Monday, September 27, 2010

Yosemite NP – Hiking to Vernal Falls

Laura and Dave joined us at Yosemite NP for the weekend. On Friday, Sept 24th, we hiked up to Vernal Falls – a 6.8 mile round trip hike with a total 1400 ft elevation gain. The day was beautiful…not a cloud in the sky….a bit cool. but warming up to the high 70’s.

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The Sierra mountains are just awesome!…….

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This is Vernal Falls from the bottom….

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And closer…….it always amazes me what power water has! Carving the rock….

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And creating rainbows…….

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To get to the top of the falls….one has to climb…..in this case, over 600 steps up the granite face (that’s what the book said, I did not count them!) this picture was taken from the top, looking down.

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This is taken from the top of the falls…….

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Just past Vernal Falls was a beautiful pool…..a perfect spot to have lunch.

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We were joined by a blue jay…..somebody called this a Stellar Blue Jay?  

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Further up the trail, you could see a great view of Half-Dome mountain. This mountain is well know  to rock climbers for its difficulty -   we met several people at the park who had climbed it.

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Heading back down…this part was a loop trail so we did not have to climb down those 600 steps (thank goodness)!

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A wonderful hike….and back to camp by 4 pm…. We fixed pizza for supper, and enjoyed a campfire (with roasted marshmallows, of course).

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