|
ONE-DAY EXCURSIONS
No. 1
IF I were so time-poor as to
have only one day to spend in Yosemite I should start at daybreak, say at
three o'clock in midsummer, with a pocketful of any sort of dry breakfast
stuff, for Glacier Point, Sentinel Dome, the head of Illilouette Fall,
Nevada Fall, the top of Liberty Cap, Vernal Fall and the wild boulder-choked
River Caņon. The trail leaves the Valley at the base of the Sentinel Rock,
and as you slowly saunter from point to point along its many accommodating
zigzags nearly all the Valley rocks and falls are seen in striking, ever-
changing combinations. At an elevation of about five hundred feet a
particularly fine, wide-sweeping view down the Valley is obtained, past the
sheer face of the Sentinel and between the Cathedral Rocks and El Capitan.
At a height of about fifteen hundred feet the great Half Dome comes full in
sight, overshadowing every other feature of the Valley to the
eastward. From Glacier Point
you look down three thousand feet over the edge of its sheer face to the
meadows and groves and innumerable yellow pine spires, with the meandering
river sparkling and spangling through the midst of them. Across the Valley a
great telling view is presented of the Royal Arches, North Dome, Indian
Caņon, Three Brothers and El Capitan, with the dome-paved basin of Yosemite
Creek and Mount Hoffman in the background. To the eastward, the Half Dome
close beside you looking higher and more wonderful than ever, southeastward
the Starr King, girdled with silver firs, and the spacious garden-like basin
of the Illilouette and its deeply sculptured fountain peaks, called the
Merced group; and beyond all, marshaled along the eastern horizon, the icy
summits on the axis of the range and broad swaths of forests growing on
ancient moraines, while the Nevada, Vernal, and Yosemite Falls are not only
full in sight, but are distinctly heard as if one were standing beside them
in their spray.
The views from the summit of
Sentinel Dome are still more extensive and telling. Eastward the crowds of
peaks at the head of the Merced, Tuolumne, and San Joaquin Rivers are
presented in bewildering array; westward, the vast forests, yellow foothills
and the broad San Joaquin plains and the coast ranges, hazy and dim in the
distance.
From Glacier Point go down
the trail into the lower end of the Illilouette basin, cross Illilouette
Creek and follow it to the fall, where from an out-jutting rock at its head
you will get a fine view of its rejoicing waters and wild caņon and the Half
Dome. Thence returning to the trail, follow it to the head of the Nevada
Fall. Linger here an hour or two, for not only have you glorious views of
the wonderful fall, but of its wild, leaping, exulting rapids and, greater
than all, the stupendous scenery into the heart of which the white
passionate river goes wildly thundering, surpassing everything of its kind
in the world. After an unmeasured hour or so of this glory, all your body
aglow, nerve currents flashing through you never before felt, go to the top
of the Liberty Cap, only a glad saunter now that your legs as well as head
and heart are awake and rejoicing with everything. The Liberty Cap, a
companion of the Half Dome, is sheer and inaccessible on three of its sides
but on the east a gentle, ice- burnished, juniper-dotted slope extends to
the summit where other wonderful views are displayed where all are
wonderful: the south side and shoulders of Half Dome and Clouds' Rest, the
beautiful Little Yosemite Valley and its many domes, the Starr King cluster
of domes, Sentinel Dome, Glacier Point, and, perhaps the most tremendously
impressive of all, the views of the hopper-shaped caņon of the river from
the head of the Nevada Fall to the head of the Valley.
Returning to the trail you
descend between the Nevada Fall and the Liberty Cap with fine side views of
both the fall and the rock, pass on through clouds of spray and along the
rapids to the head of the Vernal Fall, about a mile below the Nevada. Linger
here if night is still distant, for views of this favorite fall and the
stupendous rock scenery about it. Then descend a stairway by its side,
follow a dim trail through its spray, and a plain one along the border of
the boulder-dashed rapids and so back to the wide, tranquil Valley.
ONE-DAY EXCURSIONS
No. 2
Another grand one-day
excursion is to the Upper Yosemite Fall, the top of the highest of the Three
Brothers, called Eagle Peak on the Geological Survey maps; the brow of El
Capitan; the head of the Ribbon Fall; across the beautiful Ribbon Creek
basin; and back to the Valley by the Big Oak Flat wagon road.
The trail leaves the Valley
on the east side of the largest of the earthquake taluses immediately
opposite the Sentinel Rock and as it passes within a few rods of the foot of
the great fall, magnificent views are obtained as you approach it and pass
through its spray, though when the snow is melting fast you will be well
drenched. From the foot of the fall the trail zigzags up a narrow caņon
between the fall and a plain mural cliff that is burnished here and there by
glacial action.
You should stop a while on a
flat iron-fenced rock a little below the head of the fall beside the
.enthusiastic throng of starry comet-like waters to learn something of their
strength, their marvelous variety of forms, and above all, their glorious
music, gathered and composed from the .snowstorms, hail-, rain- and
windstorms that have fallen on their glacier-sculptured, domey, ridgy basin.
Refreshed and exhilarated, you follow your trail-way through silver fir and
pine woods to Eagle Peak, where the most comprehensive of all the views to
be had on the north-wall heights are displayed. After an hour or two of
gazing, dreaming, studying the tremendous topography, etc., trace the rim of
the Valley to the grand El Capitan ridge and go down to its brow, where you
will gain everlasting impressions of Nature's steadfastness and power
combined with ineffable fineness of beauty.
Dragging yourself away, go to
the head of the Ribbon Fall, thence across the beautiful Ribbon Creek basin
to the Big Oak Flat stage-road, and down its fine grades to the Valley,
enjoying glorious Yosemite scenery all the way to the foot of El Capitan and
your camp.
