Thursday 10th Aril 2014……Day 5 !!

This blog needs to be accompanied by a cup of coffee or tea or if in your time it is after 4.30pm a glass of wine!!!

Had a really good sleep the bed is very comfortable and I did not wake till 6.30am so that is great I had a nice cup of tea and caught up with e mails and made some reservations for later in the week.

Can you believe I  received some mail from people telling me they thought the 5 dollar per day fee for the Pearson guided tour was too much…the nerve of some people they are now banned from the blog for four days!!!!

Today was going to be the biggie..hiking to the top of Yosemite falls and I loaded up my new pack with lots of food and drinks and everything else I thought I might need…the sun was shining and it was a lovely day and I was out of Ramona 2 by 9am…although I am only 17 miles from the park gate the road in the park to the visitors center is very slow and over 24 miles long and I mis judged the time.

Some beautiful sights on the way through the park!!!

 

  A chat with a Ranger confirmed that to go to where I wanted was possible but really best for tomorrow if I start earlier but he suggested another hike Mist Falls my friend from tennis Steve also told me I should do this one.  So I parked Little Bluey and took the free shuttle bus to here

Ok you have some instructions for the next part of the blog but first a little history…I my regular and long time readers know I was raised in the Salvation Army and one of my Mum’s favorite hymns was “How great thou art”    so do me a special favor go to You tube and search for this song sung by Carrie Underwood and play it and listen to the words whilst you look at some of these amazing shots of the force of nature!!!

That waterfall is where I am heading..

Heading for the X!!!!

The noise of this water cascading was truly awesome

The rainbow is not strong but is there!!

My back pack is wonderful love it all especially the elastic pockets to hold the drink containers very easy to get to the only issue was finding some where to attach my camera without it swinging in front of me I tried 5 different places but eventually got it sorted!!

As you can see this route is a bit dangerous as the steps were soaked from the spray of the powerful falls!!!

The top!!!!!

So I was now at the top of Vernal Falls and it was a tough hike so what do I do now do I go for Nevada Falls….

  X marks the spot so what should a guy do!!!!!!!   Do what Nike suggests…”Just do it”   so off I go

I have had in the last 7 years had some wonderful lunch stop breaks but this one ranks right up there!!!!

You cannot begin to imagine the power of this falling water!!!

At the beginning of the hike there was a bear warning in effect so I had my spray ready and lucky for me because as I rounded a blind corner I ran into this creature but I stayed calm and passed by without incident!!!

 

 

 

 

 

At last the top go back and read the elevation gain!!!!!

Such a wonderful sight and I keep seeing this man too

From the shuttle bus window on the way back

 

It is always a good day when I spot a deer.

On the drive back this song came on the radio I have heard this song many times and always it seems on special days and today is no exception…the song is a tribute to life by Tim McCraw!!

He said
"I was in my early forties
With a lot of life before me
And a moment came that stopped me on a dime
I spent most of the next days
Looking at the x-rays
Talkin' 'bout the options
And talkin' 'bout sweet time"
I asked him
"When it sank in
That this might really be the real end
How's it hit you
When you get that kind of news?
Man, what'd you do?"
He said
"I went skydiving
I went Rocky Mountain climbing
I went 2.7 seconds on a bull named Blue Manchu
And I loved deeper
And I spoke sweeter
And I gave forgiveness I'd been denying"
And he said
"Someday I hope you get the chance
To live like you were dying"
He said
"I was finally the husband
That most of the time I wasn't
And I became a friend a friend would like to have
And all of a sudden going fishin'
Wasn't such an imposition
And I went three times that year I lost my dad
I finally read the Good Book, and I
Took a good, long, hard look
At what I'd do if I could do it all again
And then
I went skydiving
I went Rocky Mountain climbing
I went 2.7 seconds on a bull named Fu Manchu
And I loved deeper
And I spoke sweeter
And I gave forgiveness I'd been denying"
And he said
"Someday I hope you get the chance
To live like you were dying
Like tomorrow was a gift
And you've got eternity
To think about
What you'd do with it
What could you do with it
What did I do with it?
What would I do with it?
Skydiving
I went Rocky mountain climbing
I went 2.7 seconds on a bull named Fu Manchu
And I loved deeper
And I spoke sweeter
And I watched an eagle as it was flying"
And he said
"Someday I hope you get the chance
To live like you were dying
To live like you were dying
To live like you were dying

 

It was 7pm by the time I got back home this is the property where Ramona 2 is parked.

