Yosemite: Mariposa Grove

(Continued from Yosemite: Tunnel View)

Featured Photo: “Giant Sequoias, Mariposa Grove” Yosemite National Park, California—2023

We drove from the parking lot at Tunnel View, leaving the Yosemite Valley panorama behind, and headed west through the Wawona Tunnel, which gives the scenic spot its name.

The tunnel is an engineering marvel completed in 1933, after two years of carving nearly a mile through the mountain of granite. Exiting the tunnel, the Wawona Road turned south, toward our next destination: the Giant Sequoias in Mariposa Grove. We stopped a few times along our route…

…to take in the vistas.

Particularly striking were the fields of bare trees that looked like tall standing toothpicks—or perhaps, more like burnt-up matchsticks—surrounded by a plush carpet of green, with the mountains rising beyond. When we first saw them, we both wondered whether the fires that blackened the trees had been natural, accidental, or intentional.

My sister waited in the car while I took pictures of the burnt trees, and when I returned, she asked about the beautiful, light-blue flowers in the field (visible near the lower left corner of the photo above). With my camera focused on the trees and mountains beyond, I had not even noticed the flowers. I saw there were more just across the road from where we were parked. I walked over to take a closer look and realized they were not flowers at all, but were instead bouquets of berries. (Later, using metadata from the photo below, I learned the plant we saw was, in fact, a blue elderberry shrub.)

We continued driving south until we reached the Welcome Plaza at Mariposa Grove…

…then walked to the left, toward the slice of Giant Sequoia on display.

It’s difficult to gauge the size of the tree trunk from this photo, but the white-colored “bar” above and behind the tree slice, beyond the protective, covered shed, was the rooftop of a full-sized bus, used to shuttle visitors from the Welcome Plaza to the entrance of Mariposa Grove. Next to the slice, there was an informative sign, which told the history of the centuries-old tree.

I spent a few minutes taking close-ups of the tree slice, including the “growth rings and scars”…

…which caused us to miss our ride to the grove; as we stood watching, the bus pulled away, loaded with eager tourists. We had to wait 15 minutes longer in the cold morning air for the next shuttle, and—despite her cold hands—my sister agreed to take my picture, providing perspective on the dimensions of the Giant Sequoia.

We boarded the next bus leaving the Welcome Plaza, and traveled about two miles uphill, on a narrow, twisting road. Along the way, our driver spoke with the driver of another bus, headed in the opposite direction, to see who would reach a particularly sharp curve first. When we got there, we saw why: the road would not have been wide enough for both buses to pass at the same time. Having successfully navigated the curve and the rest of our short trip, we got off the bus at the entrance to the grove, and my sister snapped this shot…

… before we started our walk through Mariposa Grove, Yosemite’s largest stand of Giant Sequoias, containing about 500 mature trees.

It’s hard to describe what it’s like to walk within a forest of ancient, massive Sequoia trees. I recall feeling small and humbled, yet thrilled for the chance to be in the midst of such natural beauty, and grateful the woods had been preserved as part of the National Parks.

It’s also difficult to capture in pictures how grand and noble are the trees. I took nearly 200 photos in Mariposa Grove, and none truly convey what we experienced. The greatest challenge to a photographer is trying to show the height and width of the trees. I felt this on my earlier trip to Yosemite 50 years prior…

…and I felt it again on the trip with my sister; there’s no easy reference for the scale of their size and grandeur.

At one point, I gave up and took a video starting at the base of one tree—at ground level—and slowly panned up to the canopy of green needles at the top; it took 13 seconds for me to film its full height! All through our walk, I tried to capture—in pictures—the size and setting of the trees (today’s Featured Photo is an example). As we continued along the trail, we saw some trees scarred by fire…

…and a few of the majestic trees were down; the boardwalk took us alongside the Fallen Monarch…

…to its enormous roots…

…and an informative placard.

While we were in the grove, the peacefulness of the glorious setting was constant, except for one inexplicable disruption, when the roar of scrambling jet fighters suddenly thundered overhead. We both looked to the sky but could not locate the source of the noise, and then, as abruptly as it started, it was gone, replaced again by tranquility.

We tried searching the internet for an explanation—a nearby airbase responding to some military emergency, perhaps—but to no avail. The event remained merely a fleeting disturbance, memorable only on account of the contrast of the man-made loudness of the planes, compared to the natural serenity amidst the giant trees.

We left the boardwalk path of the Big Trees Loop Trail, and ventured onto the dirt path that would take us to see even more of the Giant Sequoias—living trees that were significant enough to have been given their own names.

(To be continued…)