Here it is, getting on toward the end of May, 2018, and I am hankering for the High Country. Still a bit early for me to venture up into the High Sierra. So I have decided to take a little vacation in my mind by revisiting a couple of days of hiking last summer. Here is Day 1 for your reading enjoyment.

July 12, 2017

I woke at 5:45 AM and was out the door by 6:30, riding with my friend Katie Renz up to the May Lake trailhead in Yosemite. Katie and I had met the previous summer, hiking on the High Sierra Trail in Sequoia National Park. She was on her way to Mt Whitney, and I was just wandering and enjoying a certain aimlessness. Since then, we had been planning a backpacking trip for this time period, expecting to be able to hike above the treeline somewhere.But with the enormous snowpack, the high country was still too impassable and many creeks too dangerous to ford. So in lieu of the backpacking trip, we had opted for a couple of day hikes, staying at night at the Yosemite Bug Resort, where I was cashing in on a comped two nights’ stay to make up for a water problem during the Yosemite Songwriting Retreat the previous Summer.

We stopped in Groveland at the venerable Iron Door for breakfast, which seemed to take forever. No, it actually did take nearly forever. So frustrating to be slowed down so near to our destination. When the food did come, it was pretty good, I have to say. Finally, we were climbing up Hwy 120 and into the park.

I had picked a loop trail that I hoped would let us avoid the snow, which in mid-July still lay deep in the high country. The first couple of miles from Tioga Pass Road up to May Lake were easy and mostly clear of snow. The lake, however, was a different story. It was still mostly frozen, and drifts lay deep under the shade of the firs and pines. There were a few other people scattered about the lakeshore, enjoying the clear day and sun. After a pleasant rest at the lake, we spent about an hour, or so it seemed, trying to track the trail through the snow. We finally located it, and for awhile the trail was clear and dry, and the day seemed like it would be an easy stroll from then on. We met only one other person on the trail all day, headed the opposite direction, and he remarked in an irritated tone on the amount of snow further along. He didn’t like it. Nor do I.

There were gorgeous views of the Murphys Creek drainage, and beyond to the high peaks. The next few miles were perfect hiking: deepest azure cloudless summer skies and expanses of polished granite. Everything I love about the Sierra. Katie and I were good hiking companions, well-matched speed and endurance-wise, and equally and alternately quiet and talkative.

Skunk cabbage was sprouting everywhere in the saturated ground.

We came to a stream crossing where the water sluiced across slick, glassy granite. I liked to keep my phone/camera in a zippered pocket just above the knee of my pants, where it was easy to access. I had just stepped out of the creek and onto the dry trail when I felt a strange slithering, and my phone dropped to the ground out of the bottom of the pocket. The seam had just come unraveled. I spent a few moments feeling grateful for the timing of the accident. A moment earlier, and it would have landed in the stream, and possibly have been swept downstream before I could retrieve it. It might not have killed it, but it probably would have been the end of photos that day…

We took a short detour off the trail to Raisin Lake, a little gem that is reputed to be a great place to swim, later in the season. Those trees don’t look like they could be hiding so much snow!

This little guy was hoping for a handout.

As soon as we came off the exposed East-facing side of the valley and were in among the trees, we hit huge drifts over the trail, which required that we were constantly searching on the frozen crust for scuff-marks and signs of the trail, which was somewhere beneath us, under four-to-six-feet of the darned white stuff. Bits of the trail showed themselves on occasion, usually streaming with runoff. So we alternately slid on the snow and splashed through the water and tried to avoid the worst of the mud.

As we had to watch our step constantly on the slick snow, I didn’t take many photos. That often happens when I’m busy working, and then afterwards I am always disappointed that there is no photographic evidence.

At the top of the valley, we headed east for a bit before we turned sound along the west-facing slope, and eventually returned to Tioga Pass Road, a good 9 miles later. With so much snow, it was more than I had anticipated doing the first day, but I only have myself to blame. I think Katie would have been happy turning back at May Lake.

We finally completed our little loop, and happily exhausted returned to the car. Then we had a long drive back to our lodging at Yosemite Bug. No mishaps, except that we got pulled over for speeding (going 35 in a 25mph zone) through what turned out to be a bear crossing area. Oops! Luckily, no ticket and no mishaps with the wildlife. We paid assiduous attention to all the signs after that.

Got back to the lodge just in time for dinner, but with not much of an appetite after all that work. Neither of us could finish our dinners. Now we are in our beds and I am finishing up these notes before I hit the pillow. Tomorrow: a hike that I have taken before, from Tioga Pass Road to the Yosemite Valley floor via North Dome and Yosemite Falls. Stay tuned.