Tuolumne Meadows

[nolanr]

Spent about 3 1/2 days there last week, great conditions. Snow mostly melted out, patches here and there on trails, more snow higher up but I was able to scramble up Cathedral Peak from the upper Cathedral Lake skipping the snow entirely. A few sloppy, marshy sections of trails as well. Beautiful weather, awesome area. Never made it down into the Valley. After descending Cathedral crossed a plateau and ascended into the middle of the Echo Peaks (I think) and scrambled up 3 of those as well. Fun stuff. Also did a quick scramble up Lembert Dome a couple days earlier. Didn't have any rock gear, so scrambling was all I did. The Tuolumne River is at very high volume right now, the falls both above and below Glen Aulin are incredible. Waterwheel Falls was totally raging. A few hottie climbing babes were spotted in the Tuolumne area.

 

Before arriving at Yos. did a one night trip up to 1000 Island Lake via Silver Lake. Banner Peak is pretty sweet looking. Didn't climb it, no axe and I was pretty well worn out by the time I reached camp. The first day on trail was the worst, I felt much better after that. Funny the rangers at Mammoth Lake were about as up to date on conditions as they are up here: we were told Sunday afternoon that 1000 Is. Lake was still iced over, lots of snow up higher. On Monday afternoon we found the lake completely melted out w/ only patches of snow around it, and several other lakes we saw in the 9,000' range were also thawed out. One of the rangers acted like he didn't even believe us when we gave him updated conditions on Tues. afternoon (had to return a rented bear can). Oh well.

 

I love my Cascades, but the Sierras can spoil you w/ predictably good weather and melting out much earlier in the season. But the sometimes crappy weather, approaches, and rock we have up here are all character builders, right? Good to be back, I heard I missed the mini-heat wave up here.

[Terminal_Gravity]

Thanks for the TR. It brought back some great memories.

 

To bad you didn't have rock gear. TM rock is some of the fairest of all.

[gapertimmy]

Great area, great TR. I spent about a week up there around banner and ritter, and 1000 island lakes was one of my favs. That area is so amazing, I often catch myself day dreamin about banner/ritter/minarets... be sure to read Muir's story about his ascent of Ritter/Banner, its dope!