TWO-DAY EXCURSIONS
No. 1
For a two-day trip I would go
straight to Mount Hoffman, spend the night on the summit, next morning go
down by May Lake to Tenaya Lake and return to the Valley by Clouds' Rest and
the Nevada and Vernal Falls. As on the foregoing excursion, you leave the
Valley by the Yosemite Falls trail and follow it to the Tioga wagon road, a
short distance east of Porcupine Flat. From that point push straight up to
the summit. Mount Hoffman is a mass of gray granite that rises almost in the
center of the Yosemite Park, about eight or ten miles in a straight line
from the Valley. Its southern slopes are low and easily climbed, and adorned
here and there with castle-like crumbling piles and long jagged crests that
look like artificial masonry; but on the north side it is abruptly
precipitous and banked with lasting snow. Most of the broad summit is
comparatively level and thick sown with crystals, quartz, mica, hornblende,
feldspar, granite, zircon, tourmaline, etc., weathered out and strewn
closely and loosely as if they had been sown broadcast. Their radiance is
fairly dazzling in sunlight, almost hiding the multitude of small flowers
that grow among them. At first sight only these radiant crystals are likely
to be noticed, but looking closely you discover a multitude of very small
gilias, phloxes, mimulus, etc., many of them with more petals than leaves.
On the borders of little streams larger plants flourish - lupines, daisies,
asters, goldenrods, hairbell, mountain columbine, potentilla, astragalus and
a few gentians; with charming heathworts - bryanthus, cassiope, kalmia,
vaccinium in boulder-fringing rings or bank covers. You saunter among the
crystals and flowers as if you were walking among stars. From the sununit
nearly all the Yosemite Park is displayed like a map: forests, lakes,
meadows, and snowy peaks. Northward lies Yosemite's wide basin with its
domes and small lakes, shining like larger crystals; eastward the rocky,
meadowy Tuolumne region, bounded by its snowy peaks in glorious array;
southward Yosemite and westward the vast forest. On no other Yosemite Park
mountain are you more likely to linger. You will find it a magnificent sky
camp. Clumps of dwarf pine and mountain hemlock will furnish resin roots and
branches for fuel and light, and the rills, sparkling water. Thousands of
the little plant people will gaze at your camp-fire with the crystals and
stars, companions and guardians as you lie at rest in the heart of the vast
serene night.
The most telling of all the
wide Hoffman views is the basin of the Tuolumne with its meadows, forests
and hundreds of smooth rock-waves that appear to be coming rolling on toward
you like high heaving waves ready to break, and beyond these the great
mountains. But best of all are the dawn and the sunrise. No mountain top
could be better placed for this most glorious of mountain views - to watch
and see the deepening colors of the dawn and the sunbeams streaming through
the snowy High Sierra passes, awakening the lakes and crystals, the chilled
plant people and winged people, and making everything shine and sing in pure
glory.
With your heart aglow,
spangling Lake Tenaya and Lake May will beckon you away for walks on their
ice-burnished shores. Leave Tenaya at the west end, cross to the south side
of the outlet, and gradually work your way up in an almost straight south
direction to the summit of the divide between Tenaya Creek and the main
upper Merced River or Nevada Creek and follow the divide to Clouds' Rest.
After a glorious view from the crest of this lofty granite wave you will
find a trail on its western end that will lead you down past Nevada and
Vernal Falls to the Valley in good time, provided you left your Hoffman sky
camp early.
TWO-DAY EXCURSIONS
No. 2
Another grand two-day
excursion is the same as the first of the one-day trips, as far as the head
of Illilouette Fall. From there trace the beautiful stream up through the
heart of its magnificent forests and gardens to the caflons between the Red
and Merced Peaks, and pass the night where I camped forty-one years ago.
Early next morning visit the small glacier on the north side of Merced Peak,
the first of the sixty-five that I discovered in the Sierra.
Glacial phenomena in the
Illilouette basin are on the grandest scale, and in the course of my
explorations I found that the caņon and moraines between the Merced and Red
Mountains were the most interesting of them all. The path of the vanished
glacier shone in many places as if washed with silver, and pushing up the
caņon on this bright road I passed lake after lake in solid basins of
granite and many a meadow along the caņon stream that links them together.
The main lateral moraines that bound the view below the caņon are from a
hundred to nearly two hundred feet high and wonderfully regular, like
artificial embankments, covered with a magnificent growth of silver fir and
pine. But this garden and forest luxuriance is speedily left behind, and
patches of bryanthus, cassiope and arctic willows begin to appear. The small
lakes which a few miles down the Valley are so richly bordered with flowery
meadows have at an elevation of ten thousand feet only small brown mats of
carex, leaving bare rocks around more than half their shores. Yet, strange
to say, amid all this arctic repression the mountain pine on ledges and
buttresses of Red Mountain seems to find the climate best suited to it. Some
specimens that I measured were over a hundred feet high and twenty-four feet
in circumference, showing hardly a trace of severe storms, looking as fresh
and vigorous as the giants of the lower zones. Evening came on just as I got
fairly into the main caņon. It is about a mile wide and a little less than
two miles long. The crumbling spurs of Red Mountain bound it on the north,
the somber cliffs of Merced Mountain on the south and a deeply serrated,
splintered ridge curving around from mountain to mountain shuts it in on the
east. My camp was on the brink of one of the lakes in a thicket of mountain
hemlock, partly sheltered from the wind. Early next morning I set out to
trace the ancient glacier to its head. Passing around the north shore of my
camp lake I followed the main stream from one lakelet to another. The dwarf
pines and hemlocks disappeared and the stream was bordered with icicles. The
main lateral moraines that extend from the mouth of the caņon are continued
in straggling masses along the walls. Tracing the streams back to the
highest of its little lakes, I noticed a deposit of fine gray mud, something
like the mud worn from a grindstone. This suggested its glacial origin, for
the stream that was carrying it issued from a raw-looking moraine that
seemed to be in process of formation. It is from sixty to over a hundred
feet high in front, with a slope of about thirty-eight degrees. Climbing to
the top of it, I discovered a very small but well-characterized glacier
swooping down from the shadowy cliffs of the mountain to its terminal
moraine. The ice appeared on all the lower portion of the glacier; farther
up it was covered with snow. The uppermost crevasse or "bergeschrund" was
from twelve to fourteen feet wide. The melting snow and ice formed a network
of rills that ran gracefully down the surface of the glacier, merrily
singing in their shining channels. After this discovery I made excursions
over all the High Sierra and discovered that what at first sight looked like
snow-fields were in great part glaciers which were completing the sculpture
of the summit peaks.
