Yosemite National Park

For our first year anniversary, my wife and I visited Yosemite for the first time. On Day 1 (Thanksgiving Day), we drove up from Los Angeles (~300 miles) and had an amazing Thanksgiving dinner at the Ahwahnee Hotel. One Day 2, we used the shuttle system to get around the valley to go on some short hikes and see the visitor center. On Day 3 we drove to the Hetch Hetchy reservoir and went on a longer hike. On Day 4 we walked around lower Yosemite Falls before heading back to LA.

Read on for the full report and check out my photo gallery.

Yosemite Valley

I’ve seen hundreds, if not thousands of Yosemite photos over the years but before we got ready for this trip, I didn’t fully realize how all of the major sights are concentrated in Yosemite Valley. The valley takes up a fraction of the National Park boundary (bigger than Rhode Island) but Yosemite Valley is the only place most people go. El Capitan, Half Dome, Yosemite Falls, Bridalveil Falls – they’re all right next to each other. It’s truly inspiring to see.

I learned that Half Dome isn’t just a neat rock formation in Yosemite, it’s pretty much the dominant feature of the valley. You could argue that El Capitan is, too, but it’s not as unique as Half Dome. The visitor center has a relief model of the valley, and it helps show how enormous Half Dome is. It rises nearly a mile above the valley floor! That’s pretty crazy.

The visitor center has some excellent exhibits about how the glacial valley was created and how it’s always changing. Rock falls happen all the time from the steep cliffs. The glacial “U-shaped” valley is wide and flat, and makes for fun and easy hiking. I felt like a tourist in NYC, always looking up. There’s hardly a spot in the valley where you can look up and not see some amazing cliff towering above you. Numerous large meadows allow for unobstructed views.

Getting There, Getting Around

There are 3 roads to Yosemite Valley, and we drove on all of them. We came from Los Angeles and entered from the South on Route 41, which takes you through Wawona and near the Mariposa Sequoia grove. We were in a hurry to get to our Thanksgiving Dinner, so we didn’t stop there. After peaking around 6,000 feet, the road drops back down and you go through the Wawona tunnel, about 3/4 miles long. As soon as you exit the tunnel you’re greeted with an amazing view of Yosemite Valley, and there’s plenty of parking to stop and take photos. It took us about 6.5 hours to get to the valley, and that didn’t include a lunch stop.

The Northern entrance is Big Oak Road, which meets up with Route 120 outside of the valley. Route 120 goes all the way over the Sierras, but that portion was closed as it usually is between November-May. Eventually we turned North on Evergreen Road, which meets up with Hetch Hetchy Road that finally takes you to the reservoir. There are signs, but they’re not the easiest to follow. The roads are small and very windy – it’s not nearly as developed as Yosemite Valley.

The middle road is Route 140, which follows the Merced River right into the valley. We took it out on Day 4, a beautiful scenic drive. What I liked best about this road was that you drove underneath overhanging rocks. If you drive into the park, you even get to drive under a natural rock arch. Part of the road was buried by a recent rock slide, so there was a 10 minute wait at a one-way section across a temporary bridge. Route 140 descends gracefully back into California’s central valley, which was beautiful with the golden rolling hills.

In Yosemite Valley, we didn’t drive much and instead opted for the shuttle to get us around. It worked wonderfully, and I was surprised by the hours of operation: 7am-10pm! Despite the shuttle being packed with people at times, there were still a lot of cars on the roads and in the parking lots. I can’t imagine coming here in the summer – it must be maddening.

Weather

Since it was late November it was pretty cold, but nothing horrible. The roads and paths were pretty slippery with ice in the mornings. On Friday night (Day 2) it started raining, but not until the evening when we weren’t doing anything anyways. We talked to some employees and they told us how the valley sometimes gets pretty heavy snow, but it’s always cleared so that the roads are open year round. The valley floor is only about 4000 feet in elevation, so it’s not exactly the High Sierra.

I highly recommend calling the park to ask about the weather. I checked 3 different weather websites in the days leading up to our trip and the forecasts varied by 30 degrees; only one hinted at a chance of rain. They can also tell you about road closures and chain requirements.

