It's A Small World After All
20-March 2004: My work recently did away with the old Paid-Time-Off (PTO) System and instituted a Sick Leave System, which was a bummer since I had heaps of hours hoarded up for longer vacations I anticipated taking - and I didn't anticipate being unhealthy. Now with reduced maximum vacation hours in lieu of sick leave hours, I had to take a vacation or lose some of those hard-earned hours. That sucks! So, where should I go on a spontaneous trip? The first thing that came to mind was a return to Yosemite...
The impact of all of this was the loss of the Paid-Time-Off (PTO) system, where sick leave and vacation hours were all in one basket. Replacing that was the sick leave system, where you have fewer vacation hours. However, you do have a separate bin for sick leave - which you lose half of your unused balance every year. Personally, I thought this penalized people who were healthy because of the reduced vacation hours. I also thought it was some corporate scheme to squeeze additional hours out of employees' own personal time. Regardless of what I thought, the deal was done and there was nothing I could do about it. To make matter worse, I had hoarded my vacation hours in anticipation of longer trips in the future. Now with reduced maximum vacation hours in lieu of sick leave hours, I had to take a vacation or lose some of those hard-earned hours. That sucks! So, where should I go on a spontaneous trip? The first thing that came to mind was Yosemite. Since this year was a pretty dry year, I knew we'd get comfortable spring-like conditions this time of year (March). So, I went forward with some last-minute campground reservations in Upper Pines. Keep in mind that last-minute reservations in Yosemite are practically unheard of, but this year with its early-arriving spring and summer was unusual. I also thought it might be a good time to start toying around with some filters and a wide angle lens for this point-and-shoot camera with some manual capabilities that I was using. It was some 3 megapixel Sony Cybershot camera that was already old for its time, but still got the job done. Besides, I was still learning how to take decent photos before I invested in an expensive Digital SLR. Julie couldn't take Friday off, and I intended to head out to Yosemite before dawn on Friday morning. When mom heard I was about to go alone, she took Friday off to come with me. And so we were set up for the trip. [Back to top]
On this go-around however, Tueeulala Falls was struggling to flow and Wapama Falls didn't have nearly the volume it had two years ago. Apparently, the flooded conditions we saw before doesn't happen all the time.
Expecting a frigid night since it was early spring, the night was unexpectedly pleasant and cool. Neither of us had any trouble sleeping.
After a quick breakfast of instant noodles using the handy little MSR Pocket Rocket stove, we were ready to take on the day.
By 9:30am, we were ready to take on the Upper Yosemite Falls Trail. It was unusual not to see any snow in neither the Valley nor the High Country (at least from what I could tell) this time of year. Thus, we were able to hike the Yosemite Falls trail without these obstacles.
It was at that time that I thought I saw a face and voice I recognized as mom and I passed by a group of hikers also resting near Columbia Point. It kind of nagged at me, but at the same time I didn't want to make a fool of myself so we continued on the trail. The next section of trail was brutal. We had to go up more switchbacks, but it was sandy. With each step we took, our foot with slide a little bit. This made us have to work harder on each step to make the same progress we would've made had the surface been harder. When we finally got to the top of these tiring switchbacks, both mom and I took another water break. It was at that time that the hiking party that we passed earlier caught up to us. As they were passing, I had to get another look at that guy I could've sworn I know from somewhere. Finally, I just blurted out, "Aren't you Remy?" At first he was shocked, but then he started to notice my facial features beneath my funky hiking hat, and that familiar look of recognition started to take over. What a small world! Remy was a coworker who would often talk about travel and nature with me when we'd see each other at the office. As we exchanged pleasantries, I got to meet his wife Katrina and both of them got to meet my mom. It was one of those moments where work produced both a frustrating yet cool moment. Frustrating in the sense that out of what I perceived as corporate greed, I had to take a forced vacation - though Yosemite wasn't a bad place to be on a last minute trip. At the same time, I got to unexpectedly see a familiar face in a special place. Well mom and I weren't about to keep them from getting to Yosemite Point, which was a little further from the top of Yosemite Falls. Mom and I probably weren't as strong hikers as they were, and they had a couple of friends go with them so we certainly didn't want to foil their time together. And so they moved on while mom and I went about our leisurely pace.
By now, both of us were sweating from the exertion and the heat of the mid-March day. However, the light spray from the falls cooled us down when it blew our way. Mom and I continued a little further to a series of granite steps. By now, it was about 12pm and I had a change of plan. So after photographing the profile of Yosemite Falls, I told mom we should head back to Curry Village and see if we get a late lunch. Then, we should see how far we can go on the Vernal Fall and Nevada Fall complex. I figured that given the perfect weather, we might get good rainbows at the other waterfalls while we wouldn't get as much return out of our time and energy getting to the top of Yosemite Falls. It was a judgment call, but I made my decision, and mom went along with it.
I guess I was dehydrated again. But I was a bit concerned about how much blood has been lost in this episode. Well it finally stopped bleeding after some ten minutes of constantly swapping tissue paper soaked with blood with fresh new ones. It was getting late in the day and we had to proceed. When we got to the Mist Trail, the trail closure signs were still up. This was typical since there's usually ice and falling icicles on the trail throughout the winter and early spring. However, we saw heaps of people just jump the sign and kept going. Since we were short on time and there was clearly no ice, we took a chance and followed these people. Soon afterwards, we took some photos of Vernal Fall from the Lady Franklin Rock. My hunch about rainbows was spot on. Because as we looked up the Merced River, there was the glowing collection of colors floating before the base of the waterfall.
