Twelve Hour Hike
All images Copyright © 1999 by Stephen Gunn and Bich-Thuy Le. All rights reserved.
We started at 9am in Yosemite Valley climbing up the 'Four Mile Trail' to
Glacier Point. A 3000 foot elevation change.
After we reached Glacier Point, we rested briefly and then tried to
find the Panorama Trail. The area had burned a few years ago and
it was difficult to discern the trail. There seemed to be many trails
all heading in more or less the same direction, but after a couple
minutes you'd realize they were not the trail and have to
backtrack a bit to try to find the real trail. We did this for about
20 minutes, and then we happened on a Park Ranger leading a group of
people. We were going to ask him where the trail was, but before we
could he asked us where we were going, and when we told him we were
looking for the Panorama Trail, he told us that he was leading a group
to Illilouette Fall along the Panorama Trail, and that we were welcome
to join them. Although hiking alone is nice, we both were happy to
join a small group (and happy to finally have found the trail!)
Along the way someone spotted black bear cub tearing apart rotting
tree stumps with his claws to get at the grubs. Since our telephoto
is a heavy lens, we had opted not to bring it on this long hike,
so this blurry blown up picture of the cub is all we have.
Illilouette Fall
Everybody else with us had had Illilouette Fall as their final
destination: but not us, we were continuing on the Panorama
Trail to Nevada Fall and Vernal Fall along the Mist Trail.
The Ranger asked us how much water we had left (a little more
than a liter each) and said that we should be able to make our
intended hike by the end of the day, and that we probably had
just enough water.
There's a section of trail that's made of cut giant steps, maybe
2 1/2 feet tall. It took us about 40 minutes to get down it, and
it was pure agony for me by that point because I had many months
earlier had an inflamed lateral ligament in my knee, and by this
point in the hike, it was hurting again.
We made it down to the valley about 1/2 hour before sunset: just
in time. By the time we made it back to the car at the base of
Glacier Point, it was dark.
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