Returned

I had no idea that a National Park site billed as a natural wonder full of wild animals could be so... commercialized. I went in with camp foods, trash bags, a firearm and two knives, a Leatherman, cold and wet weather gear, and so forth, since I figured we would be way out from civilization. Nah. Within 200 yards of our tent were three restaurants, a coffee/ice cream shop, a relaxation lounge for those who, you know, didn't want to get dirty, and a grocery/supply store. A little disappointing after I hauled all that shit up there.

Another surprise were the people. At least half of all the people I encountered there were foreigners of all sorts... Russian, German, British, Australian, Japanese... The rest of the (American/Canadian) folks looked like either the rugged outdoorsy types who do this kind of thing for kicks, (whom I expected to see) hippies, (seriously, who else brings a guitar and bongo drums along with their scruffy beards to a national park?) or upper class WASP types on vacation. A large percentage of the middle aged+ men (and there were quite a few) came along with a young, pretty girl. My wife ventured that they were of the mail order variety.

Got some nice pics of the park I figured I would share.

The whole park is in an extended valley so pretty much wherever you look is an image like this. The shade provided is nice when the weather is hot like it was on our trip.











Here we have a scenic river. It's quite low here, as you can judge by the prevalence of non-submerged river stones, but I understand that it's practically raging during spring and early summer from snowmelt.

This is a nice shot of Vernal Falls, which we climbed. And that climb was a bitch, especially since the wife and I decided to be all hard core and military and carry full ruck-loads on our backs that included meals, water, and emergency supplies. Something like an 833m climb, very steep. I'm happy that we made it, but it sure did hurt afterwards.






This is a shot of part of the granite stairwell we climbed to get to the top of the falls. It resembles something you'd find in Incan ruins in Peru, though mercifully at a lower altitude. It continues around the back side of that mountain on the right for quite a ways down, and on the left proceeds up to a near sheer cliff face and climbs up to the falls themselves.






A shot of the valley from the top of the falls. i.e. proof of victory over the damned stairway. That little band of winding water is the same one pictured above with all the river rocks showing, but much higher in elevation.















Atop the falls was a little pool between the runoffs and the falls proper labeled Emerald Pool where a number of people (including some attractive foreigners of some type or another... didn't recognize the language) brought swim suits along for a dip, which they very soon regretted. The water was quite cold.







A nice trip, though the drive was long and the experience vaguely disappointing because of 1) all the hype about Yosemite being marvelous, though I imagine it's better in the spring with more and larger waterfalls, and 2) the commercialization. $50 souvenir clothing and a beer store within spitting distance of your 'camp ground' does not a mystic natural experience make.