A day not soon to be forgotten…..relaxed and iced my knee and don’t where the night went but it is after 10pm.

So has hard as the hike was today with the elevation gain tomorrow is even more so…700 feet more elevation gain and 2 miles longer…so bring it ON!!!!

For those interested the history of Yosemite!!!!

 

 

Miwok Indians in front of Umacha teepee, Yosemite National Park, 1925

For thousands of years, the Ahwaneechee Indians occupied the area we know today as Yosemite. In 1851, the first white men entered the Yosemite valley searching for Indians with the aim of driving them from their homeland. One of the men, a young doctor named Lafayette Bunnell, was struck by the astonishing beauty of the place. He named the area "Yosemite," mistakenly believing it to be the name of the tribe living there.

In 1855, a second group of white people led by James Mason Hutchings entered Yosemite Valley. Hutchings hoped to make a fortune by promoting California's scenic wonders and running a tourist hotel in the valley. In 1859, Hutchings returned to Yosemite with a photographer. News and images of the incomparable beauty of Yosemite quickly spread, bringing more tourists to the area.

 

In those early days, visiting Yosemite required a two-day trip from San Francisco to the nearest town, followed by a grueling two- to three-day trek along rocky mountainsides either by foot or on horseback. Between 1855 and 1864, only 653 tourists made the arduous journey.

When Frederick Law Olmsted, the designer of New York City's Central Park, visited Yosemite, he wrote that it was "the greatest glory of nature... the union of the deepest sublimity with the deepest beauty." There was a growing sense that the area needed to be legally protected if it was to survive through the ages.

The cavalry was given the task of protecting the national parks. Under Captain Charles Young, the first black man to be put in charge of a national park, soldiers built the first trail to Mount Whitney and erected protective fences around the big trees.

 

 

 

John Muir, circa 1860

On May 17, 1864, Senator John Conness of California, acting at the urging of some of his constituents, introduced a bill to Congress that proposed something totally unprecedented in human history: setting aside a large tract of natural scenery for the future enjoyment of everyone. On June 30, 1864, President Abraham Lincoln signed an act of Congress ceding the Yosemite Valley and the Mariposa Grove of Giant Sequoias to the state of California.

As a member of the board of commissioners appointed to oversee Yosemite, Frederick Law Olmsted wrote a detailed report about the future of the park. He called for strict regulations to protect the landscape from anything that would harm it and stressed the importance of making Yosemite accessible to everyone. But his recommendations were deemed too controversial to bring to the state legislature and his report was quietly suppressed.

Park pioneer Galen Clark was the unanimous choice to be given the job of protecting the new Yosemite Grant and Mariposa Grove. He had been lured to Yosemite by James Hutchings' lavish accounts and was the first white man to see the collection of giant sequoias that he named the Mariposa Grove of Big Trees. Clark threw himself into the nearly impossible task of maintaining and protecting the park on only $500 a year.

In brazen defiance of the new law, Hutchings had quickly moved to expand his operations and exploit the valley. He already owned two hotels in Yosemite and soon began charging people for the privilege of seeing the park. He decided he needed a sawmill, and in the fall of 1869 he hired 31-year-old John Muir to run it. Muir would become an eloquent spokesman for the virtues of the park, and its fiercest protector. In 1873, Muir and Hutchings parted ways, with Muir moving to Oakland to write articles about Yosemite for various publications.

Clark continued to fight against James Hutchings, who was technically an illegal squatter in Yosemite. In 1875, after lengthy legal battles, Hutchings was evicted from his hotel and banished from the valley

Yashi Kochi!!!