Rising early, - which will be
easy, as your bed will be rather cold and you will not be able to sleep much
anyhow, - after visiting the glacier, climb the Red Mountain and enjoy the
magnificent views from the summit. I counted forty lakes from one standpoint
on this mountain, and the views to the westward over the Illilouette basin,
the most superbly forested of all the basins whose waters drain into
Yosemite, and those of the Yosemite rocks, especially the Half Dome and the
upper part of the north wall, are very fine. But, of course, far the most
imposing view is the vast array of snowy peaks along the axis of the Range.
Then from the top of this peak, light and free and exhilarated with mountain
air and mountain beauty, you should run lightly down the northern slope of
the mountain, descend the caņon between Red and Gray Mountains, thence
northward along the bases of Gray Mountain and Mount Clark and go down into
the head of Little Yosemite, and thence down past. the Nevada and Vernal
Falls to the Valley, a truly glorious two-day trip!
A THREE-DAY EXCURSION
The best three-day excursion,
as far as I can see, is the same as the first of the two-day trips until you
reach Lake Tenaya. There instead of returning to the Valley, follow the
Tioga road around the northwest side of the lake, over to the Tuolumne
Meadows and up to the west base of Mount Dana. Leave the road there and make
straight for the highest point on the timber-line between Mounts Dana and
Gibbs and camp there.
On the morning of the third
day go to the top of Mount Dana in time for the glory of the dawn and the
sunrise over the gray Mono Desert and the sublime forest of High Sierra
peaks. When you leave the mountain go far enough down the north side for a
view of the Dana Glacier, then make your way back to the Tioga road, follow
it along the Tuolumne Meadows to the crossing of Budd Creek where you will
find the Sunrise Trail branching off up the mountain-side through the forest
in a southwesterly direction past the west side of Cathedral Peak, which
will lead you down to the Valley by the Vernal and Nevada Falls. If you are
a good walker you can leave the trail where it begins to descend a steep
slope in the silver fir woods, and bear off to the right and make straight
for the top of Clouds' Rest. The walking is good and almost level and from
the west end of Clouds' Rest take the Clouds' Rest Trail which will lead
direct to the Valley by the Nevada and Vernal Falls. To any one not
desperately time-poor this trip should have four days instead of three;
camping the second night at the Soda Springs; thence to Mount Dana and
return to the Soda Springs, camping the third night there; thence by the
Sunrise Trail to Cathedral Peak, visiting the beautiful Cathedral Lake which
lies about a mile to the west of Cathedral Peak,. eating your luncheon, and
thence to Clouds' Rest and the Valley as above. This is one of the most
interesting of all the comparatively short trips that can be made in the
whole Yosemite region. Not only do you see all the grandest of the Yosemite
rocks and waterfalls and the High Sierra with their glaciers, glacier lakes
and glacier meadows, etc., but sections of the magnificent silver fir,
two-leaved pine, and dwarf pine zones; with the principal alpine flowers and
shrubs, especially sods of dwarf vaccinium covered with flowers and fruit
though less than an inch high, broad mats of dwarf willow scarce an inch
high with catkins that rise straight from the ground, and glorious beds of
blue gentians, - grandeur enough and beauty enough for a lifetime.
THE UPPER TUOLUMNE EXCURSION
We come now to the grandest
of all the Yosemite excursions, one that requires at least two or three
weeks. The best time to make it is from about the middle of July. The
visitor entering the Yosemite in July has the advantage of seeing the falls
not, perhaps, in their very flood prime but next thing to it; while the
glacier meadows will be in their glory and the snow on the mountains will be
firm enough to make climbing safe. Long ago I made these Sierra trips,
carrying only a sackful of bread with a little tea and sugar and was thus
independent and free, but now that trails or carriage roads lead out of the
Valley in almost every direction it is easy to take a pack animal, so that
the luxury of a blanket and a supply of food can easily be had.
The best way to leave the
Valley will be by the Yosemite Fall Trail, camping the first night on the
Tioga road opposite the east end of the Hoffman Range. Next morning climb
Mount Hoffman; thence push on past Tenaya Lake into the Tuolumne Meadows and
establish a central camp near the Soda Springs, from which glorious
excursions can be made at your leisure. For here in this Upper Tuolumne
Valley is the widest, smoothest, most serenely spacious, and in every way
the most delightful summer pleasure-park in all the High Sierra. And since
it is connected with Yosemite by two good trails, and a fairly good carriage
road that passes between Yosemite and Mount Hoffman, it is also the most
accessible. It is in the heart of the High Sierra east of Yosemite,
eighty-five hundred to nine thousand feet above the level of the sea. The
gray, picturesque Cathedral Range bounds it on the south; a similar range or
spur, the highest peak of which is Mount Conness, on the north; the noble
Mounts Dana, Gibbs, Mammoth, Lyell, McClure and others on the axis of the
range on the east; a heaving, billowy crowd of glacier- polished rocks and
Mount Hoffman on the west. Down through the open sunny meadow- levels of the
Valley flows the Tuolumne River, fresh and cool from its many glacial
fountains, the highest of which are the glaciers that lie on the north sides
of Mount Lyell and Mount McClure.
Along the river a series of
beautiful glacier meadows extend with but little interruption, from the
lower end of the Valley to its head, a distance of about twelve miles,
forming charming sauntering-grounds from which the glorious mountains may be
enjoyed as they look down in divine serenity over the dark forests that
clothe their bases. Narrow strips of pine woods cross the meadow carpet from
side to side, and it is somewhat roughened here and there by moraine
boulders and dead trees brought down from the heights by snow avalanches;
but for miles and miles it is so smooth and level that a hundred horsemen
may ride abreast over it.
