Yosemite

What can you say about Yosemite that hasn’t already been said? And what can you photograph that there aren’t already ten copies of on Flickr? (Don’t even get me started on some of those people that used film rather than CMOS sensors.)

Having said that, it didn’t stop me trying. There is no two ways about it: Yosemite is an absolutely stunning location. Everywhere you look there is more beautiful scenery, forests, water falls.

I arrived on the Friday afternoon, checking into the hotel just outside the park and driving into Yosemite itself. The drive from the entrance to the visitors centre was longer than I was expecting but sunset over Half Dome was every bit as spectacular as I’d been led to believe.

The next day I decided to do a little more driving and went as far as Olmsted Point and then a little bit of the John Muir Trail until the path just petered out. This wasn’t entirely unexpected as the trail had only opened a few weeks previously and there was still snow on the ground in some parts.

On Sunday and Monday morning I decided to stay in the valley. I saw Yosemite Falls ((I’m willing to be corrected on the names. Although looking distinct at the time, the names have kind of blurred into one now that I’ve got home!)) and Vernal Falls on the Sunday. On Monday, before driving back, I decided to head to Mirror Lake which, despite its name, is not actually a lake. It does, however, resemble a mirror with some beautiful reflections of the surrounding mountains. Unfortunately I took the wrong path. I nick-named it the horse-poo path for good reason and didn’t go down the trail as far as I had intended.

Turning back I took a slight detour past The Ahwahnee, the only hotel in the national park. If I ever win the lottery ((I’ve never bought a ticket so that seems unlikely.)) I might stay there. This time, though, I had to just pop in for a quick look around and then return to the car for the journey back to the Bay Area.

The only thing that I could really complain about was the food. It was invariably not great and overpriced but, frankly, with the scenery and my luck with the weather it wasn’t going to spoil my weekend. Next time maybe camping would be the way to go.

One thought on “Yosemite”

  1. you got the names of the waterfalls right. 🙂 and i’m all for camping next time. good luck convincing my sister and my husband that we should do that…

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