Trip report: boondocking and hiking near Tioga Pass

I agree with you about the entrance station. As to the E lake trailhead, there is a large parking lot for it. I was camping, but it looked like you could park there to dayhike. You would have to drive through the camp area to get to that.

I usually sleep at Lower Lee Vining USFS camp, then drive up the hill early for my day's activites. That one time I lucked into TM camp, it was fabulous. I got a level site near the river. This was several years ago, a few days before they closed for the season.

Thanks for the tip! Now, the only trick is scoring a scarce Tuolumne Meadows campsite. Actually, we have discovered that even when we are camping on the east side of the mountains near Lee Vining, the Tuolumne Meadows area is not a bad "commute" early on a weekday. Later in the day or on a weekend, the lineup at the Tioga entrance to Yosemite can eat up a half hour.

I have never understood why they don't add another lane to allow a "fast pass" for folks who have annual passes. The cash customers take forever, and the rangers stop to answer questions, holding up everyone else. (Grumble.) Mt. Rainier has multiple entrance lanes -- why can't we do that at Tioga? Think of the extra pollution and carbon caused by all of those idling cars! (Grumble grumble.)

Elizabeth Lake trailhead is in Tuolumne Meadows campground.

Tiger, Emma Lake is near Obsidian Campground, north of Bridgeport, and we have stayed at Obsidian (which is very nice -- essentially boondocking -- no water). Where is Elizabeth Lake?

And there is no such thing as a hike that is too easy -- we just combine it with other stuff so that we have an active day -- which makes it easier to sit around and relax in the evening!

Rethinking, I suppose that Elizabeth Lake and Emma Lake are outside of your area.

Twenty Lakes Basin has some easy X-C hiking, possibly too easy for you two, but I really enjoy it. You might want to visit Z Lake next time.

Tiger, great to hear from you -- very sorry that you are under the weather. The good news is that the weather is hot in the mountains, so this is a great time to be in coastal California! (We have been surfing every morning for the past few days -- we have had a very nice little Baja hurricane swell, giving us peaky waves at the beach breaks. Almost as much fun as camping!) Hang in there -- I have to believe that you will hit the trails again soon, just as you did after your knee surgery.

Speaking of trails, which ones did we miss?? I am always interested in high country stuff -- since we do not backpack, we really like those rare Sierra trailheads at or above 9,000 feet, which provide us with access to cool alpine terrain without too many miles of climbing. But there are not too many roads that reach that elevation.

One of the joys of that area is photos which are so gorgeous that no editing is needed. Even photos from my pocket-size Canon are almost as good as these.

I am at home for medical and other reasons this summer, so your TR has had to substitute for my annual trip to that area. I have hiked almost all of those trails. You missed a few that I have done and you included a couple for me to try next time. As always, your trip reports are an inspiration.

And Phil, the best part of photo tweaking is that it takes up a huge amount of time that would otherwise be wasted on work!

I should add that although I enjoy sharing our blog with all of our friends in this forum, the real purpose of the blog is to help us remember the things we have done. In the old days before computers (which I vividly remember), we had photo albums. The albums were never up to date. There was hardly any text -- just labels for the pix. There were many fewer pictures because film was so expensive. We never edited or enlarged the shots -- they were just 4x6 snapshots glued into the album.

As a result, our memories from the trips we took back in the old days (when the kids were small) are hazy and sparse. Now, with the easier-to-use (and free!) blogging software, we can keep a record of what we have done, and the pictures look a lot better than they did in the old days (because of digital cameras, and especially the digital SLR).

Yep ... thanks much Dan for all your hard work!

I know from experience how much work it can be to produce long photo essays with each photo being individually optimized on several parameters. I use Photoshop ... which is expensive, ultra-powerful, and takes a long time to master. Even though we use a pretty good digital camera to start with, I see very few photos from it that can't stand a tweak or two to bring out the best before "publishing". ;)

profdant139 wrote:
(I know that some folks have said that they prefer trip reports that are fully set out in this forum, without the need to click on a link, but this report is just too long to duplicate -- too many photos.)

As always, Dan, your adventures are something I look forward to reading. For forty years I backpacked all over the United States, 35 years of backpacking, including two 88 mile backpack trips, through Yellowstone, to the bottom of the Grand Canyon five times and weeks trekking on the Appalachian Trail and others. Thanks for reminding me of those wonderful times, through your photos and narration.

Yes, it is always nicer to have Trip Reports posted here, but if the alternative is not to have one noted/linked to us here, that would be sad. I certainly appreciate your efforts, as my Death Valley Trip Report had more than 150 photos and just as many links in it, as well as many of my other Trip Reports. They are definitely something one spends time to produce and then share. For this effort, thank you Dan. Your report/s are appreciated by all of us, in whatever means you chose to produce them.

b