The main lower portion of the
meadows is about four miles long and from a quarter to half a mile wide; but
the width of the Valley is, on an average, about eight miles. Tracing the
river, we find that it forks a mile above the Soda Springs, the main fork
turning southward to Mount Lyell, the other eastward to Mount Dana and Mount
Gibbs. Along both forks strips of meadow extend almost to their heads. The
most beautiful portions of the meadows are spread over lake basins, which
have been filled up by deposits from the river. A few of these river-lakes
still exist, but they are now shallow and are rapidly approaching
extinction. The sod in most places is exceedingly fine and silky and free
from weeds and bushes; while charming flowers abound, especially gentians,
dwarf daisies, potentillas, and the pink bells of dwarf vaccinium. On the
banks of the river and its tributaries cassiope and bryanthus may be found,
where the sod curls over stream banks and around boulders. The principal
grass of these meadows is a delicate calamagrostis with very slender
fihiform leaves, and when it is in flower the ground seems to be covered
with a faint purple mist, the stems of the panicles being so fine that they
are almost invisible, and offer no appreciable resistance in walking through
them. Along the edges of the meadows beneath the pines and throughout the
greater part of the Valley tall ribbon-leaved grasses grow in abundance,
chiefly bromus, triticum and agrostis.
In October the nights are
frosty, and then the meadows at sunrise, when every leaf is laden with
crystals, are a fine sight. The days are still warm and calm, and bees and
butterflies continue to waver and hum about the late- blooming flowers until
the coming of the snow, usually in November. Storm then follows storm in
quick succession, burying the meadows to a depth of from ten to twenty feet,
while magnificent avalanches descend through the forests from the laden
heights, depositing huge piles of snow mixed with uprooted trees and
boulders. In the open sunshine the snow usually lasts until the end of June
but the new season's vegetation is not generally in bloom until late in
July. Perhaps the best all-round excursion-time after winters of average
snowfall is from the middle of July to the middle or end of August. The snow
is then melted from the woods and southern slopes of the mountains and the
meadows and gardens are in their glory, while the weather is mostly
all-reviving, exhilarating sunshine. The few clouds that rise now and then
and the showers they yield are only enough to keep everything fresh and
fragrant.
The groves about the Soda
Springs are favorite camping-grounds on account of the cold,
pleasant-tasting water charged with carbonic acid, and because of the views
of the mountains across the meadow - the Glacier Monument, Cathedral Peak,
Cathedral Spires, Unicorn Peak and a series of ornamental nameless
companions, rising in striking forms and nearness above a dense forest
growing on the left lateral moraine of the ancient Tuolumne Glacier, which,
broad, deep, and far-reaching, exerted vast influence on the scenery of this
portion of the Sierra. But there are fine camping grounds all along the
meadows, and one may move from grove to grove every day all summer, enjoying
new homes and new beauty to satisfy every roving desire for change.
There are five main capital
excursions to be made from here - to the summits of Mounts Dana, Lyell, and
Conness, and through the Bloody Caņon Pass to Mono Lake and the volcanoes,
and down the Tuolumne Caņon, at least as far as the foot of the wonderful
series of river cataracts. All of these excursions are sure to be made
memorable with joyful health- giving experiences; but perhaps none of them
will be remembered with keener delight than the days spent in sauntering on
the broad velvet lawns by the river, sharing the sky with the mountains and
trees, gaining something of their strength and peace.
The excursion to the top of
Mount Dana is a very easy one; for though the mountain is thirteen thousand
feet high, the ascent from the west side is so gentle and smooth that one
may ride a mule to the very summit. Across many a busy stream, from meadow
to meadow, lies your flowery way; mountains all about you, few of them
hidden by irregular foregrounds. Gradually ascending, other mountains come
in sight, peak rising above peak with their snow and ice in endless variety
of grouping and sculpture. Now your attention is turned to the moraines,
sweeping in beautiful curves from the hollows and canons, now to the granite
waves and pavements rising here and there above the heathy sod, polished a
thousand years ago and still shining. Toward the base of the mountain you
note the dwarfing of the trees, until at a height of about eleven thousand
feet you find patches of the tough, white-barked pine, pressed so flat by
the ten or twenty feet of snow piled upon them every winter for centuries
that you may walk over them as if walking on a shaggy rug. And, if curious
about such things, you may discover specimens of this hardy tree mountaineer
not more than four feet high and about as many inches in diameter at the
ground, that are from two hundred to four hundred years old, still holding
bravely to life, making the most of their slender summers, shaking their
tasseled needles in the breeze right cheerily, drinking the thin sunshine
and maturing their fine purple cones as if they meant to live forever. The
general view from the summit is one of the most extensive and sublime to be
found in all the range. To the eastward you gaze far out over the desert
plains and mountains of the "Great Basin," range beyond range extending with
soft outlines, blue and purple in the distance. More than six thousand feet
below you lies Lake Mono, ten miles in diameter from north to south, and
fourteen from west to east, lying bare in the treeless desert like a disk of
burnished metal, though at times it is swept by mountain storm-winds and
streaked with foam. To the southward there is a well-defined range of pale-gray
extinct volcanoes, and though the highest of them rises nearly two thousand
feet above the lake, ou can look down from here into their circular,
cup-like craters, from which a comparatively short time ago ashes and
cinders were showered over the surrounding sage plains and glacier-laden
mountains.
To the westward the landscape
is made up of exceedingly strong, gray, glaciated domes and ridge-waves,
most of them comparatively low, but the largest high enough to be called
mountains; separated by caflons and darkened with lines and fields of
forest, Cathedral Peak and Mount Hoffman in the distance; small lakes and
innumerable meadows in the foreground. Northward and southward the great
snowy mountains, marshaled along the axis of the range, are seen in all
their glory, crowded together in some places like trees in groves, making
landscapes of wild, extravagant, bewildering magnificence, yet calm and
silent as the sky.
