(Continued from Yosemite: Channeling Ansel Adams)
Featured Photo: “Arch Rock Entrance, El Portal Road” Yosemite National Park, California—2023 |
In my earlier post, Yosemite: Making Plans, I wrote about the four main roads that traverse the National Park, carrying tourists in automobiles to the broad range of sights found within Yosemite’s boundaries. If you’ve been reading along with me so far, you know my sister and I had already driven the roads leading from our hotel in El Portal, California to the Giant Sequoias in Mariposa Grove (red line) and to the many wonders of the Yosemite Valley (yellow line) on the first two days of our trip.
In the earlier post, I also shared some of the detailed itinerary I had prepared to ensure we made the most of our time while visiting there.
It was Sunday, October 15—our third day in Yosemite National Park. In my previous posts, I’ve detailed how we’d already taken in all the sights I had planned for both Saturday and Sunday, accomplishing this feat in just one day, during our busy and productive exploration of Yosemite Valley the day before. As we looked ahead at the four potential things to do on the itinerary for Monday—our “Free Day for Sight-Seeing”—each of the options to hike a trail would require that we head back into Yosemite Valley. Neither wishing to undertake another hike, nor to rejoin the tourist crowds in the valley, we decided against these possibilities (options 1 and 2 on the itinerary). Rather than another day in Yosemite Valley, we would spend our last two days setting out in our car to follow the green and blue lines on my edited map, toward Hetch Hetchy and Tuolumne Meadows (options 3 and 4). With apologies to Robert Frost, we would be taking the roads “less traveled by”.
How to better explain our interest in visiting these less-well-known locations? Back when I was finishing the itinerary for our trip, I was reading through the descriptions of Yosemite’s sights in my Fodor’s Travel Guide to the National Parks, and was particularly intrigued by this comment about Hetch Hetchy: “The most remote, least visited part of Yosemite accessible by automobile, this glacial valley is dominated by a reservoir and veined with wilderness trails.”
Leaving the beaten path behind to reach the most remote and least visited area of the park, where few tourists typically go, sounded very appealing at the time, and became even more alluring while on the trip, after having actually been surrounded by all the park’s visitors crammed into Yosemite Valley. Curious as to its appearance, I had come across a photo of a trail at Hetch Hetchy on the National Park Service Website, and felt eager to view for myself the beautiful scenery alongside these footbridges.
But a few other sights were also highly recommended in Fodor’s Travel Guide. Listed among the “Top Reasons to Go” to Yosemite was this suggestion: “Inhale the beauty. Pause to take in the light, pristine air as you travel about the High Sierra’s Tioga Pass and Tuolumne Meadows, where 10,000-foot granite peaks just might take your breath away.” And Tuolumne Meadows was awarded the “highlight of east-central Yosemite”, described as a “wildflower-strewn valley that’s laced with hiking trails and nestled among sharp, rocky peaks.”
When I was planning the trip, I very much wanted to see these much-admired Tuolumne Meadows in addition to the glacial Hetch Hetchy valley, but felt that if I must choose, I slightly preferred Hetch Hetchy. Later during the trip, on our first day into Yosemite, my sister picked up a park newsletter that also described the park’s many sights. Perusing the options, she also came down on the side of Hetch Hetchy, but by then, I had changed my mind; I was now leaning in the direction of seeing Tuolumne Meadows, and the other beautiful vistas situated in the high country along Tioga Road.
This reversal was guided by my conversation with one of the Park Rangers posted outside the Visitor Center in Yosemite Valley on Saturday. After I had picked up my map at the Rangers’ station for hiking around Cook’s Meadow, I had separately asked whether she would recommend Hetch Hetchy or Tuolumne Meadows for a one-day visit. She reiterated what I had already read about Hetch Hetchy: that it was remote and well worth seeing. But when she started talking about Tuolumne Meadows, she became positively radiant, describing her first visit to the meadows, including Tenaya Lake and especially Soda Springs, as “life changing”.
