Yosemite National Park
May 23-25
Steps: 70,416 (3 days)
One of the best parts about Yosemite is the fact that it blows you away the second you enter the valley. The picture above is us at tunnel view. This is the first sight we got of the valley from the road and had to pull aside to get a picture.
Our first hike in Yosemite was to Mirror Lake. (Pictured above) Following the same theme as most of the park, the elevated water levels created an extra large lake that made it a little more difficult than what AllTrails told us. Below you will see us passing through freezing cold water to get to the other side of the lake's loop trail. This went up about half my shin, but was so cold that we had to coward away on rocks to warm up.
Above is a picture of Half Dome from the other side of Mirror Lake.
A pretty bluejay came to eat our neighbors pistachios. This camp site had a lot more people and the campsites were a lot closer to each other. Our neighbors were super nice and we were able to hang out with them for a little bit in between adventures and sleep.
Pictured above is a waterfall that seemed to glow in the sunset. We took this on our way up to a lookout to watch the rocks change colors with the sun dropping.
SHE SAID YES!! After hiking a mile away from the crowd at tunnel view to Inspiration Point, I popped the ultimate question. We ended up being the only ones at this location, and I got away with recording the proposal by propping my phone up on a tree and telling Kaylee it was for a time-lapse video. After I finished blacking out from the experience, we posed for some pictures. Unfortunately the ring did not fit, so that is why it is on her pinky finger, but I ended up proposing with a family ring and we will build her permanent one soon! It was an opportunity and a location that I could not pass up! I also got lucky by being able to sneak away from the hotel room in Bakersfield long enough while Kaylee was still asleep to call her parents on the other side of the world to ask for their blessing.
Although the camp site was very similar in Yosemite as Sequoia, we had Curry Village nearby that we could shower and get food from if needed. We took advantage of that along with the cooler weather. The highs were in the low 70's, but the lows got down to the upper 30's! This surprisingly did not affect us and we survived with a comforter and top sheet in the tent.
Although I haven't been to Yosemite before, I am sure the rivers don't typically run this intense!
We took the Mist Trail up to the top of Vernal and Nevada Falls. The mist created rainbows and a beautiful scenery. It also created the coldest hiking experience I have ever had. It was all fun and games until we approached the base of Vernal falls and got drenched! The intensity of the waterfall blew snowmelt water all over and this caused the trail to have its own waterfall on it.
The river came up onto the path and I decided to still stand on the edge for some pictures because my feet were already soaked.
The hike to the top of Nevada falls was a lot more pleasing as there was not near as much freezing mist hitting us.
We ended up making it almost half way to Half Dome before turning around, but I will definitely have to come back to conquer this some day! We wanted to take the John Muir trail down, but this ended up being closed due to a rock slide risk.
Pictured above is one of the several times that we had to cross rivers/bodies of water on the trail.
The view from the top of Nevada falls was amazing!
We tried to avoid the mist from Vernal Falls on the way down by taking the long route. This was almost not worth it, but the view above was from this detour and made up for the switchbacks.
We ended up hiking around the base of upper and lower Yosemite Falls to end our second day!
Due to roads being closed through the mountains, we decided to take off early on our third day towards Death Valley. The sunrise in the morning was worth a photo opportunity before we fully left.
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