Based on this years trips so far, I feel like I had supposed to start climbing at least one year ago. Having visited Yosemite and Joshua tree in one year makes me think how would have this trips been only if I knew how to climb before. How would this have affected the planning of the trip?
Neverless… WOW! Yosemite and Joshua tree are just places that make you feel you are not on planet earth.
This time, Jess and I planned a quick 3 day trip to Yosemite plus a two day trip to Vegas. We landed in San Francisco and sprinted right away to the nearest In and Out burger place before the three hour road trip. It was already midnight when we started driving, so there was nothing pretty about this road trip.
We stayed at Yosemite Autocamp, and let me tell you that I truly doubt there’s a better way to do Yosemite. I am a big camping enthusiast, but this glamping thing in Airstreams is just like a dream. Not to mention the clubhouse. The only thing truly missing would be a full service cafe, but other than that I have NO complaints at all…. (Amazing beer seleciton as well!). Also eventually you have to do the camping thing in Yosemite for sure, but for a first time, with jessi that as you know by now, she is not the biggest camping fan there is, Autocamp Yosemite is the best way to do Yosemeti for sure!
Food wasn’t that good around Yosemite, I don’t know if it was because we did not do a good research before the trip, but we did not have any luck with food during our stay. Autocamp even recommended “the best couple places” in the nearest town and it was a complete fail. So plan ahead where will you be planning to eat while at Yosemite and do more research than we did please.
DAY 1: Our first stop in the park was to stop at the “Mariposa Grove” where you can see the giant sequoias. (You have to enter through the south entrance – Wanona Entrance. Not a lot of people think of giant Sequoias whenever talking about Yosemite, but we thought it was a good idea since we had never seen Giant Sequioas, so we decided to check them out first to get them out of the way and then just focus in the real Yosemite attractions. Also it is a great place for trail running… I wanted to do a long loop, but wasnt felling so good and called it a run after a 3 mile short run. Keep in mind that the bootom of the park is usually super packed, but the furthest we walked in the park, the lonelier it got. People just want to see the giant famous trees, but once you pass “The Grizzly Giant” you will rarely see another soul.
After visitiong Mariposa Groove we then had lunch at the Wanona Golf Course convenience shop. Its just perfect for your short lunch break to get a Hot Dog or a slice of Pizza. There’s also a very old, but well maintain hotel by the golf course… Looked pretty nice… they also had lunch hours but we didnt make it on time for lunch, so plan ahead if you want a more serious meal.
I wanted to see sunset from a magical place in Yosemite. From doing some research I came to the conclussion that the best spot to watch the sunset from would be Tatch Point, so we wanted to get there before it got to crowded and before sunset time.
NOTE: If you are planning to get a hike pass for the Half Dome be sure to read through the rules… It has to be two days in advance between certain hours.. I missed it by like twenty minutes or so, so be sure to set up an alarm or something. Although by talking to a guy at my local climbing gym, he assures that if you risk it and take the hike all the way to the start of the sketchy hike of the half dome, where rangers actually request your permit you can meet people decending the dome and ask them for the permit.. – Just in case you forget to secure yours.
It took us around a 2-3 hours drive to get to Taft Point. It is actually a famous spot where newlyweds go to take the “trash the dress” photo session. We were “unlucky” enough to see like 4 couples doing it. It was kinda annoying and disctracting, since you are trying to take in the beautifull scenery and colors and sky, etc, etc while in the background you have all this production and photographers telling the couples how to pose and stuf.. the pictures where actually super cool though. So far I would say it has been my favorite place to watch a sunrise ever. It is just breathtaking and its only a short 2k hike.
One thing I would’ve done differently would be visiting Glacier Point and Taft point at the same time. I honestly didn’t know they were so close together until the next day when we had to make the long drive again, and realize it while passing by the Taft Point trail entrance that both points were actually less than 20 minutes away from each other but like a 3 hour drive from the hotel and almost a two hour drive from Yosemite Valley.
DAY 2: For our second day we wanted to soak in the Yosemeti Valley views and just relax. Let me tell you something, Yosemeti Valley is like going to Disneyland on peak season days… The first view you get to take in is the Arch Rock entrance and thats when you trully know you are already summerged in the Yosemite magic… But then you encounter traffic, cars and people and you kinda fell a little out of place because of that. But again, the place is so magicall that even though it was PACKED it still took you breath away. Theres a huge mini dowtown area in the center of Yosemite Valley with a huge convenience store, adventure booking booths and a couple different options for hotels as well. Keep in mind that it was also PACKED! From here you can rent bicycles and cycle around the Yosemite Valley in order to check some of the most popular points around the valley.
My favorite place was the beach where you can see El Cap from. I have this weird habit of getting in mountain rivers of lakes whenever traveling to this places… theres just something about how relaxing this places are, that no matter how cold the water is, the beauty of nature can make you forget how cold the water actuallly is.
We also walked to several spots to see waterfalls, but some of them were actually dry, so most of our attemps failed. After having lunch at the valley, we decided to drive up (again) to Glacier point and that when we realized that the day before we were just a couple minutes away from there. From Glacier you have majestic views of half dome. You can actually run from the valley (four mile trail) to glacier point, it takes around 10 miles, and it will be so worth it. Be sure to take water with you, since there are no water points along the route. The best way, in my opinion, is that if not all members in your party are willing to do the kinda intese hike, have them meet you in the top of glacier point of taft point, so that way you wont have to go back.
DAY 3: For our last day we just wanted to drive the part of the park we didnt know yet. Let me tell you that this part felt like the highest part and the most secluded part of the park, where you would also find less people. It amazed me how big and how much time would it take one to traverse this national park (we calculated that at least five hours from one park entrance to the furthest entrance – from the Wanona entrance to the Tioga entrance). The scenics highways are just out of this world honestly. From Yosemite Valley we just took Tioga Road all the way until the tioga exit, which would lead us to the highway to continue our trip to Vegas, where we manage to drive down death valley as well. It is a longer (2-3 hours more) drive, but definelty worth the views.
DRIVE TO TIOGA ENTRANCE VIEWS:
VALLEY AND EL CAP GALLERY:
TAFT POINY GALLERY:
VEGAS GALLERY:
Auto Camp : https://autocamp.com/guides/location/yosemite/
Everything you want to learn about Yosemite in this link: https://www.nps.gov/yose/index.htm
MiBiCi Adventures 