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The great naturalist John Muir
once wrote that Yosemite is "a paradise that makes even the loss of Eden seem
insignificant". Indeed, a visit to the nation's first national park always
invites a private assessment as to whether this is the most beautiful place on
earth. Usually I try to visit in the winter, but this visit was in the
fall and that meant an opportunity to visit some places I hadn't seen before.
From there it was off to drive along the northern route of the Tioga pass. Tioga and the road to Glacier Point are closed in the winter and had only been briefly reopened from the season's first snow. As it was, there was a long wait for Tioga to open as the rangers waited for the ice to melt in the middle of the day. Toulumne Meadows in the high country spends much of the year under several feet of snow, but it offers some really pretty landscape and contrasts. It must be spectacular in the spring when the first flowers poke through the snow. As it was, the high country was pretty chilly and the streams, lakes, and ponds all had ice even though it was 70F in the valley. Just a few days after I visited more snow came and the roads were closed. Being in the high country also exposed ancient trees over 1,000 years old as the Ice Age ended. (For those of you not familiar, Yosemite was formed by glaciers during the last Ice Age and the big mountain of Half Dome was covered with ice up to just 700 feet below the top. To put that in perspective, Half Dome reaches a whopping 8,842' above sea level and nearly 5,000' above the valley floor.)
The funny thing is that I almost didn't go to Yosemite on this trip. I've done Yosemite numerous times and thought I should really find something else to see in the area. I ended up getting to see some things I have never seen before and the trip served as a gentle reminder that paradise is never boring.