Wildlife

I can’t believe how many male deer we saw – I’ve never seen so many antlers! We also walked within ~5 feet of a doe and fawn. That’s kind of sad, though – they shouldn’t be that comfortable around humans. Speaking of which, we also almost stepped on a raccoon and saw a coyote get run down by a dog. I can’t believe that happened – dogs need to be on leashes in wild places like this. The dog didn’t actually hurt the coyote, it just chased it away, probably protecting its owner. It certainly could have though – the coyote didn’t see it coming. There were also the expected squirrels and birds.

We did NOT see any bears, but we heard the rangers talking about a couple of break ins that happened the night before. If you see a bear, you’re supposed to immediately try and scare it away by yelling and making yourself look big. I’m guessing few visitors actually do this when they see a bear.

Lodging

If you like luxury, stay at the Ahwahnee, but you’ll have to deal with lots of tourists milling about – it’s a pretty popular stop. We stayed in Curry Village, where the rates are low (relatively) and they pack you in like sardines. All of the tents, cabins and tent cabins were in very close proximity, and there wasn’t a lot of privacy because the sound carries right through the walls. Of course, there aren’t any public gathering places near the sleeping areas, so once it got dark it was pretty quiet. By the way, you cannot cook or have fires in Curry Village.

We booked a signature tent cabin, which has a heater built in. The heaters are built-in, but they turn the gas off in the summer. Each tent cabin has a bear box where you have to store your food and anything with a scent. It’s also a squirrel box – we had one in our food in less than a minute after leaving the door open. We’d used bear boxes before, but on this trip it really got old having to move everything back and forth. If you rent a cabin then you can store food inside.

Also, the tent cabins were a weird hybrid of tents and cabins. There was a hinged door, solid walls and electricity. On the other hand, there was just a canvas flap for the windows, and the door didn’t seal at all. We stayed warm by blasting the heater and using 4 wool blankets. Sure, it wasn’t real camping, but it was still roughing it.

The central bathrooms were nice – heated and pretty clean.

Photography

As expected I took a lot of photos, but at a final count of 530 I think I did an OK job not going overboard. I carried my D80 and tripod for most of the trip. I wanted to do a better job of using small apertures for landscape shots, and I think it mostly worked out well. 61 of my favorites are in my Yosemite | Nov 09 gallery. The are all geotagged, which I had to do manually. It’s funny because I had a hard time placing photos near El Capitan. Even though it’s one of the largest features in the valley, it rises straight up, so it doesn’t show up very well on satellite images.

Some things I learned (or was reminded about):

• Overcast days do not make for good landscape shots – the sky is an important element.
• Fisheye lenses are fun! You can make them less distorted by leveling the horizon and placing subjects in the center of the frame.
• In photos of the people, always always always focus on them, not the pretty mountains behind them.
• Fingerless gloves keep your hands warm while still being able to work the camera controls.
• Get up early to take photos, but don’t stay out past the time you told your wife you’d be back.
• To reduce residual vibration on a tripod, set your self-timer for 5 seconds, 2 is not enough.
• Remember to turn off vibration reduction (or image stabilization) when using a tripod.
• Remember not to use auto ISO for long shutter speeds/night shots.

Food

The second thing we did after arrival (after checking in) was drive to the Ahwahnee Hotel for Thanksgiving dinner. It was delicious! We had an appetizer plate of pickled things including carrots, potatoes and cauliflower, as well as olives and regular pickles. Then we were brought delicious butternut squash soup, which warmed my insides nicely. Following close behind was a salad with dried figs and bleu cheese – a combination I was not expecting to be so delicious (much better than figs and goat cheese).

After the salad we got our main courses – I got the prime rib and Ann got the turkey. Both were delicious and hearty, and we ended up sharing a lot. We each had a glass of the house wine; she got Chardonnay, I got Cabernet Sauvignon – both were quite good and we bought bottles to take home. For dessert I got mincemeat pie – which I normally have at my parents’ house – and she got pumpkin. Finally they brought us coffee and tea.