Some eight glaciers are in
sight. One of these is the Dana Glacier on the north side of the mountain,
lying at the foot of a precipice about a thousand feet high, with a lovely
pale-green lake a little below it. This is one of the many, small, shrunken
remnants of the vast glacial system of the Sierra that once filled the
hollows and valleys of the mountains and covered all the lower ridges below
the immediate summit fountains, flowing to right and left away from the axis
of the range, lavishly fed by the snows of the glacial period.
In the excursion to Mount
Lyell the immediate base of the mountain is easily reached on meadow walks
along the river. Turning to the southward above the forks of the river, you
enter the narrow Lyell branch of the Valley, narrow enough and deep enough
to be called a caņon. It is about eight miles long and from two to three
thousand feet deep. The flat meadow bottom is from about three hundred to
two hundred yards wide, with gently curved margins about fifty yards wide
from which rise the simple massive walls of gray granite at an angle of
about thirty-three degrees, mostly timbered with a light growth of pine and
streaked in many places with avalanche channels. Toward the upper end of the
caņon the Sierra crown comes in sight, forming a finely balanced picture
framed by the massive caņon walls. In the foreground, when the grass is in
flower, you have the purple meadow willow thickets on the river-banks; in
the middle distance huge swelling bosses of granite that form the base of
the general mass of the mountain, with fringing lines of dark woods marking
the lower curves, smoothly snow-clad except in the autumn.
If you wish to spend two days
on the Lyell trip you will find a good camp-ground on the east side of the
river, about a mile above a fine cascade that comes down over the caņon wall
in telling style and makes good camp music. From here to the top of the
mountains is usually an easy day's work. At one place near the summit
careful climbing is necessary, but it is not so dangerous or difficult as to
deter any one of ordinary skill, while the views are glorious. To the
northward are Mammoth Mountain, Mounts Gibbs, Dana, Warren, Conness and
others, unnumbered and unnamed; to the southeast the indescribably wild and
jagged range of Mount Ritter and the Minarets; southwestward stretches the
dividing ridge between the north fork of the San Joaquin and the Merced,
uniting with the Obelisk or Merced group of peaks that form the main
fountains of the Illilouette branch of the Merced; and to the northwestward
extends the Cathedral spur. These spurs like distinct ranges meet at your
feet; therefore you look them mostly in the direction of their extension,
and their peaks seem to be massed and crowded against one another, while
immense amphitheaters, canons and subordinate ridges with their wealth of
lakes, glaciers, and snow-fields, maze and cluster between them. In making
the ascent in June or October the glacier is easily crossed, for then its
snow mantle is smooth or mostly melted off. But in-midsummer the climbing is
exceedingly tedious because the snow is then weathered into curious and
beautiful blades, sharp and slender, and set on edge in a leaning position.
They lean toward the head of the glacier and extend across from side to side
in regular order in a direction at right angles to the direction of greatest
declivity, the distance between the crests being about two or three feet,
and the depth of the troughs between them about three feet. A more
interesting problem than a walk over a glacier thus sculptured and adorned
is seldom presented to the mountaineer.
The Lyell Glacier is about a
mile wide and less than a mile long, but presents, nevertheless, all the
essential characters of large, river- like glaciers - moraines, earth-bands,
blue veins, crevasses, etc., while the streams that issue from it are, of
course, turbid with rock mud, showing its grinding action on its bed. And it
is all the more interesting since it is the highest and most enduring
remnant of the great Tuolumne Glacier, whose traces are still distinct fifty
miles away, and whose influence on the landscape was so profound. The
McClure Glacier, once a tributary of the Lyell, is smaller. Thirty-eight
years ago I set a series of stakes in it to determine its rate of motion.
Towards the end of summer in the middle of the glacier it was only a little
over an inch in twenty-four hours.
The trip to Mono from the
Soda Springs can be made in a day, but many days may profitably be spent
near the shores of the lake, out on its islands and about the volcanoes.
In making the trip down the
Big Tuolumne Caņon, animals may be led as far as a small, grassy, forested
lake basin that lies below the crossing of the Virginia Creek Trail. And
from this point any one accustomed to walking on earthquake boulders,
carpeted with caņon chaparral, can easily go down as far as the big cascades
and return to camp in one day. Many, however, are not able to do this, and
it is better to go leisurely, prepared to camp anywhere, and enjoy the
marvelous grandeur of the place.
The canon begins near the
lower end of the meadows and extends to the Hetch Hetchy Valley, a distance
of about eighteen miles, though it will seem much longer to any one who
scrambles through it. It is from twelve hundred to about five thousand feet
deep, and is comparatively narrow, but there are several roomy, park-like
openings in it, and throughout its whole extent Yosemite features are
displayed on a grand scale - domes, El Capitan rocks, gables, Sentinels,
Royal Arches, Glacier Points, Cathedral Spires, etc. There is even a Half
Dome among its wealth of rock forms, though far less sublime than the
Yosemite Half Dome. Its falls and cascades are innumerable. The sheer falls,
except when the snow is melting in early spring, are quite small in volume
as compared with those of Yosemite and Hetch Hetchy; though in any other
country many of them would be regarded as wonders. But it is the cascades or
sloping falls on the main river that are the crowning glory of the caņon,
and these in volume, extent and variety surpass those of any other caņon in
the Sierra. The most showy and interesting of them are mostly in the upper
part of the caņon, above the point of entrance of Cathedral Creek and
Hoffman Creek. For miles the river is one wild, exulting, on-rushing mass of
snowy purple bloom, spreading over glacial waves of granite without any
definite channel, gliding in magnificent silver plumes, dashing and foaming
through huge boulder-dams, leaping high into the air in wheel-like whirls,
displaying glorious enthusiasm, tossing from side to side, doubling,
glinting, singing in exuberance of mountain energy.
