the map of the fun hike:

We parked our car not far from the Nature Center and set off.

 The first .7 miles of the hike is to the incredible Vernal Falls.  It's a manmade staircase.  This is called the Mist Trail, because a lot of mist from the falls makes the staircase a little slick.  I'm not sure if I'd bring my kids up it because it's still pretty dangerous for little ones.

This is the view from the top of the falls.

This view is looking over the edge.  It's a lot farther down than it looks in the photo.  Those rocks at the bottom are HUGE.

Here we are standing at the guardrail for Vernal Falls.  When it's raining, the water will pour over the area we are standing.

After a small break we headed up to Nevada Falls.  The path we took let us walk by the base of the falls, but not the top of them.  We didn't see the top of Nevada Falls until our way back down from Half Dome.

 I didn't take any pictures for the next 4 miles of the hike.  After 5 hours of hiking we arrived at the base of the sub-dome where we gave the park ranger our permit.  Drew was WIPED OUT!  He had taken a 5 hour energy drink before we left, which is loaded with caffeine.  It caused him to sweat and lose a lot of electrolytes, so by the time we arrived at the hard part of the hike, he was feeling dizzy and worn out.  I was feeling fine so we pressed on.  The park ranger told us all the warnings.  He said there was a 30 % chance of showers.  If we saw any gray clouds "get down immediately".  If we saw any lightening, "get down immediately".  He then proceeded to give us the climbing info.  He said "First you'll come to the staircase of the subdome.  It's a bunch of steep switchbacks that go back and forth and back and forth.  It'll give you nightmares.  Then you get to the saddle of the dome, which is where you'll put on your gloves and wait in line to climb the cables to the top."  After he said all that I was thinking "This won't be a big deal."  I thought he meant it would be like a nightmare because it was so exhausting, not because you're worried you might die!!!

We took a small break then started off.  As you can see from the first shots, we were in the trees when we started up the staircase.  For some reason that clump of trees offered a sense of security for me.  But the higher we climbed, the smaller the comforting trees became.  After a few switchbacks I turned around to see the view and a sudden rush of fear came over me.  It was a panic feeling.  A feeling that if I slip and fall, there is nothing stopping me from falling to my death.  I tried my best to push the feeling of fear out of my mind, but the higher I climbed, the worse it became.

I sat down for a while and took a few pictures.  This is what the stairs looked like.

 Drew wasn't' feeling very good, but was doing his best to climb it and offer me comfort at the same time.  It was strange.  It was almost like I could hear a voice in my head telling me not to go any farther.  And the higher I climbed, the louder it became.

 After climbing a few more switchbacks, I realized that I was making a big mistake to continue forward.  I sat down again and told Drew that I was really scared and didn't think I could make it.  He told me that he was getting a strong impression that we needed to turn back.  So we did.  He said that he was so dizzy and exhausted that he was worried he would fall.  So we headed back down the mountain.  I got a huge sense of relief when we made it back to the bottom of the subdome.  I still felt defeated and disappointed that we didn't make it all the way, but I still had no regrets for turning back.  It was the right thing to do.  So I took this great picture of Drew at the base of the staircase.

Here's our path back down:

As you can see on the map, about a mile down from where we chickened out, WE SAW A BEAR.  We could hear some loud noises from off the trail so we stood there for a while and a bear came into view.  It was tearing the bark from a tree, and was about 50 yards from where we stood.  Here's a photo I took.  I didn't want to get any closer than this for a better shot.  It's hard to see, but there you go.

We hiked back down the trail and I took a few photos of the Half Dome from the back side.   Click on the picture and it will open a bigger version, where you can see the people climbing the half dome.  We were about 500 feet down.  There's NO WAY I could have done that.

And this gives you a better idea of what we hiked.  It looks so innocent in this picture.

We took a break at the top of Nevada Falls.  It felt SO GOOD to take my hiking boots off and wade into the water.  I didn't go in too far.  This river heads straight for the falls.

We took the John Muir trail down.  it had these incredible weeping rocks that made it feel like it was raining.  Drew was feeling terrible by this point and didn't feel up to posing for any more photos.

I wanted to get a couple more pictures, so I had a lady take this one of me, while I let Drew hike ahead.  He didn't want to stop, so I just hurried and caught up to him.  And yes, those are rain clouds in the background.  Yet another reason I'm glad I didn't hike the Half Dome.

When we arrived at the bottom it was pouring rain.  We went straight to the lodge, where we cleaned up and had a nice hot meal at the Mountain Room Restaurant.  The food was PERFECT.  Then we went straight to bed!  We were both exhausted from hiking 17 miles in 9 hours.

The next morning we went to Yosemite Falls, which is right by the Lodge where we stayed.  

It's really a place you must see in person.  Pictures never do it justice.  

We hiked all over the rocks at the base of the lower falls.  I didn't get too close to the pool because I didn't want to get soaked, since we were already checked out of our hotel.

If you look closely you can see people on the other side of the falls.  It's huge!

Then we headed out of the park on Hwy 41 towards Fresno.  We stopped one more time to take a picture of the majesty of this National Park.  You can see the Half Dome in the distance.

A few miles down the road we heard a train whistle.  Drew quickly pulled into the Yosemite Mountain Sugar Pine Railroad and we were lucky enough to jump on the train for a tour of part of the Sierra National Forest, where logging took place years ago.

I loved it!

 When we exited the park we decided to go North up HWY 49, through the old gold mining towns.  It was so much fun.  Then we headed towards Lake Tahoe.

Lake Tahoe is incredible at Sunset.

We stayed the night in Carson City and then drove straight home the next morning.  I loved this vacation so much.  It was great to be with my husband and share those memories with him.  I love him very much.

And it was great to see the kids when we got home. Even the crying ones. Thanks Dixie for making the trip possible!