Surfin’ USA

Backpacking in Yosemite

A few days ago, Teiko and I escaped crowded and busy Orange County for a while and drove up to Yosemite National Park for an extended weekend of backpacking. We made the trip up on Saturday, hiked from Sunday to Tuesday and returned late on Wednesday.

Saturday night we camped in Yosemite Valley, the central area where they have shops and hotels. Early Sunday morning we packed our backpacks and took a bus up to Glacier Point, where we started our 7-mile hike along the Panorama Trail to the backcountry camp in Little Yosemite Valley. With tent, water, food, and other things, I carried 50 lbs. (23 kg) and Teiko had 40 lbs. (18kg) on her back — so we were quite exhausted when we got to the campsite around 6pm that day. We quickly pitched our tent, cooked some dinner and went to bed early.

The next morning we left most of our things at the tent and started the 8 mile round-trip hike, climbing upwards, towards famous Half Dome. The last part is solid granite, which is so steep (I’d guess 80% inclination) that you have to pull yourself up on heavy iron cables that have been installed there. They say that lots of people get scared and turn around when they see the cables — and I have to admit, it is pretty intimidating. But Teiko and I decided that we didn’t drag ourselves up there for nothing, so we slowly climbed towards the top at 8800 feet (2700m), always setting one foot after the other, not looking up, let alone down. And boy, was it worth it! The views from up there are breathtaking! We spent more than an hour on the top of Half Dome before we got ourselves to climb back down again — still scary, but I found it a little easier then the way up. And what a great feeling it was to get off the cables and stand on solid ground again. Somewhere along the way back down to our campsite we then ran out of water (it was a very hot day), but eight long hours after we had left that morning we eventually got back to our tent thirsty but safely.

After a well-deserved good night’s sleep we packed up all our things the next morning and hiked another 5 miles back down to the main valley, where we pitched our tent again for the last night before we went off to indulge in some of the great achievements of civilization, pizza and beer. On the morning of our departure we went for another short hike to pretty Mirror Lake and made some photo stops on our way out of the park, before we eventually hit the road for the drive back south.

All in all it was a really unforgettable experience, even though both our feet hurt quite a bit afterwards and each of us had several mosquito bites that itched for some days. I’m definitely hoping we can return some day and explore other corners of Yosemite…

Obviously, we took tons of pictures over the days and it’s very hard to make a selection for a small gallery here. Therefore I’ll just refer to the extensive album that Teiko put together (click here), which is also the basis for the slide show above. I’ll conclude with a panorama shot of Yosemite Valley from Glacier Point, that I stitched together from several images (click for bigger version):