Every one who is anything of
a mountaineer should go on through the entire length of the caņon, coming
out by Hetch Hetchy. There is not a dull step all the way. With wide
variations, it is a Yosemite Valley from end to end.
Besides these main,
far-reaching, much-seeing excursions from the main central camp, there are
numberless lovely little saunters and scrambles and a dozen or so not so
very little. Among the best of these are to Lambert and Fair View Domes; to
the topmost spires of Cathedral Peak, and to those of the North Church,
around the base of which you pass on your way to Mount Conness; to one of
the very loveliest of the glacier meadows embedded in the pine woods about
three miles north of the Soda Springs, where forty-two years ago I spent six
weeks. It trends east and west, and you can find it easily by going past the
base of Lambert's Dome to Dog Lake and thence up northward through the woods
about a mile or so; to the shining rock-waves full of ice-burnished,
feldspar crystals at the foot of the meadows; to Lake Tenaya; and, last but
not least, a rather long and very hearty scramble down by the end of the
meadow along the Tioga road toward Lake Tenaya to the crossing of Cathedral
Creek, where you turn off and trace the creek down to its confluence with
the Tuolumne. This is a genuine scramble much of the way but one of the most
wonderfully telling in its glacial rock forms and inscriptions.
If you stop and fish at every
tempting lake and stream you come to, a whole month, or even two months,
will not be too long for this grand High Sierra excursion. My own Sierra
trip was ten years long.
OTHER TRIPS FROM THE VALLEY
Short carriage trips are
usually made in the early morning to Mirror Lake to see its wonderful
reflections of the Half Dome and Mount Watkins; and in the afternoon many
ride down the Valley to see the Bridal Veil rainbows or up the river caņon
to see those of the Vernal Fall; where, standing in the spray, not minding
getting drenched, you may see what are called round rainbows, when the two
ends of the ordinary bow are lengthened and meet at your feet, forming a
complete circle which is broken and united again and again as determined by
the varying wafts of spray. A few ambitious scramblers climb to the top of
the Sentinel Rock, others walk or ride down the Valley and up to the
once-famous Inspiration Point for a last grand view; while a good many
appreciative tourists, who have only a day or two, do no climbing or riding
but spend their time sauntering on the meadows by the river, watching the
falls, and the play of light and shade among the rocks from morning to
night, perhaps gaining more than those who make haste up the trails in large
noisy parties. Those who have unlimited time find something worth while all
the year round on every accessible part of the vast, deeply sculptured
walls. At least so I have found it after making the Valley my home for
years.
Here are a few specimens
selected from my own short trips which walkers may find useful.
One, up the river caņon,
across the bridge between the Vernal and Nevada Falls, through chaparral
beds and boulders to the shoulder of Half Dome, along the top of the
shoulder to the dome itself, down by a crumbling slot gully and close along
the base of the tremendous split front (the most awfully impressive, sheer,
precipice view I ever found in all my caņon wanderings), thence up the east
shoulder and along the ridge to Clouds' Rest - a glorious sunset - then a
grand starry run back home to my cabin; down through the junipers, down
through the firs, now in black shadows, now in white light, past roaring
Nevada and Vernal, glowering ghost-like beneath their huge frowning cliffs;
down the dark, gloomy caņon, through the pines of the Valley, dreamily
murmuring in their calm, breezy sleep - a fine wild little excursion for
good legs and good eyes - so much sun-, moon- and star-shine in it, and
sublime, up-and-down rhythmical, glacial topography.
Another, to the head of
Yosemite Fall by Indian Caņon; thence up the Yosemite Creek, tracing it all
the way to its highest sources back of Mount Hoffman, then a wide sweep
around the head of its dome-paved basin, passing its many little lakes and
bogs, gardens and groves, trilling, warbling rills, and back by the Fall
Caņon. This was one of my Sabbath walk, run-and-slide excursions long ago
before any trail had been made on the north side of the Valley.
Another fine trip was up,
bright and early, by Avalanche Caņon to Glacier Point, along the rugged
south wall, tracing all its far outs and ins to the head of the Bridal Veil
Fall, thence back home, bright and late, by a brushy, bouldery slope between
Cathedral rocks and Cathedral spires and along the level Valley floor. This
was one of my long, bright-day and bright- night walks thirty or forty years
ago when, like river and ocean currents, time flowed undivided, uncounted -
a fine free, sauntery, scrambly, botanical, beauty-filled ramble. The walk
up the Valley was made glorious by the marvelous brightness of the morning
star. So great was her light, she made every tree cast a well-defined shadow
on the smooth sandy ground.
Everybody who visits Yosemite
wants to see the famous Big Trees. Before the railroad was constructed, all
three of the stage-roads that entered the Valley passed through a grove of
these trees by the way; namely, the Tuolumne, Merced, and Mariposa Groves.
The Tuolumne Grove was passed on the Big Oak Flat road, the Merced Grove by
the Coulterville road, and the Mariposa Grove by the Raymond and Wawona
road. Now, to see any one of these groves, a special trip has to be made.
Most visitors go to the Mariposa Grove, the largest of the three. On this
sequoia trip you see, not only the giant Big Trees, but magnificent forests
of silver fir, sugar pine, yellow pine, libocedrus, and Douglas spruce. The
trip need not require more than two days, spending a night in a good hotel
at Wawona, a beautiful place on the south fork of the Merced River, and
returning to the Valley or to El Portal, the terminus of the railroad. This
extra trip by stage costs fifteen dollars. All the High Sierra excursions
that I have sketched cost from a dollar a week to anything you like. None of
mine when I was exploring the Sierra cost over a dollar a week, most of them
less.
