Yosemite: Lots of Big Rocks and Trees

[Warning: this post is quite long! But there are lots of pretty photos. :-)]


A little over two weeks ago (July 21 and 22) (okay it's really basically 3 weeks ago, but trying to stay with the 2-weeks late theme), a group of us went to Yosemite National Park. There were 10 of us, but only 3 MBA interns. The others were 3 undergrad Toyota interns, one grad Toyota intern, one wife of an MBA intern, and 2 interns from Nestle. It was a really fun weekend.

I carpooled up on Friday with my friend Jeff, his dog Sophie, and 2 of the Toyota undergrads. Unfortunately, a tractor-trailer had jack-knifed on the 5, the main highway running north from LA to Yosemite, and had closed all lanes. We had to go out of our way to the east and back in order to avoid that mess. So, it took us about 6 hours to get there. But, I must say the drive wasn't bad since there was good company. Sophie spent pretty much the entire ride just like this, on Jeff's lap.

Instead of taking the 5, we were forced to take the 14 over to Palmdale, then up and back over to Bakersfield via the 58. It was pretty much the desert, with not much around. However, we would pass these gorgeous, huge houses perched atop a mountain, but all they overlooked was the highway! We couldn't understand why someone would pay all that money to construct a beautiful house with a lousy view.

We also passed a TON of windmills (the photo below tries to capture that, but it was dark out), which was a really cool sight. At one point, we passed a refinery that was all lit up with orange lights in this valley near some mountains, with a slew of windmills on the mountain slope across from it. I thought it looked like Mordor with an army of windmills instead of giant trees (nerd alert! LOL).

One extremely funny thing we saw on the road was a truck with 3 caskets in the back! We thought that was funny/weird in itself, but even funnier to a group of Toyota interns was the fact that it was a Tundra! Knowing the heavy campaigns going on about the towing and toting strength and size of the Toyota Tundra, it was funny to think of a new ad slogan like "The Toyota Tundra -- strong enough to carry all your caskets/dead bodies".

We arrived at the house we had rented around midnight after stopping for dinner at Jack in the Box, my first time eating at that fine fast food establishment. It was actually REALLY good! Although I must say on the way back, I had the chicken sandwich, which wasn't nearly as good as the burger. But that place is kind of weird - they have everything: breakfast served all day, egg rolls, burgers, tacos, dessert, chicken, salads, etc.

Anyway, back to the house. When we got there, we pretty much just talked about what people wanted to do the next day and then hunkered down on our various air mattresses, beds, and futons and got some sleep. I woke up early the next morning to the long hike group making breakfast (I was in the short hike group). I got some juice and a bagel and went out on the porch to enjoy the quiet, beautiful scenery and the cool air before the sun got higher in the sky. It was such a relaxing change from the hub-bub and smog of LA. This was our view from the house:

The backyard had a fire pit, but since it was so dry out, fires were prohibited. The house was right next to a historic railroad, and on Sunday morning, we all heard trains going by. We didn't know if they were from the historic railroad, or newer trains going through the valley.



This was the carport. The garage is in back and there was a hot tub next to it. I did not get a chance to use it, but some others did throughout the weekend.




Master bedroom:

View from the master bedroom:


Downstairs bedroom:

Porch off of the downstairs bedroom:


Room with futon leading into the other downstairs bedroom with bunk beds:


So, one group wanted to go on a 6-hour hike down the mountain from Glacier Point (basically a big vista of Half Dome and the valley), so they left relatively early. But the 4 of us who remained (the 3 MBA students, one's wife, and the dog) were not big hikers and my friend Jeff was limited on where he could take the dog. So, the plan was that Jeff and Sophie were going to take one car and do their own thing, and the 3 of us would take the other car and go to Glacier Point, do a short hike to Sentinel Dome, go through the giant Sequoia grove, and come back. However, our plans were dashed when we went out to the cars and discovered that someone from the other group had accidentally taken the keys to one of the cars. So, all of us had to go together.

Since everything in the park is very far away from one another and it takes a long time to go anywhere due to the winding roads, it wasn't really feasible for us to split up and then meet back up. We decided that Jeff should just come on our hikes and bring the dog. She was on a leash and small, and we didn't think it would be a problem to take her on the path. So that's what we did!

It was about an hour drive from our house to Glacier Point, but we didn't expect this traffic outside the entrance, so it ended up taking us a bit longer! When we got to the gate, we discovered that they were just letting everyone through without paying. We thought that was very nice of them and lamented the fact that we bought a pass on Friday when it wasn't needed. But on the way out of the park later that day, it turns out they were charging people as they left. Pretty smart traffic control on their part.

Once we got to Glacier Point, the view was worth it. Although I quickly discovered, as the title of this blog entry implies, that basically all there is to see are a lot of huge rocks and trees. We kept joking that we had to take photos of Half Dome from every angle as it seemed that was all we saw. :-) Unfortunately since it's been so dry out here, a lot of the waterfalls were either smaller than usual, or totally dried up. We saw two spots in particular where you could see where the fall was supposed to be, but instead, it was just stained rock.

