wow, that's big!

(yes, yes, jason and i were in yosemite in april ;)  hope you enjoy!)

yosemite:  the birthplace of modern climbing.

as you drive into "The Valley," the roads are lined with purple flowers and large trees comprising of even more purple petals!  ive never seen anything like it!  then you arrive in The Valley, and you see gorgeous water falls.  tall trees.  meadows.  and endless lines of cliffs - thousands of feet in the air.  el capitan.  half dome.  yosemite is just as breathe-taking as everyone says.

summary:
- we spent 5 days in The Valley.
- we lucked out and got a campsite in the famous Camp 4.
- on the rest days, we spent a lot of time hiking around.
- we completed two big climbs:  The Nutcracker 5.8+, and Snake Dike 5.7.
- we spent a few evenings in The Village across the street.  one of those evenings, we watched a movie showing in the plaza:  Vertical Frontier, narrated by Tom Brokaw.  what an eye-opening film that describes the beginnings and evolution of rock climbing in yosemite.  people did some crazy, crazy things.  i highly recommend watching the movie.

fun Yosemite facts:
- Yosemite is the first area to be recognized and protected as a national park.
- the rock is made of compressed, crystallized magma that was formed underground and then pushed to the surface.
- there is no other "half" of Half Dome.
- the Valley itself was carved out by a glacier.
- Camp4 is a nationally recognized historic site.
- there are 10-15 bears living in The Valley.

Half Dome is in the middle.  El Capitan is on the left.

El Cap

Yosemite Falls

it was super windy at the bottom of the waterfall

jason said this water was icy cold

Half Dome

Royal Arches

Astroman (classic route) is up there somewhere

i took this picture of us

jason took this one

Bridal Veil Falls

The Nose (classic climb) is on the right side somewhere

camping

our first evening, we arrived at Camp 4 around 630pm.  the sign on the ranger station at Camp 4 stated:  "all sites are assigned and shared, and the entire campground was full" (the ranger left at 5pm).  over the course of the next few hours, we essentially drove around all of yosemite trying to figure out what to do.  all the other campgrounds were also full.  finally, someone recommended the Backpacker Lot.  we ended up "rogue-ing" it for the night in that parking lot.  it was kind of nerve-wrecking.  its such a commercial park, we expected there to be rangers everywhere patroling the streets and the parking lots.  we were afraid of getting ticketed since we didnt have a permit or anything.  luckily, our first night was uneventful.  :)

we got up really early the next morning to get in line at Camp 4 to talk with a ranger about getting a spot.  turns out, everyone had the same idea.  by 615am (the ranger station opens at 8am), there were already 15 people in line!  jason and i agreed that we'd rather be climbing.  so we did just that ;)  after we finished our climb around 4pm, we headed back to the ranger station at Camp 4 to see what our options were - with the expectation that the campground would be full again.  we talked to the ranger and it seems that a party was "just leaving" (we're guessing they were kicked out since you can only stay for a certain amount of time) and there was an open site!  so, fortunately, for the rest of our stay, we managed to stay in Camp 4!  sooo lucky.

Camp 4 is about the size of a football field with a bathroom in the middle and the parking lot on one end.  you cannot sleep in your car or van.  you have to set up a tent in the campground.  most importantly, all your food has to be kept in a bear box.  you must be bear aware!  im guessing we made 7 trips back and forth bringing the necessities - tent, sleeping bag, sleeping pad, camp stove, pots, water jugs, etc.  and as you can imagine, since we live in Nessa, we have tons of food that had to be moved - not just one cooler.  goodness, i'm not used to this ;)

no-joke hiking

we chose to hike to the Upper Yosemite Falls - a hike that will take you to the top of one of the waterfalls.  its 1 mile to the Lower Falls.  its another 2.5 miles to the Upper Falls.  you can also choose to hike yet another mile to Yosemite Point, which is a viewpoint overlooking The Valley.  of course, we took it to the top!

cracking nuts on a pile of manure :)

the first climb we did is called The Nutcracker, 5.8+.  its located next to El Capitan on a much smaller cliffline called the Manure Pile.  ;)  come on.. that's funny!  it has an AWESOME short approach, like 10 minutes.  most times, long trad climbs have this crazy long approach that takes hours, uphill with sketchy scrambles over loose rock.  ;)  i was quite content with such a short hike to reach the base of the climb.  another bonus, we were the first ones there!  we started around 9am.  we were done climbing at 230p.  the hike down took about an hour.  not too shabby!

in the middle of the bottom, you'll see the Manure Pile, and the dotted line of the Nutcracker

Pitch 1:  huge underclinging flake with a decent belay on top.

jason is "crouched" (or underclinging) at the top of the bookcase-sized flake

Pitch 2:  easy gulley scramble to a huge ledge belay.

Pitch 3:  super cool flake crack system to a bad small ledge belay.

jason is at the top of the crack system

Pitch 4:  difficult (but fun!) moves to pull over an awkward bulge to yet another bad small ledge belay.

Pitch 5:  really cool (and exciting) mantle onto a ledge, where if you didnt make it, you could take a potentially very bad fall back onto slab.  Top out and finish the climb!

My feet were KILLING me by the end.  jason pointed out that i wasnt sitting on the anchor stations.  instead i was still on my feet.  ha!  i guess i wasnt trusting the anchors ;)  ok, so noted for next time - save my feet!