EARLY HISTORY OF THE VALLEY
In the wild gold years of
1849 and '50, the Indian tribes along the western Sierra foothills became
alarmed at the sudden invasion of their acorn orchard and game fields by
miners, and soon began to make war upon them, in their usual murdering,
plundering style. This continued until the United States Indian
Commissioners succeeded in gathering them into reservations, some
peacefully, others by burning their villages and stores of food. The
Yosemite or Grizzly Bear tribe, fancying themselves secure in their deep
mountain stronghold, were the most troublesome and defiant of all, and it
was while the Mariposa battalion, under command of Major Savage, was trying
to capture this warlike tribe and conduct them to the Fresno reservation,
that their deep mountain home, the Yosemite Valley, was discovered. From a
camp on the south fork of the Merced, Major Savage sent Indian runners to
the bands who were supposed to be hiding in the mountains, instructing them
to tell the Indians that if they would come in and make treaty with the
Commissioners they would be furnished with food and clothing and be
protected, but if they did not come in he would make war upon them and kill
them all. None of the Yosemite Indians responded to this general message,
but when a special messenger was sent to the chief, he appeared the next
day. He came entirely alone and stood in dignified silence before one of the
guards until invited to enter the camp. He was recognized by one of the
friendly Indians as Tenaya, the old chief of the Grizzlies, and, after he
had been supplied with food, Major Savage, with the aid of Indian
interpreters, informed him of the wishes of the Commissioners. But the old
chief was very suspicious of Savage and feared that he was taking this
method of getting the tribe into his power for the purpose of revenging his
personal wrong. Savage told him, if he would go to the Commissioners and
make peace with them as the other tribes had done, there would be no more
war. Tenaya inquired what was the object of taking all the Indians to the
San Joaquin plain. "My people," said he, "do not want anything from the
Great Father you tell me about. The Great Spirit is our father and he has
always supplied us with all we need. We do not want anything from white men.
Our women are able to do our work. Go, then. Let us remain in the mountains
where we were born, where the ashes of our fathers have been given to the
wind. I have said enough."
To this the Major answered
abruptly in Indian style: "If you and your people have all you desire, why
do you steal our horses and mules? Why do you robe the miners' camps? Why do
you murder the white men and plunder and burn their houses?"
Tenaya was silent for some
time. He evidently understood what the Major had said, for he replied, "My
young men have sometimes taken horses and mules from the whites. This was
wrong. It is not wrong to take the property of enemies who have wronged my
people. My young men believed that the gold-diggers were our enemies. We now
know they are not and we shall be glad to live in peace with them. We will
stay here and be friends. My people do not want to go to the plains. Some of
the tribes who have gone there are very bad. We cannot live with them. Here
we can defend ourselves."
To this Major Savage firmly
said, "Your people must go to the Commissioners. If they do not your young
men will again steal horses and kill and plunder the whites. It was your
people who robbed my stores, burned my houses and murdered my men. If they
do not make a treaty, your whole tribe will be destroyed. Not one of them
will be left alive."
To this the old chief
replied, "It is useless to talk to you about who destroyed your property and
killed your people. I am old and you can kill me if you will, but it is
useless to lie to you who know more than all the Indians. Therefore I will
not lie to you, but if you will let me return to my people I will bring them
in." He was allowed to go. The next day he came back and said his people
were on the way to our camp to go with the men sent by the Great Father, who
was so good and rich.
Another day passed, but no
Indians from the deep Valley appeared. The old chief said that the snow was
so deep and his village was so far down that it took a long time to climb
out of it. After waiting still another day, the expedition started for the
Valley. When Tenaya was questioned as to the route and distance, he said
that the snow was so deep that the horses could not go through it. Old
Tenaya was taken along as guide. When the party had gone about halfway to
the Valley, they met the Yosemites on their way to the camp on the south
fork. There were only seventy-two of them, and when the old chief was asked
what had become of the rest of his band, he replied, "This is all of my
people that are willing to go with me to the plains. All the rest have gone
with their wives and children over the mountains to the Mono and Tuolumne
tribes." Savage told Tenaya that he was not telling the truth, for Indians
could not cross the mountains in the deep snow, and that he knew they must
still be at his village or hiding somewhere near it. The tribe had been
estimated to number over two hundred. Major Savage then said to him, "You
may return to camp with your people and I will take one of your young men
with me to your village to see your people who will not come. They will come
if I find them." "You will not find any of my people there," said Tenaya; "I
do not know where they are. My tribe is small. Many of the people of my
tribe have come from other tribes and if they go to the plains and are seen
they will be killed by the friends of those with whom they have quarreled. I
was told that I was growing old and it was well that I should go, but that
young and strong men can find plenty in the mountains: therefore, why should
they go to the hot plains to be penned up like horses and cattle? My heart
has been sore since that talk, but I am now willing to go, for it is best
for my people."
Pushing ahead, taking turns
in breaking a way through the snow, they arrived in sight of the great
Valley early in the afternoon and, guided by one of Tenaya's Indians,
descended by the same route as that followed by the Mariposa Trail, and the
weary party went into camp on the river-bank opposite El Capitan. After
supper, seated around a big fire, the wonderful Valley became the topic of
conversation and Dr. Bunell suggested giving it a name. Many were proposed,
but after a vote had been taken the name Yosemite, proposed by Dr. Bunell,
was adopted almost unanimously to perpetuate the name of the tribe who so
long had made their home there. The Indian name of the Valley, however, is
Ahwahnee. The Indians had names for all the different rocks and streams of
the Valley, but very few of them are now in use by the whites, Pohono, the
Bridal Veil, being the principal one. The expedition remained only one day
and two nights in the Valley, hurrying out on the approach of a storm and
reached the south-fork headquarters on the evening of the third day after
starting out. Thus, in three days the round trip had been made to the
Valley, most of it had been explored in a general way, and some of its
principal features had been named. But the Indians had fled up the Tenaya
Caņon Trail and none of them were seen, except an old woman unable to follow
the fugitives.