The views from Glacier Point. You can see two waterfalls here and Half Dome. (The large rock to the left of the photo).

Half Dome (again). Can you believe people actually climb that thing?

There were some ground squirrels running around the vista and Sophie went crazy chasing them. Here she is trying to get at one that disappeared through a chink in the wall. :-)

We walked around a bit, and then I stopped in the gift shop and overheard a lady telling the cashier that there was a young bear in the parking lot! I went outside and told my friends, and we rushed over to get a look. When we arrived, the bear was REALLY close to the lot with a gaggle of photographers around it (probably a little too close for comfort if you ask me). But by the time we got there, the bear was moving on. We followed it as it walked away and snapped some photos. I got this good one (below). But as it stared down Jeff's small dog, we decided it was time to go. :-)

We continued our drive to the Sentinel Dome trailhead, just a few minutes up the road. By this time, I was really feeling the altitude and not feeling so hot, but I decided to press on and my friends just said we could turn around at any time if I wasn't feeling well enough to go on. But I was determined to do the walk. It was very easy and flat, but I hadn't realized the hike was not just to Sentinel Dome, but to the top of it! Check it out!

Can you believe we actually climbed that thing? Well, okay, I wouldn't believe it either because it's not exactly true. :-) The trail leads you to the BACK of the dome, which while fairly steep, is definitely climbable (is that a word?) and you don't need any special ropes or pickaxes. In fact, there were many kids doing the climb and one guy did it with a guitar and backpack on his back (while his tiny girlfriend carried nothing, by the way). Why he needed to bring a guitar I have no idea. As we stood at the top, I heard one young kid call back to his dad, "I'm doing this for the gummy bears!" What that meant, I'll never know, but it was really funny. :-D

This is Magda, Jeff, and Sophie (the dog) at a point on the trail.

Sentinel Dome peeks out between the trees.

This is Alex, Magda, and I taking a rest just before we started to climb up the dome.

The view from the top was uncomparable. 360-degree views of the park, including Half Dome, El Capitan, and my personal favorite, the Cathedral Rocks. The wind was also a nice respite from the heat of the hike and we stayed up on the dome for quite a while, taking in the scenery, taking photos, and resting.

Me with El Capitan and Cathedral Rocks behind me.

El Capitan on the right and Cathedral Rocks on the left.



Views of the "wilderness" of Yosemite. Did you know that 90% of the park is wilderness?



I thought this log was really cool-looking. Jeff took some photos from where he sat behind the log (see below).

El Capitan.
Magda, my friend Alex's wife, as we relaxed.



Jeff and Alex relaxing on the dome.



Cathedral Rocks.


If you look VERY closely, you can see the moon in this photo.


Here you can see one of the spots I mentioned earlier, where there should be a waterfall but you can just see stained rock.



Half Dome.


The hikers! (Me, Alex, Magda, Jeff, Sophie)

After a while, we made our way back down (much easier than going up and I had adjusted to the altitude). It took us about 10 minutes less going this way. This time, however, we passed a park ranger on the way out, which made us a little nervous since we weren't supposed to have the dog. But she just smiled and said hello. When we got back to the trailhead, we tried to pose Sophie in front of the No Dogs sign. :-)

Next stop was Mariposa Grove, with the giant sequoia trees. Since the day was getting later and we were all pretty pooped from our previous hike, we decided to just do the lower grove of trees. It included a tree that you could walk through and was only about 2 miles roundtrip. Looking at the map and after the walk as well, we decided that we made the right decision since we got to see most of the trees this way anyhow.

This was the first tree we came across. The Fallen Monarch. This fell over 300 years ago.







This cracked me up! Doesn't it look like the tree fell on this baby stroller? You can just imagine that stroller has been there for hundreds of years. ;-)

The Bachelor and Three Graces.



The Grizzly Giant! This is the oldest tree in the grove and it was HUGE!





The California Tunnel Tree. Cut in 1895 to allow coaches to pass through and as a marketing gimmick to attract visitors.

See the Asian girl making a peace sign in front of me? We saw a lot of that from foreign tourists posing for photos.

Alex and Magda.

Afterwards, we went back to the house and rested and waited for the other group to return. Then we all made a nice dinner and ate together, played some games, and then went to bed.

Me and Sophie.

On Sunday, people splintered off to do various things once more. Our group of 4 decided to skip going to the valley floor for a few reasons: 2 of them had gone on Friday before we got there, it was an hour and a half drive to the valley floor, so that's 3 hours total driving out of our day, and Jeff and I felt we had seen the major things that you would have been able to see from the valley floor (aka Half Dome and El Capitan). Like I said, lots of big rocks and trees. :-) So the 4 of us decided to drive to a nearby lake that was on the way home called Bass Lake. I had expected to just relax on the beach and swim a little, but we ended up renting a boat and tube! It was AWESOME and probably my favorite part of the trip!

Since this post ended up being so long, I will do a separate post for Bass Lake. Keep tuned in! I also have a few videos from Yosemite that I will post when I get home tonight.

One last look at the group from Yosemite!