Finally I headed off to Glacier Point, an incredible viewpoint looking down over almost the entire Yosemite Valley. From it you could see the falls to the north, Half Dome and all the other domes behind it, and people the size of ants way way down on the valley floor. (watch my video on facebook for a full tour of the sights from above... it was a second too long to put on youtube and embed here)
Then I headed back down to the valley floor. It was a gorgeous, sunny day, so I spent some time exploring the Merced River. I parked in a random spot on the side of the road to be alone in a spot on the river that no one else had discovered that day. I found a perfect little rock in the middle of the river for lunch with the sound of waterfalls around me and the big cliffs above me.
After lunch I wandered down below my rock to take a dip under the waterfalls--I know, no swimming after eating, right?
Next I headed north toward Tuolumne Meadow. This is a big trek from the valley floor, a few hour drive along winding park roads (and the park employees tell me the park police are real assholes about speeding). Most of the folks who visit this side of the park are either wilderness backpackers or rock climbers. It was a bit cloudier, so the pictures are less spectacular, but there is still a lot to see and do.
I made it up to the meadow as the clouds were rolling in and the light was fading toward evening. (hard to get a picture in these conditions to do justice to the beauty of the meadow, but take my word for it!)
Up at the Tuolomne visitor center, I found a local, Matteo, who gave me the lowdown on where to go from there. He sent me to the Yosemite Bug hostel just outside the park past El Portal and also told me about the restaurant/bar at Cedar Lodge, with beer on draft and a pool table--a place he called the closest the valley gets to having anything called a "nightlife."
So from there I headed south and west, following the Merced River out of the park on its steep descent (at least a mile elevation drop). I checked in to the hostel, showered (a serious necessity at this point!) and headed to Cedar Lodge for dinner (I had to see exactly what kind of "nightlife" there could be in El Portal on a Saturday night!!). As Matteo had warned me, a section of the road through the valley was closed a couple years ago by a massive rock slide, requiring bridges to be installed on either end of the rockslide to take vehicles over to the other side of the river to a one-laned road... the rock slide is also so large that there are stoplights on either side signalling when it is your turn to cross the bridge and use the one-laned road which say "Be prepared to wait 15 minutes"!!
I had my burger and some beers at the lodge, but found no nightlife whatsoever. As the bartender told me, the place is hit or miss, and I had missed the big fun the night before when a collection of Irish guys mixed with a crowd of locals to go through many rounds of flaming shots before retreating to the gazebos across the street when 2am came with several more 6-packs from the bar. Darn! Instead I chatted with the bartender and a couple other locals and park employees that came and went, finding out from them that they all consider Yosemite to be one of the poorest-run parks in the nation (partly because it is one of the most popular... so there's always lots of environmental groups suing to stop any work done in the park) and what a stupid idea it would be to drain Hetch-Hetchy because they would just have to drown another valley somewhere else to make up for the water storage lost.
So I went back to the hostel. There was a cafe with a few beers on tap there as well, so I went to get a beer and use their wireless internet for a while. I was soon distracted from that goal, however, when I found a mixed group of travellers chilling with some pitchers on the patio. I joined them with my Guinness and discovered some very interesting characters including a tree-climbing hippie (named Aaron from Jersey... huh?) and a guy playing a pvc-pipe didgeridoo.
Before we knew, it was 2am and the bar was closing. So we decided the best idea was to get a couple pitchers and continue to hang out on the porch! Then Aaron started having fun with my camera...
After a bit when the pitchers had been doled out and our beers were running low, someone had the great idea to take a field trip with the remainders to the ridge above the hostel. Aaron laid out a blanket for us and we enjoyed the stars. Then of course we didn't want to stop when our beers run out, so I found the wine I had in my car, some Jim Beam appeared from someone else's, and I don't even remember what else probably joined the pile on the blanket. At this point our collection included Aaron the hippie, Bert the dog, two Brits, two Aussies, Dom the gay bartender, and me. Before long the sun was about to come up, and I was somehow covered in dirt (and a bit tipsy judging by the look of that picture!!)
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