Ben and Doug's 2006 September Tuolomne-Vogelsang trip

Summary

14–16 September 2006

My nephew Ben just turned 12 years old the month before this trip. We'd been on two other three-day backpacking trips together; in both cases, we slept in the same camp on the two nights. This would be his first trip where we camp a different spot each night.

We left Ben Lomond Thursday evening around 8, and drove up 120 towards Yosemite. Stayed at Diamond O Campground on the Hetch Hetchy road. Friday A.M., we drove up to Tuolomne, got a permit, and walked on out to the south, via Lyell Canyon and then the Rafferty Creek trail. Cold Friday night above Boothe Lake. Saturday took us past Vogelsang High Sierra Camp, Fletcher Lake, Evelyn Lake, and down to Ireland Creek's junction with the Lyell Fork (and our trail's junction with the John Muir Trail). Sunday we walked back to the car, drove down to Yosemite Valley, and then finally back home.

A page of Thumbnails

Here is a whole page of 84 captioned thumbnails, each linked to a somewhat larger (usually 480 x 640, or vice versa) version of the same picture. Those in a hurry can read it as if it were a trip report written in a rather extremely terse style.

Details

I always see way more wildlife when I go places with Ben than when I'm on my own. It's weird. This trip was no exception. On Thursday night, between Groveland and the Hetch Hetchy turnoff, we saw a mouse, an owl, a fox, and a jackrabbit. The fox was the coolest -- light brownish, with a dark tip on his tail. He ran across the street in front of us, did a 360 just like our Spaniel does, and then hightailed it up the bank. Later, I examined "sierra nevada" foxes on Google images, and my recollection sure looks more like a red fox than like the more common ones.

We got to the Diamond O around 1 am, and (sorta) slept in the car. It was pretty cold, though not too bad. We later heard that the folks at Vogelsang that night got two hours of snowfall and that Yosemite Valley had temps in the low 20's. We awoke before 6:30, and got going. Ben said that he'd been having dreams about bears in grass skirts.

We drove up towards Tuolomne Meadows, stopping to read several of the interpretive signs. One of them describes the old Tioga Road, and is in the inner side of the turnout, so that when you're reading the sign, you're looking back towards the road. I noticed some motion, and it turned out that a dozen or two yards the other side of the road, there was a bear.

After we took a few photos, we headed on. A bit farther along the road, in the Yosemite Creek drainage, we saw another bear. (The photo just shows the top of his back, but we got a good view of him on the road, then ambling off to the north.)
We stopped at the recently-renovated Olmstead Point, which has a new brass relief map.

We arrived at the Tuolomne Meadows Wilderness Permit station, where about 8 or 10 people were waiting for it to open. By the time it opened, there were nearly 20 of us. We stood through the "leave no trace" spiel, competently delivered by one of the rangers there. My favorite part was when she asked "Do any of you use soap in the backcountry?" and not a single hand was raised.

We got the permit to go up Rafferty Creek, went back to the car, and hit the trail. A couple of flat miles, then we found the Rafferty Creek turnoff. The Creek itself was totally dry, giving us a bit of concern (wondering whether we would find any more places to filter any water for the rest of the day). The trail up the creek was pretty steep at first, and we weren't (well, I wasn't) very well acclimatized yet. The day remained pretty cold, and I moved pretty slowly as we climbed the steeper part.

Ran into a woman we had met at the Grill. She said that she had just "run up to Tuolomne Pass and back", that it was really really windy there, and that this was a quite nice campsite.

Day 2 — from above Boothe Lake, up past Vogelsang; beautiful Fletcher Lake, with a small icefield melting into it; a marmot; Lake Evelyn; a crazy runner; a glacial erratic; Amelia Earhart; and then hit the final ridge, from which we would descend. A lot. Deer. Bear Lair. Spooky camp. Bear time.
Day 3 — up earlyish, I found the missing cook-pot (had basically slept on it, a big-time no-no); found a beautiful spot on the Lyell fork at which to attempt to boil/purify some water. Bah. Ben found icicles. Very nice helpful backpackers let us filter 1.5 liters of water, plenty for the five-mile, mostly very nearly flat downhill back to the car.

Up to Tioga Pass for a look-see, then down to the Tuolomne Grill for some burgers, and down into Yosemite Valley. Visited Bridalveil Falls. Just as we entered the one-way section of road into the Valley, a bear ran full-speed down the hill from our right, across the road in front of us, and on down into the forest toward the Merced. Cool.

Fun.