I was intrigued and later spoke with another Ranger to gather details about the route. She said that Tioga Road provided not only a fabulous drive through Yosemite, full of features not found in other areas of the park, but the beautiful scenery extended out beyond the eastern-most park entrance at Tioga Pass, providing stunning views all the way to the small town of Lee Vining near Mono Lake, an ancient saline lake that covers over 70 square miles. I wanted to make sure I had all the details, so I had her circle the places she had spoken about in pen on the park map, before I headed off on my hike that day in Cook’s Meadow.
It was these conversations with the Rangers that I shared with my sister during our steak dinner on Saturday night at the Mountain Room Restaurant in Yosemite Valley Lodge. Since we had visited all the sights we’d planned to see in Yosemite Valley, we decided to spend our remaining days driving in both directions: first to Tuolumne Meadows on Sunday and then to Hetch Hetchy on Monday.
Our Sunday morning began as had the previous two: we slept with the sliding glass door open to hear the soothing sound of the Merced River flowing just beyond our balcony. Fortunately, we were not awakened again by the ongoing road work, as we had been the night before, either being so tired from our long day of adventures on Saturday, or because the repair crew and their grating noises had moved farther down the road. It was probably both.
Still, we rose early, threw open the sliding screen door, and stepped out onto our balcony to take in the early morning view…
…then lingered over another breakfast of frozen sandwiches heated in the microwave, as we watched the sky grow lighter with the new day.
Heading out toward Tioga Road, we drove east from our hotel in El Portal and passed through the Arch Rock Entrance to Yosemite Park (today’s Featured Photo) for the third time—the image of the boulders and surroundings showing less contrast, with colors more washed-out by the overcast, hazy sky that early morning. Happily, the sun would burn through later to provide a bright blue, cloudless sky once we reached the high country, to accentuate once again the dramatic natural scenery in Yosemite.
A few miles later, rather than continuing on toward Yosemite Valley, we took a sharp left turn to head west-northwest onto Big Oak Flat Road, running nearly parallel to the nearby El Portal Road, essentially backtracking where we had just been. Then the two roads diverged, with Big Oak Flat Road taking us more northwesterly on a twisting, turning route, carrying us through several tunnels that had been cut through the granite walls…
…while climbing quickly more than 2,000 feet higher than the floor of Yosemite Valley. We experienced the effects of the increased elevation, feeling the temperature drop several degrees and witnessing the effect of so many previous winters’ snows on the cracked and pitted road. The rough road surface continued as we drove toward the intersection with Tioga Road, which would carry us north-eastward to the Tioga Pass Entrance of Yosemite.
In fact, had we scheduled our visit much later in the year, we would not have been able to make the journey to Tioga Pass at all. Tioga Road—the only route between Yosemite Valley and Tioga Pass—is closed due to impassable winter conditions…
…every year beginning sometime in November—occasionally as early as mid-October—not to reopen until the following year, in late May or early June. The same is true for Glacier Point Road, also in Yosemite’s high country, which we had driven just two days prior.
Fortunately for us, winter did not come early to Yosemite in 2023, the year of our visit. Both roads remained open until mid-November, a few weeks after we were there, and in their snow-covered state, they would rest untouched by tourist traffic throughout the nearly eight-month-long winter season, until mid-April, when the snowplows would begin the hard work of clearing the snow and ice from the roads.
(To be continued…)
I feel like I’m riding in the car again as we made this part of the trip! On we go!
Yes, several stops along Tioga Road to come as we journey out to Lee Vining for that cup of coffee!
It’s almost like being there!
Glad you feel that way…and happy to bring you along for the ride!
I am looking forward to y’all arriving there and seeing the beautiful meadows.
Thanks for the comment, but you’ll have to be patient for now. There are a couple of stops before we get to the meadows.
Finally in a car!! Now your getting more into my territory, or at least reference point. I enjoy reading about the history of the place (Yosemite) as well. Keep it up. I’m looking forward to more from the road saga!
Thanks for the comment, Mike. Glad you are along for the ride! It sounds like you may have driven on Tioga Road before. It was my first time, and it was truly spectacular. I’m happy you are also enjoying the history…I am having fun doing the research and weaving it into the narrative. Thanks again for reading!