Waterfalls and thin air

This morning starts fairly early, we are on the road for 08:30, foregoing breakfast as last nights meal continues to fill us.

The hotel sits on Highway 140 a short distance from the park entrance and we are soon pulling up at the rangers hut, a young tattooed ranger leans into the car and welcomes us to Yosemite cheerfully requesting the $20 entry fee, which he points out is valid for seven days.

I have $4 in my wallet and have to step out of the car to retrieve the balance from the boot, a small queue of vehicles forms behind us, those that already have tickets pass using the bus entry lane.

We continue on into the park, passing the turn off onto Highway 120 (The Tioga road), the road closed signs have been pushed into the verge and we smile noting cars entering and exiting the turning.

The 140 forks into a one way road and we turn away from Yosemite Village and towards Bridlevale falls and Glacier point. Shortly after the turn we pull into a small car park and walk the short distance to Bridlevale falls, even this early in the morning it is hot, although we both feel a cooling of the air as we approach the base of the falls and begin to feel the mist created by it, soon people appear coming away from the base of the falls, some wearing plastic ponchos, all are soaked through.

We stand back and consider our closest approach for pictures and opt for a position where the water mist and spray is not too great. Pictures taken we return to the car and head onwards towards Glacier point which it turns out is 26 miles away up a series of sweeping horseshoe curves continually climbing in altitude, markers announce our height as the road rises, a little redundantly as a simple glance out of Davids window indicates the height more clearly than any sign.

In places the edge of the road is simply some scrub land with tall pine and redwood, the tarmac crumbling into the verge, elsewhere a short stone wall skirts the bend, speed limits are clearly signposted and as yesterday I appear to be the only one applying them, a Honda convertible roars past us at one point straddling the double solid yellow line in the centre of the road.

We come across him after a couple of bends crawling behind a towing camper. The Glacier point road has numerous opportunities to pull over and park to take in the spectacular scenery, which we do. At this time in the morning its fairly quiet.

It takes about 45 minutes to get to Glacier point and an altitude of around 8000ft. The car park here is busy but has spaces and we take the short walk to the observation platform, the walk, in parts, is uphill causing us to catch our breath in the thinning air.

The views from the platform of; Yosemite falls, El Capitan and Half Dome are fantastic, and an awe inspiring view of the valley floor nearly 2 miles below is available from the overlook.

We ask a short but friendly Harley Davidson rider to take a picture of the two of us stood an a rock with the view behind, his stature proves a problem as the final picture shows more sky than view, I leave it to you to decide if ultimately it is any good.

Having had our fill of the views we head back down to the valley.

The car park at Bridlevale falls is now full with a line of traffic feeding into it blocking highway 140, we are headed to Yosemite village so we avoid this, however we discover the traffic is heavy here also.

The village and Yosemite centre parking area is full a ranger advises us to turn and park on one of the side roads, this we do, our parking place has a great view of Yosemite falls, which we head towards on foot.

The air temperature and humidity in the valley is high and we stop by the Village centre cafe for bottled water.

The walk to the falls is over level ground, many cyclists pass us on the way it is possible that bikes can be hired here, we do not explore the possibility.

Yosemite falls consists of two water falls, the upper falls is massive, it roars over the cliff edge and plumes of spray and water surge in the air as it tumbles down the cliff face before it crashes onto a lower level ridge here it pools briefly before surging forward over that ridge as the lower fall, it is this lower fall that we approach and stand with others in its mist and spray, cooling us and wetting our gear.

Once cooled we move off, heading back towards the car. Its 15:30 our visit to Yosemite has been brief but the views will live with us eternally, we pass clusters of tents in camp grounds as we exit under El Capitan towards the hotel, once again faster local traffic pressing us down the twisting mountain roads.

At the hotel we take time to utilise the laundry facilities as we use one of the pools, I send David to fetch wash powder from the hotel shop he returns claiming there is none. I pull on a shirt and shoes and head over to check myself, there is no Persil, no Bold, no Ariel but there are a bevy of single wash packets of 'color bleach''s I procure one and return to load the top loading coin operated machine.

The packet says it is for a single full load, we have half a load so I consider half a packet, putting the half full carton on top of the machine, as the clothes are loaded it is knocked in!

We enjoy the pool and the sun and finally head back to our wash, I load the garments into a drier and we return to the room. It is only later when airing the garments I question David on why I have roughly 15 garments in the wash, whereas David has 4 which includes two pairs of socks.

David considers this to be acceptable so we move on!

Tomorrow I face a minimum 5 hour drive across the Tioga Pass to Furnace Creek in Death valley with him.

Posted in: Tioga,travel