There was even one point when we saw a full rainbow before the waterfall, which was quite a treat. As we continued onwards to the end of the Mist Trail, the rainbow persisted, but it now started to shrink and move off to the side of the waterfall. Knowing that our rainbow experience was over for this waterfall, we quickened our pace. It wasn't long before we got to the top of Vernal Fall, and then continued towards Nevada Fall along the Mist Trail. The light of the day was continuing to get more orange while the shadows continued to get longer. I was in search of a view of Nevada Fall that I saw on one of my Ansel Adams portraits. It was basically in front of the waterfall with a rainbow at its base. I had missed this view on all my previous tries in this area so I was determined to be successful today. Minutes before the Mist Trail went from light forest to more granite steps, we followed the treeline to an informal spur that led to a rocky outcrop. Being careful not to get too close to the edge of this natural platform, we looked before us and saw an incredible sight of Nevada Fall with a long rainbow before it!
Mom delighted in the sight of yet another rainbow. After taking heaps of more photos, it was well past 4:30pm, and daylight was fading fast. So we headed back but decided to take the longer John Muir Trail instead of the Mist Trail. Not far from where we rejoined the John Muir Trail after a brief climb from the Silver Apron area, we saw a nice overlook that looked down upon the entirety of Vernal Fall. It was yet another viewpoint that I had missed in all my previous trips, and we finally got to see this very satisfying view.
Darkness had fallen upon us by the time the John Muir Trail rejoined the spur to the Mist Trail. I had a tiny CMG Reactor LED flashlight as well as a Princeton Vor-Tec headlamp in my back. Mom carried the flashlight, while I had the headlamp. We continued on in the darkness with the lights and with our eyes pretty well adjusted to the low lighting conditions. However, it wasn't long before the trail started to seem unfamiliar. By now, we had probably walked at least twenty minutes since the trail junction. I knew the Vernal Fall footbridge couldn't have been that far away so both of us stopped and turned around. After about ten minutes of anxious hiking, we finally saw the junction that we missed - which was very easy to do in the darkness. Technically, we could've kept going and followed the west banks of the Merced River, but we wanted to hike in more familiar grounds and that meant following the JMT along the east banks of the river. And so we found the Vernal Fall footbridge, kept going, and finally made it back to the Upper Pines Campground by 7pm. After returning to Curry Village to shower and have their delicious pizza, we returned to camp. Despite the little bit of drama at the end of the day, we were quite satisfied with the photos and the scenery we obtained. [Back to top] I thought we could use this opportunity to see Mirror Lake in the early morning light, and perhaps see Snow Creek Falls. The leisurely paved trail took us quickly to the famed Mirror Lake. After getting the usual reflection photos, we continued on the trail in search of Snow Creek Falls. Probably another twenty minutes or so later, we heard that familiar sound of tumbling water. Could this be the elusive Snow Creek Falls?
Convinced this was Snow Creek Falls, we took photos of it and then started to head back to the trailhead. Unfortunately, I found out this wasn't the desired waterfall after the fact. It was actually an ephemeral waterfall that tumbled beneath Basket Dome. I would eventually dub this unnamed ephemeral waterfall "Mirror Lake Falls," but I was a little disappointed it wasn't the other waterfall. Still, it was quite nice for an ephemeral waterfall.
Anyhow, it was a great way to cap off the photo run that mom and I had just experienced. And when this weekend was through, Yosemite managed to make me forget about my corporate frustrations (albeit temporarily) with the incredible photo opportunities, the picture perfect weather, and especially the rainbows. It's no wonder why Yosemite is a haven for photographers. Yet perhaps more importantly, the park was the scene for meeting up with a familiar face - from work of all places - in such a special place. And so while I got a glimpse of what a coworker's life was like outside of work. I also came to the realization that indeed we live in a small world after all. [Back to top]
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Since we had experienced an exhilarating yet scary 
So the rest of the day passed without incident. After getting some late afternoon shots of 
We used the soft light of the morning to get good photos of 
The hike relentlessly went up numerous switchbacks in the first mile. Ultimately, it led us to Columbia Point - where we could see Half Dome hovering over Yosemite Village.
It wasn't long after the pleasant exchange that we saw the Upper Yosemite Fall. It was quite a sight to see this 1425ft freefalling column of water against a backdrop of a cloudless blue sky.
When we continued on the Mist Trail, the rainbow became even larger. The mist wasn't so bad that we needed ponchos. As a matter of fact, we just kept hiking while enjoying the list mist and rainbows before the massive waterfall. 
Yes, this was what I was looking for!
It was too bad everything was in shadow at the time, but we did snap a few photographs before we had to get back to our Upper Pines Camp. There was still some sections of snow in the areas that seemed to be under shadow all day long at some of the switchbacks. This slowed us down a little, but we were still able to get by without a problem with our hiking sticks and decent hiking boots.
As the sound got louder, we looked up through the trees and saw what looked to be quite a tall 
As mom and I were on our way out, we managed to get one more wide-angle snap from the Valley View Lookout. It's pretty cool that we could get 