One of my favorite parts of the meal was that we weren’t rushed at all. Of course, we paid good money for it – $100 per person – but still, it’s nice to have great service and be able to really, truly enjoy the meal. We were sat in an isolated part of the room (it’s a huge dining room) and had views of the valley around us.

For breakfasts and lunches we brought an ice chest from home. All food has to be stored in a bear box outside your tent cabin – you cannot leave food in your car. Even random parking pulloffs have bear boxes so you can store your food if you go on a hike. The bears have learned to depend on human food to the extent that they don’t hibernate anymore and are active all year. By the way, the definition of food is anything with a scent, not just things humans would eat.

For dinners on Day 2 and 3, we found ourselves at the Curry Village Pizza Deck – surprisingly good pizza. Curry Village had some other places to eat, too, but we didn’t have a chance to try any of it.

Hikes

Happy Isles

Day 2 – Happy Isles

We chose this hike first because it was so close to where we were staying. Even so, we still waited for the tram to take us to stop 17 and save us some extra walking. Happy Isles is a place where the river cuts through a couple of islands and there is a “fen” which is a type of wetland. The ?SDF? river had a decent amount of water in it and there were some great views of North Dome.

Mirror Lake

Day 2 – Mirror Lake

The shuttle stop for this hike was just down the road from Happy Isles. The hike was about 2.5 miles up the valley to a wide area of the river where the water spreads out like a lake. Sadly, Mirror Lake is seasonal and Fall is not its season, so there was mostly a lot of sand. When it’s full, you get great reflections of Half Dome and the surrounding formations. Even without the mirror, we got to hike through a lovely area and were treated to amazing views of Half Dome from directly underneath it. As we prepared to go back, the weather started to turn colder as a storm approached.

Hetch Hetchy Reservoir

Day 3- Wapana Falls, Hetch Hetchy

Not wanting to spend our entire trip in the Yosemite Valley, we drove 40 miles north (1.5 hours) to the Hetch Hetchy reservoir. It’s also an amazing place in its current state, but its a little sad because it was once a grand glacial valley like Yosemite. Now it is a reservoir for San Francisco drinking water. John Muir fought heavily to preserve it.

To get to the trail, you have to walk across the O’Shaughnessy dam and through a tunnel. It was so incredibly windy at the dam, and it stayed windy for a couple hours. I thought the wind would die down in the tunnel, but it actually got worse and brought tears to my eyes. Once we got out of the tunnel it was bearable.

The glacial origins of the valley were really evident along parts of the trail, where there were smooth, curving granite surfaces. Hetch Hetchy is also a good deal lower in elevation than Yosemite Valley, so the vegetation was different. We saw a lot of manzanita bushes.

Day 4 – Yosemite Falls

Well, Lower Yosemite Falls to be exact. It’s not really even a hike, just a nice stroll to the base of the falls. The hike to the top of Upper Yosemite Falls is quite strenuous and we did not have the time or energy to do that. The trail is a wide, paved path that should be accessible to just about anyone. It took us about 10-15 minutes to reach the base of the falls, where there is a large viewing area. I read that the falls often run dry at certain times of the year, so I was happy they were flowing a little. I’m sure if it were springtime we would have been getting soaked from the spray.

Next time we go we will…

Check out Wawona – We had to make our dinner reservations, so we just drove on through this area.

Enjoy a bottle of wine to the Pizza Deck – Lots of other people were drinking their own wine, we felt a little left out.

Choose a different season – Fall was nice, but it definitely limited some of the things we wanted to do. The biggest limitations were that Glacier Point and Tioga Road were closed.

Stay somewhere other than Curry Village – Hopefully we’ll go at a time when we can tent camp and not freeze. We also heard good things about the Housekeeping Camp – also tent cabins – where you are close to the river and allowed to have fires and cook.

Bring our bikes – I had no idea that there were so many bike paths in the valley. It makes sense since it’s so broad and flat – a perfect place for bike riding.