A second expedition was made
in the same year under command of Major Boling. When the Valley was entered,
no Indians were seen, but the many wigwams with smouldering fires showed
that they had been hurriedly abandoned that very day. Later, five young
Indians who had been left to watch the movements of the expedition were
captured at the foot of the Three Brothers after a lively chase. Three of
the five were sons of the old chief and the rock was named for them. All of
these captives made good their escape within a few days, except the youngest
son of Tenaya, who was shot by his guard while trying to escape. That same
day the old chief was captured on the cliff on the east side of Indian Caņon
by some of Boling's scouts. As Tenaya walked toward the camp his eye fell
upon the dead body of his favorite son. Captain Boling, through an
interpreter, expressed his regret at the occurrence, but not a word did
Tenaya utter in reply. Later, he made an attempt to escape, but was caught
as he was about to swim across the river. Tenaya expected to be shot for
this attempt, and when brought irto the presence of Captain Boling he said
in great emotion, "Kill me, Sir Captain, yes, kill me as you killed my son,
as you would kill my people if they were to come to you. You would kill all
my tribe if you had the power. Yes, Sir America, you can now tell your
warriors to kill the old chief. You have made my life dark with sorrow. You
killed the child of my heart. Why not kill the father? But wait a little and
when I am dead I will call my people to come and they shall hear me in their
sleep and come to avenge the death of their chief and his son. Yes, Sir
America, my spirit will make trouble for you and your people, as you have
made trouble to me and my people. With the wizards I will follow the white
people and make them fear me. You may kill me, Sir Captain, but you shall
not live in peace. I will follow in your footsteps. I will not leave my
home, but be with the spirits among the rocks, the waterfalls, in the rivers
and in the winds; wherever you go I will be with you. You will not see me
but you will fear the spirit of the old chief and grow cold. The Great
Spirit has spoken. I am done."
This expedition finally
captured the remnants of the tribes at the head of Lake Tenaya and took them
to the Fresno reservation, together with their chief, Tenaya. But after a
short stay they were allowed to return to the Valley under restrictions.
Tenaya promised faithfully to conform to everything required, joyfully left
the hot and dry reservation, and with his family returned to his Yosemite
home.
The following year a party of
miners was attacked by the Indians in the Valley and two of them were
killed. This led to another Yosemite expedition. A detachment of regular
soldiers from Fort Miller, under Lieutenant Moore, was at once dispatched to
capture or punish the murderers. Lieutenant Moore entered the Valley in the
night and surprised and captured a party of five Indians, but an alarm was
given and Tenaya and his people fled from their huts and escaped to the
Monos on the east side of the range. On examination of the five prisoners in
the morning it was discovered that each of them had some article of clothing
that belonged to the murdered men. The bodies of the two miners were found
and buried on the edge of the Bridal Veil meadow. When the captives were
accused of the murder of the two white men, they admitted that they had
killed them to prevent white men from coming to their Valley, declaring that
it was their home and that white men had no right to come there without
their consent. Lieutenant Moore told them through his interpreter that they
had sold their lands to the Government, that it belonged to the white men
now, and that they had agreed to live on the reservation provided for them.
To this they replied that Tenaya had never consented to the sale of their
Valley and had never received pay for it. The other chief, they said, had no
right to sell their territory. The lieutenant, being fully satisfied that he
had captured the real murderers, promptly pronounced judgment and had them
placed in line and shot. Lieutenant Moore pursued the fugitives to Mono, but
was not successful in finding any of them. After being hospitably
entertained and protected by the Mono and Paiute tribes, they stole a number
of stolen horses from their entertainers and made their way by a long,
obscure route by the head of the north fork of the San Joaquin, reached
their Yosemite home once more, but early one morning, after a feast of
horse-flesh, a band of Monos surprised them in their huts, killing Tenaya
and nearly all his tribe. Only a small remnant escaped down the river caņon.
The Tenaya Caņon and Lake were named for the famous old chief.
Very few visits were made to
the Valley before the summer of 1855, when Mr. J. M. Hutchings, having heard
of its wonderful scenery, collected a party and made the first regular
tourist's visit to the Yosemite and in his California magazine described it
in articles illustrated by a good artist, who was taken into the Valley by
him for that purpose. This first party was followed by another from Mariposa
the same year, consisting of sixteen or eighteen persons. The next year the
regular pleasure travel began and a trail on the Mariposa side of the Valley
was opened by Mann Brothers. This trail was afterwards purchased by the
citizens of the county and made free to the public. The first house built in
the Yosemite Valley was erected in the autumn of 1856 and was kept as a
hotel the next year by G. A. Hite and later by J. H. Neal and S. Al.
Cunningham. It was situated directly opposite the Yosemite Fall. A little
over half a mile farther up the Valley a canvas house was put up in 1858 by
G. A. Hite. Next year a frame house was built and kept as a hotel by Mr.
Peck, afterward by Mr. Longhurst and since 1864 by Mr. Hutchings. All these
hotels have vanished except the frame house built in 1859, which has been
changed beyond recognition. A large hotel built on the brink of the river in
front of the old one is now the only hotel in the Valley. A large hotel
built by the State, and located farther up the Valley, was burned. To
provide for the overflow of visitors there are three camps with board
floors, wood frame, and covered with canvas, well furnished, some of them
with electric light. A large first-class hotel is very much needed.
Travel of late years has been
rapidly increasing, especially after the establishment, by Act of Congress
in 1890, of the Yosemite National Park and the recession in 1905 of the
original reservation to the Federal Government by the State. The greatest
increase, of course, was caused by the construction of the Yosemite Valley
Railroad from Merced to the border of the Park, eight miles below the
Valley.
It is eighty miles long, and
the entire distance, except the first twenty-four miles from the town of
Merced, is built through the precipitous Merced River Caņon. The roadbed was
virtually blasted out of the solid rock for the entire distance in the caņon.
Work was begun in September, 1905, and the first train entered El Portal,
the terminus, April 15, 1907. Many miles of the road cost as much as one
hundred thousand dollars per mile. Its business has increased from four
thousand tourists in the first year it was operated to fifteen thousand in
1910. |
